DeTomaso Mailing List: January 98, Message #223
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Item Subject: DICKHEAD! The following article was published in the January addition of the PCNC newsletter. Since some of our net friends are mentioned in the article (Mad Dog, GoNancy), I thought some of you might like to read it: As PCNC Motorsports Director, I guess I'm obligated to write at least one article a year so this is it! First let me say what we have planned for 1998: Three autocrosses at Sears Point. Our first one is to be held on February 19th. A drivers school. The class will be limited to six people who will have Thunderhill all to themselves. It will be taught by a professional race car driver. The class will include 8 hours of track time and 4 hours of classroom instruction. The cost is $550 per person. This class filled up last year. We already have 4 names for this year. One drag race at Sears Point. We will once again have our own lane for competition. The CFRA recordis 12.8, the PCNC record is 13.5. Two Test Days. We will be having our traditional Fall Test Day in September or October. But for the first time, we will be adding a Spring Test Day to our schedule. The event will be held in March or April. The format will be the same as the Fall Test Day. As usual, we will be using Thunderhill. We will also participate in the Thunderhill driver's school at some point during the summer. This year the track is offering they're own drivers school. We will also be holding for the 1st time what we have named the CFRA 200. This will be a road trip for sports cars to a Bed & Breakfast over looking the ocean. It should be fun and romantic! If you are interested in any of these activities, Please contact Ed Kornegay at 707-792-2492 or Email him at ed_kornegay@hp.com The year in Review 1997: Our first performance event in 1997 was an autocross. The 1972 Pantera of Joel Gust not only beat Peter Beckham's Pantera record of 47.34 set in 1996, but set a record for the whole club with a 43.41. To set this record Joel beat a Porsche 911 RSA, a 1996 Corvette Grandsport and a BMW Z3. He even beat my Miata (43.63) which had previously been undefeated at our clubs autocrosses! This was Joel's first time on his new R1 tires and boy did they make a difference. Our other Pantera pilot was Larry Laino. His time was 47.66, witch put him in 10th place for the event. This is the 4th fastest time ever for a Pantera on this course. Third place is held by Ellis Woumnm with a 47.63. Larry was really impressed by Joel's tires. When we left, Larry was on his way over to the tire shop. Our second performance event was our CFRA driver's school. We only had one Pantera participate. Nancy Haney was the driver and she did a great job. She reduced her lap times by 7 seconds during the class. Her best Thunderhill lap is now 1:46. This makes Nancy the 4th fastest Pantera in the club. Eric Belter is still number one with a 1:34, followed by Pete Beckham with a 1:40 (street tires) and Joel Gust 1:42. Our drag race was another success story for Joel. He came in second over all but set a new Pantera record with a 13.5 for the * mile. You may say that you would expect a Pantera to be quicker, but it's not easy to launch a Pantera. Only one other Pantera his tried to beat Joel and he blew his clutch on the first pass! But if you think you actually have a Pantera that can beat a 13.5 bring it to our 1998 drag race. Joel will be happy to defend his record against you! Our next event was in June with NASA at Thunderhill. Charlie Puckett was there to do some testing. He ran only 2 sessions due to a missing header bolt. Eric Belter was there practicing with the RX7 that he has made into a race car. NASA was running the track in the reverse direction so we didn't keep any lap times. In August we participated in the Ferrari Club event at Laguna Seca. Pete Beckham and Ellis Woumnm represented our club. No official times were taken. October was our Fall Test Day. Our biggest event of the year. The event held only one bright spot for Pantera owners. Charlie Puckett set a new club record with a 1:25 lap time! That's five seconds faster than the club record he established last year. Charlie is currently the only member running in the unlimited class in our club. We had four Panteras sign up for the street class. Nancy Haney dropped out two days prior to the event because her new rims and tires had not arrived in time. Joel was the next to drop out of the competition because he was unable to get his steering rack repaired. Joel had already set Pantera records in Autocross and Drag racing. I was waiting to see if he could win the track event and hold the Triple Crown. I guess it just wasn't to be. Joel did show up with a rental Neon and set a new rental car record with a 1:38. This is faster than any Pantera on street tires has ever gone accept for Eric Belter. Pete Beckham and Eric Belter did show up with their Panteras to the event. I was predicting a 1:30 for both of them. Eric had been on the track more in 1997 than Pete (3 days vs. 2 days) but Pete had rebuilt his motor to put out 580 hp to Eric's 375 hp. It was going to be a close match for fastest street Pantera. Records where going to fall! When qualifying time came around, Pete had already blown the clutch in his car. Eric took to the track but was unable to beat his old record (1:34) due to fuel contamination problems. So out of the four street Panteras signed up for the event. Three didn't even make it to qualification and one was having problems that prevented it from qualifying well. Yes, it was a sad day for street Panteras. Fastest street time was set by a Porsche 911 RSA with a 1:29. Second place went to me and my Miata with a 1:30. I would also like to mention that I picked Dennis Antenucci To receive the PCNC Motorsports award for 1997. He was been very proactive in giving the Pantera a positive performance image by winning his class in the May 1997 Silver State Challenge. In the May 97 race Dennis averaged 139.73 mph and finished 1st in his class (140 class). In the Sept 97 race, he averaged 142.06 mph and came in 3rd place in the "145 class". This makes Dennis the 3rd fastest PCNC Pantera to run in the Silver State. Jr. Wilson is still the King, followed by Charlie Puckett (153 MPH avg.). Pete Beckham drops to 4th with a best run of 139 MPH. Dennis will try and average 160 or 165 mph in next race. He will run a taller 5th gear or a taller ring gear. Dennis, I salute you! Thunderhill's President has agreed to accept our CFRA race licenses at most of their Friday test days. This means that our top drivers will be able to go to Thunderhill and test along with all the other racecars for a small fee. Pete Beckham took advantage of this a few months ago. For $75 he received about four hours of track time and only had to share the track with three other cars. Not a bad deal. We will be awarding our first race licenses at our CFRA banquet on January 31st. The recipients will be Ed Kornegay, Charlie Puckett, Peter Beckham, Joel Gust and Erik Belter. Please note that the only members of CFRA to earn a race license at this point are all PCNC members as well. 1998 is a New Year and I hope to see more Panteras on the track. We even have a nice safe slow class for the beginners. It's very safe (as long as you're not on the track at the same time as Charlie). You can start off with the February autocross to build your confidence and then head for Thunderhill which has no guardrails. Please note the NO Pantera has ever been damaged at Thunderhill. See you on the Starting Line Ed Kornegay Motorsports Director PCNC/CFRA Ed_kornegay@hp.com 707-792-2492