Another beautiful California evening and more great food, snacks, desserts, and hydration products. Dean made some great chicken soup and bread to complement the house bread, and we had a very tasty dinner before racing commenced.
Once again, our stellar 2025 Promoter of the Year, Dean Donaldson, invited two more new drivers into the fold, and last Saturday’s new driver, Mark Wialbut, returned for his second visit to the raceway. A very solid group of slotheads and plenty of competition.
Short Story
| Place | Name | Laps | Points | Total Time |
| 1 | Dustin Jolley | 200 | 118 | 2093.197 |
| 2 | Jeff Seltzer | 106 | 62 | 1154.160 |
| 3 | Max Dunn | 103 | 49 | 999.582 |
| 4 | Bev Seltzer | 104 | 44 | 1035.450 |
| 5 | Tara DelaGarza | 89 | 38 | 1002.428 |
| 6 | Mark Wialbut | 98 | 35 | 1058.522 |
| Expert | ||||
| 1 | Steve Stewart | 194 | 127 | 2105.784 |
| 2 | Dean Donaldson | 197 | 111 | 2093.983 |
Yeah, yeah, Home Cook’n is always at or near the top of the Expert leaderboard, big surprise (His tracks!). That said, those days are numbered, as you can see from the Race 1 summary below.
In fact, Sportsman driver Dustin Jolley placed second overall in this event, which he does quite frequently. He’s either going to earn an Expert upgrade or request one soon.
Race 1: Viper V-SPEC F1/Indy 1.7 (i) Lexan Eric Lane Set
Wow! While we probably could have run four lanes with good corner marshal coverage, we opted for segment sit-outs to man the keyboard and went with all six lanes for racing.
Again, with newer drivers in the mix, it’s a good idea to go with a top-level magnet car as they get up to speed with slot car racing. It’s cool to compare early lap times to later ones. Talk about getting up to speed quickly.
The big story in this very hotly contested race was Jeff Seltzer, who, with the exception of just one of the eight segments, held onto 3rd place until the very last segment. In fact, if you take the Experts out of the equation, Jeff finished 2nd overall. Jeff put on a clinic on mastering refueling, cutting fast laps, and achieving consistent top 3 segment finishes.
Our newest drivers, Tara DelaGarza and Max Dunn, both had impressive moments in the race and posted some nice best laps. Tara clicked off a 5.539 lap in the blue lane, while Max had a 5.368 also in the Blue lane. I think they had fun, and both clearly got faster as the race went on. Details
| Place | Name | Laps | Points | Total Time |
| 1 | Steve Stewart | 119 | 87 | 1000.273 |
| 2 | Dustin Jolley | 119 | 78 | 975.064 |
| 3 | Dean Donaldson | 111 | 71 | 987.044 |
| 4 | Jeff Seltzer | 106 | 62 | 1154.160 |
| 5 | Max Dunn | 103 | 49 | 999.582 |
| 6 | Bev Seltzer | 104 | 44 | 1035.450 |
| 7 | Tara DelaGarza | 89 | 38 | 1002.428 |
| 8 | Mark Wialbut | 98 | 35 | 1058.522 |
Race 2: Fray T-Jets (i)
This race was way fun, but a but we lost over half the field before the start. No, it wasn’t because of the car choice; it just got late, and it was time for some to go home.
The Fray T-Jet is definitely not an ideal platform for new drivers or the typical hobbyist. The Fray T-Jet is based on the oldest H.O. scale slot car platform out there. Fray enthusiasts have transformed this 1960s toy chassis into a very sophisticated, high-performance car. The best way I know to describe this platform is to call it a “hyper-tuned Swiss Watch.”
The best part about this race was that both Dustin and Dean absolutely loved racing these things. Dean, who previously had declared the Viper V-SPEC L4 platform as the only thing worth racing, has recently discovered the challenge and thrill of racing cars that you have to actually drive every inch of every lap.
The big story of this one was that these cars hadn’t seen track time in a long time and were not well prepared to race. Consequently, they were not well matched, with the White lane car markedly better than the Green lane car, and the Orange lane car almost impossible to stay on the same lap as the Green car by the time the last segment rolled.
If you have time, the detailed results pretty much tell the story. The Orange lane car’s tires were nearly worn out at the start. By the time the race was over, the tires were toast. Surprisingly, each driver won their White lane segments, and Dean “Magnet Man” won the race! I think he’s finally realizing that there is a whole lot more to slot car racing than “stuck” magnet cars. Details
| Place | Name | Laps | Points | Total Time |
| 1 | Dean Donaldson | 86 | 40 | 1106.939 |
| 2 | Dustin Jolley | 81 | 40 | 1118.133 |
| 3 | Steve Stewart | 75 | 40 | 1105.511 |
Thank you all for supporting our cool weeknight program! These events have been tremendously successful. A special thanks to Dean for his amazing advocacy and promotion of slot car racing in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
This Saturday is still open for a Junior/Parents Team event and/or regular Sportsman racing. I’ll shoot out an invite ASAP.
Okay, shut up and drive!
