Rotax Max Challenge, Keystone/Buckeye Series
BeaveRun Motorsports Complex, Beaver Falls, PA
June 7th Race #3
June 8th Race #4
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Friday Practice
Coming into the weekend, we knew we were expecting some fairly hot weather in the 90's with strong humidity. From our perspective, this would be the first time at the track when it wasn't "green" from the off-season or lots of rain. As Julian now has plenty of laps on the track, the Practice would be used to figure out the jetting in this incredibly humid and warm weekend, and battle with chassis setup for higher grip.
Day 1
The weather forecasts were showing in the high 80's for Saturday so the conditions would be similar to Friday's Practice. Julian chose to do just the first morning practice to get warmed up before Qualifying. We encountered a new noise from the motor/exhaust and weren't sure how it was affecting things. The jetting was changed for Qualifying but we were still experiencing the noise. However, the motor was still turning the best revs we could see among the other drivers, and Julian was only .1 sec slower than Ryan Punsulan. What was a little disturbing was that after Julian's first two laps, his times got worse even without traffic. The motor was running hotter than we liked so we attributed it to jetting.
The jet was changed and we went out for the Heat Race. Julian was lagging behind at the start a little, so he immediately ducked in behind Punsulan, but Killen exited turn one well and got next to Julian, only to back off because of a lack of space. Punsulan and Julian stretched a lead and while Julian was doing well behind him, he ended up going through a turn too hot causing him to slide and have more distance than hoped. The finished in their start order but left us struggling with a possible jetting issue as Julian's best time was still .2 off of Punsulan.
Between the Heat and Feature races, we discussed with many other "team mechanics" what we thought of the issue. Again, even better revs in the Heat race started leading us to the other important part of the kart...the chassis. Because we came to this track when it was lower grip and had a rainy first weekend, we didn't realize how much grip would be too much. However, it was time to make a big change to see what would happen. We freed up the rear of the chassis by going to a much wider (3"!) track and smaller hubs. It worked! Julian was very close to Punsulan through most of the race, including a moment where he looked to pass down the straight. They reached lapped traffic and it worked against Julian and for Ryan Punsulan. However, the race was a crucial learning tool and Julian even ran a faster best lap time than Ryan P. by just over a tenth.
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DAY 2
Same weather, but hotter is predicted for the Sunday race, the good news is that there is a breeze. A good Practice session was taken in to see if we were tuned ok, and everything seem to check out alright. Qualifying started off fine, but with some stragglers getting onto the track late, the Minimax drivers encountered traffic by their second lap...not good. Julian ran a 1:01.7 on his first lap which was a good solid time, a 1:01.8 on his second lap with a slight holdup, and then it was over as he wouldn't get a reasonably clean lap after those two. He got lucky as Punsulan chose the wrong jet and wouldn't get faster than a 1:02.2.
The Heat Race required little change to the setup and Julian was confident with leaving well enough alone. Mostly uneventful, he lead from the beginning to the end as he drove consistently to help keep the gap over both of the Ryans...
Starting on pole for the Feature race was a good thing as they were bound to hit the same type of traffic from the previous day. Like the Heat Race, it was a clean start and Punsulan was back a couple of kart lengths until the traffic came. This time, Julian was the lucky one as he was able to come out of turn three behind the traffic and sprinted past them through turn four for a clean turn five/six, where Punsulan was stuck behind one of the back-markers. This gave Julian a solid distance to finish out the race and win.
Back to Solo as our first National Pro Solo event is at the end of June!
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