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Wendover, UT ProSolo Notes

Round seven of SCCA's ProSolo series was held in Wendover, UT on July 20th and 21st. As is often the case with summer events, afternoon thunderstorms on Friday, with high winds and lightning, caused practice starts to be halted for roughly 30 minutes.

Weather improved greatly for Saturday and Sunday's competition, which featured a long ProSolo course with a crossover located near the start and finish lines. Officials were forced to delay the 20-second shot clock - launching cars at roughly thirty second intervals - which combined with the record attendance, contributed to Saturday's runs continuing past 8pm.

The weekend's most news worthy story was the return of Bob Tunnell and his BSP class M3. It wasn't enough that Bob scored 20 points for the class win, he also went on to win the overall Peavey Super Challenge round. Tunnell's BimmerHaus camp made a strong presence in other classes too, with David Fauth winning DSP in his 325i, and Patty Tunnell winning the Ladies 1 class in a 330ci.

And speaking of BMWs, Russell Blume took the G-Stock class win over Chris Hartman's Subaru, after class favorites Brian Priebe and G.H. Sharp were no-shows. Blume scored his second class win of the year - securing maximum class points - as did Ken Motonishi (C-Stock Miata), Kevin McCormick (D-Stock Type R), Paul Wooley (H-Stock Mini), Hiroo Sumida (STS Subaru), and Corey Smith (SM Audi S4). Corey's Audi S4 is pumping out nearly 400hp, and launches with an incredible fury that no other car could match.

On the opposite end of all that power were the frisky little tikes of Spec Formula Junior. Eight racers battled it out all weekend, with Jonathon Clements just edging out Kyle Short and Lisa Berry for the win. It was exciting to see such good competition and sportsmanship in this development class.

Cone penalties turned out to have an effect in several classes, most obvious being Super Stock. John Ames came away with the class win, with heavyweights Erik Strelnicks and Stacey Molleker hampered by downed cones. Ames also picked up valuable challenge points, with his runner-up finish to Tunnell. Tom Berry may have helped to secure his Nationals ride, as Howard Duncan joked during the trophy presentation, as car owner Steve Eguina came away with the ESP victory over Berry, with fast, clean runs all weekend.

There was some seriously tight competition in other classes too, including Joe Goeke's win over Andy McKee (Honda S2000s) in B-Stock, and Randy Noll's win over Paul Brown in E-Stock (MR2s). The overall finishing order in both Ladies classes came down to the end, in fact, the tie-breaker between third place Katie Elder (Type R) and fourth place Pam Eames (Audi TT) came down to their third best times, as their second best times resulted in a tie too!

Although not quite a tie, Leslie Cohen (ZO6) edged out Laura Molleker for the L2 runner-up spot by one thousandths of a second. Nobody felt bad for Laura though, as she went on to win the overall Ladies Challenge in her Corvette ZO6.

And last but not least, was the event's luckiest winner. No, Chris Dorsey didn't hit the jackpot at the Rainbow Casino, but he did manage to bring his G-Stock Neon ACR to the Bonus Challenge win, earning himself a free ProSolo license and event entry.
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