Photo Credit: Barbara Seeger
The weather graced Devens today with a gorgeous Massachusetts blue sky for the first day of the Devens Champ Tour. Drivers sitting at the top of their class put down impressive times but are well aware they must perform with the same tenacity tomorrow.
In A Street, Jeremy Prati has eighty-six thousandths on Mark Daddio, who cleaned up his last run to put the pressure on Prati. While the course certainly had its acceleration sections where a Corvette could pull away, it was littered with fast sweepers, offsets and slaloms galore, requiring regular use of the middle pedal to haul the car down. We’re going to keep an eye on them tomorrow as it’s sure to be a close race. B Street is a different story as Evan Schickel holds first with a 1.2 second lead over second, both drivers running C5 ‘Vettes. In E Street, Daniel Podolski has first in his Midship Runabout against a field of Mazda Miatas. As we look to G Street, Charlie Thompson is out in front in his ’99 Civic Si over Matt Jones in his Focus ST. The top five G Street drivers are no more than a second and some change apart. We’ll be sure to catch the three-wheelin’ GS action tomorrow morning. Patrick Huxley holds the lead in a strong H Street class of eleven drivers, not including ladies. Lastly, SSR saw a tough fight between Strano, Reeve and Luster, currently sitting in that order. Sam Strano grabbed first place on his third sprint around the runways, previously held by Josh Luster who was ultimately bumped down by Grant Reeve. SSR will be a close battle to the finish tomorrow morning.
Moving to STR, Joseph Ottofaro leads the class but six drivers are within a second of his time. Joseph will be pushing his car hard tomorrow to hold on to his lead. A while Petschauer, Tocci, Koscieln, Davies, Chen and Clavijo will be fighting to gain the lead. The ladies of STR put up a fight as well, Tamra Hunt holds first there with an eight tenths lead. Ben Wagstaff holds the first trophy in STS; his ’91 Miata on Bridgestones has a nine tenths lead over second place. The same discrepancy can happen tomorrow so he’ll be pushing his car hard tomorrow. In STX, John Rappa took the lead from Nathan Whipple on his second run which was enough to stay in first at the close of the day.
In Devens' Street Prepared classes, NER Region’s Billy and Bob Davis have a 1-2 in CSP with blisteringly fast runs; they sit 1-2 in PAX as well with a couple tenths to spare. Erik Carlson finished first today in ESP, he has a three tenths lead. Looking to our Street Mod and Prepared classes, we saw a lot of shuffling Friday night to build certain classes. In X Prepared, Jake Namer holds the lead by a large margin in his incredible FD Mazda RX-7, normally competing in SSM. In SM, Rachel Baker sits way out in front driving PJ’s notoriously fast “Panda.” There were a few Street Prepared cars that jumped up to SSM here at Devens, they put up a great fight too. Finally, to wrap it up, William Goodale piloted his A Modified Dragon F1 to an alarming fast 62.182, about three seconds in front of Street Modified’s fastest times.
Going into Sunday we have a lot of classes showing close fights. The weatherman says another day of clear skies and hot temperatures. Tune in for tomorrow’s action on sololive and ustream!
