Tag Archives: Austin

The second round of the 2017-18 SBMRL season took place at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.  The day was warm, but overcast, allowing for optimal racing conditions.  After being the only car not to finish at the season opener in Portland, Launch Bornado sat on pole.

P1 – Launch Bornado (Barb)
P2 – Stevie Wondertyres (Jason)
P3 – Captain Slow (Jason)
P4 – Whiplash (Frank)
P5 – The Stig (Jason)
P6 – Bubba McQueen (Barb)
P7 – Sheila Dinkum (Frank)
P8 – Jaap Snellrijder (Frank)

Segmentation in the first two corners

The drag race up the hill to Turn 1 saw the Launch and Stevie Wondertyres battle it out while Captain Slow stuck with them.  Sheila Dinkum and The Stig were the two to fall behind the middle pack, with Jaap making a strong push from last on the grid.

As the pack approached the back straight, Stevie had the inside line on Launch, with Captain Slow right on their tails.  However, it was Launch who was able to carry the necessary speed needed into Turn 6.  Behind the front runners, Whiplash was also on a charge, catching his teammate and Captain Slow down the stretch.

Out of the back straight

Captain Slow then suffered minor body damage as Bubba McQueen charged recklessly from behind.  Jaap and Sheila had also caught up to the group, leaving the Stig in a very lonely last place.

Launch coolly handled all that the 3rd sector had to throw at him, and after a clean lap, the race leader skipped the pits to seemingly cement the win with a whole lap to go.  The Sprite Racing duo pitted from 2nd and 3rd, but Sheila caught them up after following Launch’s tactic of not pitting.  Bubba, Jaap, and the Captain all pitted, with Captain Slow falling all the way to 7th in the exchange.

The first sector of the second lap saw Whiplash, Stevie, and Sheila push in an effort to catch up with Launch, but nothing they did could catch the Force Ravenswood driver in the absence of any mistakes.  The winding, slow nature of Turn 3 gave the illusion of closeness to the proceedings, but there really wasn’t anything the rest of the pack could do.

Launch leaves a bit of his car on the track…

Again down the back straight they charged, and again Launch found speed to burn.  With less than half a lap to go, Launch gave it everything, causing some engine damage in the process of slowing down for Turn 7.

Whiplash and Sheila got a leg up on Stevie at Turn 6.  The trailing pack, now comprised of Bubba, Captain Slow, and Jaap, all took the aggressive approach to the back straight.  Jaap carried too much speed through Turn 6, but it was Bubba who hit some debris on the track that was the first casualty of the race.  A short while later, Jaap’s tires gave out he joined Bubba as a spectator for the remainder of the the final lap.

… which teammate Bubba broke his suspension on

At the back of the field, the Stig was certainly enjoying the fate of his rivals.  Despite being far behind the rest of the field, the various shenanigans in the third sector meant that he would be able to move up a few spots simply by finishing.  When Stevie spun out in Turn 8, he even had a glimmer of hope to finish ahead of another finisher, but that hope was short lived.

Back at the front, Launch easily secured the victory in what was simply the cleanest race run.  Sheila and Whiplash battled it out for 2nd place, with Sheila able to carry extra speed around the final corner to get the edge in that pairing.  By the time the checkered flag waved, they were really the only two cars with any question left to be answered.  Captain Slow, who had the most up-and-down race of anyone, came in 4th.

Final Results

Launch becomes the 6th driver to win from pole, recording his 3rd victory in his last 4 races, dating back to last season.  Sheila has a second consecutive race of charging from 7th to 2nd, and is the only driver in SBMRL history to score a podium in all their races.  Granted, it’s just two races, but that now has her leading the driver standings.  Whiplash scores his first podium in his second race.

At the other end off the spectrum, Bubba’s DNF means that Force Ravenswood is 2 for 2 in terms of having a car crash out of a race.  They have 2 podiums and 2 DNF’s in 2 races.  Jaap’s DNF means that he now has 3 DNF’s in his last 4 races.  He and Launch are mirror images, either winning or crashing out in each of those contests.

At the team level, no team got much of a leg up on anyone in Austin, with all four teams finishing in the top 4 cars.  Force Ravenswood picked up a few more points than Regency Motors, but not enough to take over the team lead.  Sprite Racing has now eked out a narrow, 1 point lead over Scandinavian Blitz.

Race Gallery

(Note that Captain Slow and the Stig are swapped in the first 3 photos.  We fixed that as soon as we caught it!)

A beautiful day for racing brought us to Austin, TX to race Circuit of the Americas for round 2 of the 2016-17 SBMRL season.  With just one race in the books for the year, the starting grid was the reverse order of finish from Spa-Francorchamps.  The only notable change was that Cobalt unveiled their official livery for the new season after having raced in a provisional livery in Belgium.  The new livery would be silver with teal highlights (Mercedes AMG Petronas).  Here, then, is how the cars lined up:

P1 – Mater (Ryan)
P2 – Nero (Lonny)
P3 – Jaronimus Maximus (Geoff)
P4 – Jamonito del Verde (Geoff)
P5 – The Stig (Jason)
P6 – Launch Bornado (Frank)
P7 – Danger Wheel (Ryan)
P8 – Captain Slow (Jason)
P9 – Jaap Snellrijder (Frank)
P10 – Ice (Lonny)

Starting from pole position, Mater was hot off the line with a flying start, but he couldn’t quite get the edge on the rest of the field into turn 1.  Instead, Nero and Jaronimus joined him for a three car leading pack that would be virtually unbroken throughout the entirety of the first lap.  Behind them, the race to the first corner was extremely tight.  With both Scandinavian Blitz drivers and Launch Bornado going three wide up the straight, Danger Wheel found no room to squeeze through and had to slam on the brakes to avoid collision.

Congestion before turn 1

Throughout the first lap, the leading trio battled back and forth.  Mater held the early advantage, Nero took charge from the esses through the middle of the third sector, and Jaro went out in front at the end of the lap.  None of the three were able to find any significant advantage over the other two.

Behind the front pack, the remainder of the field initially divided into two subgroups.  The challengers included Jamonito, Launch, The Stig, and Danger Wheel.  The trailers were Jaap, Ice, and Captain Slow.  Both groups saw their share of battles, but there just wasn’t much movement between them.  That began to change as the packs moved into the second sector and onto the long back straight, where Regency Motors saw both their drivers take big gambles.

Launch Bornado flies through turn 6

The first was Launch Bornado throwing caution to the wind, flying through Turn 6 in 6th gear.  The cost was heavy wear on both tyres and brakes, but advantage had been gained as he became the first legitimate hope to catch the front three.  The second charge came from Jaap Snellrijder, who managed to move up from the trailing pack to the challenging pack courtesy of some adept gear shifting that allowed him to carry speed onto the straight.  The Stig found himself heading in the opposite direction, finding his engine unwilling to respond to the demands placed on it.

Unfortunately for Launch, the earlier gamble came back to haunt him around the final corner.  He was forced to slow down significantly in order to safely reach the pits.  The need for fresh tyres and a brake repair allowed the challengers to catch up again.  His run in 4th was too adventurous, and he’d fall as far back as 9th before finishing in 6th.

The Scandinavian Blitz drivers, by now well behind the rest of the field except for Ice, both decided to skip the pits entirely.  Jamonito used a quick pit stop to begin his efforts to haul in the front runners, while Jaap’s pit crew wasn’t up to the same task.  The field stratified into more groups, with Mater and Nero leading the way.  Jamonito was able to catch up to this teammate in the esses to form the second group, with Jaap and Danger Wheel hot on their heels in the third.  The rest of the cars struggled to catch up.

Mater takes control as Nero falls behind

Mater grabbed control of the race through Turn 4 after a mistake by Nero.  Despite more than half a lap remaining, the last real shot at catching Mater proved to be the back straight, but he drove flawlessly and the others lack the speed to catch him.  In the end, the third sector was a matter of simply doing what he’d done all day.  Mater took the checkered flag for his first win and a well deserved one.

The battle for the rest of the podium wasn’t nearly as simple.  Nero found himself in a tight drag race down the back straight with Jamonito and Jaronimus and had to give it his all to keep up.  Suprisingly, the three of them all of a sudden found themselves with a hard charging Danger Wheel in their rear view mirrors.  Mater’s teammate caught the challengers in Turn 6 to make it a 4 car battle.  Jaap and Launch had meanwhile taken a commanding lead over the rest of the field and were ready to pounce should anyone falter.

As a quick aside, it should be noted that the battle at the back of the field wasn’t any less intense.  Ice didn’t win any friends when he cut in front of the Stig on the racing line in Turn 4.  The shunt forced the Stig to a near stop in order to avoid a collision, but the damage was done.  He found himself floundering along in last place the rest of the race.

The Stig gets stuck

Back to the challengers, the battle through Turns 7 and 8 proved tight.  First Nero was in front, then Jaronimus, then Danger Wheel.  It all came down to Turn 10, the final corner.  Jamonito was the one to take charge, finding himself with the right amount of speed and tyres to burn as he ploughed onto the pit straight.  Nero, on the other hand, couldn’t muster the strength to keep up.  Jamonito flew past and Jaronimus followed close behind as Danger Wheel just missed getting on the podium.

Four cars fighting for 2nd place

Nero’s sputtering finish was to the gain of Jaap and Launch.  Both drivers had managed to stay close enough behind to take advantage of his misstep, forcing him to settle for 7th.  The Cobalt driver was left stunned after having been in second place just moments earlier.

In the end, all 10 cars finished the race, which given the amount of wheel-to-wheel racing that occurred was quite remarkable.  Only minor body damage occurred throughout the race.  Mater’s first win leaves only Launch Bornado and the two Osito Racing Company rookies as those without victories.  Despite a formal protest to the race stewards from the Stig, no disciplinary action was taken against Ice for cutting in front.

Final Results

Mater became the third driver to win from pole position and has proven a master at Austin.  Last season, he finished 2nd in the same race.  He goes from last to 3rd in the driver standings.  A disastrous debut race for Osito Racing Company’s rookies in Belgium is now clearly in the rear view mirror.  Jamonito and Jaronimus delivered from their high starting positions and became the first pair of teammates in SBMRL history to finish 2nd and 3rd in the same race.  Jaap’s 5th place finish is his lowest ever.  After two races, only 5 points separate the top 5 drivers.

On the team front, Red Bull takes over the top spot from Regency Motors thanks to the 3rd highest scoring race ever.  It’s the first time Regency Motors has had to look up at another team.  Osito Racing Company jumps up to 3rd place, while Scandinavian Blitz earned the minimum possible 3 points to put them in the cellar.

RacE Gallery