This one started as a small group of four and nearly doubled at Go time! Nine drivers showed up Sunday around noon for some track time.
It was unique because four juniors and five seniors showed up: one new driver to Stewart Raceway and two returning drivers.
Participating Teams:
Team Maddox
Donaldson Racing
Che-Vargas Racing
Team Johnson
Stewart Racing
The juniors quickly overtook SR3 and began hotlapping on four of the six lanes, leaving the rest of us with limited lane access. We could have set up a rotation, but we opted to fire up SR2 instead.
Jared took over Race Director duties on SR3 and ran a couple of Dash races with the juniors while the rest of us cleaned off SR2 and started to cut laps there. I think Jared might be Deputy Race Director soon.
SR2 was remarkably clean indoors and didn’t take many laps to clean off. We need to do more racing on SR2; it’s a bit hectic with Vipers and other magnet cars, but it’s a fun and challenging track.
So, what was expected to be a small group of drivers getting track time on the SR3 oval turned out to be quite a multifaceted track day.
Our newest driver, Dean Donaldson, once again brought out some engaging vintage HO-scale platforms to try out today. This rig is a Tyco Truck platform that ran well after some oiling and greasing. We need to get three more of these rigs for some IROC fun. Dean and Eric “Fast” Lane are definitely “Pickers.” They’ll get along very well.
We didn’t do much racing, but it was a fun Open Track day. The juniors cut a few laps, Donaldson Racing broke in his new MegaG+ 1.7 Alpha-Romeo F1 car, and Che-Vargas Racing cut some fast laps with Viper V-SPEC L4 cars on SR2.
There’s a back story with Che-Vargas Racing. Joe Vargas has procured the remnants of an SR2 clone track. The copy was created shortly after I designed the layout and had the original SR2 built by Viperscaleracing.com back in July 2018. Joe found the whole track and table somewhere in Sacramento, but they only wanted to sell the track pieces, not the whole table. Anyway, a longer story to tell here, but the bottom line is Joe is working on getting “SR2.2” operational again.
Aaron is also very near to procuring another cool 4-lane routed track. He’ll be driving down to the LA area later this month to check it out. There could be a nice revival of HO-scale racing in the Bay Area soon!
Okay, stay tuned for an email about resuming racing and completing the final round of our 50/50 series. It’ll be an oval event on SR3.
Many of you have suffered from the SlotTrak bug that can occur during a yellow flag situation. As power is cut to the lanes, the software does not detect or register that you have entered the pits. When the track goes green, your car doesn’t refuel. This is very frustrating, of course.
I haven’t fully tested the latest version of SlotTrak because the Fuel Management feature didn’t work with those versions. However, their update documentation indicates they may have fixed this problem in one of the latest versions. We tried to run the latest on SR2 and SR3 several times, but the software did not detect pit entries, rendering the feature useless.
We’re currently running version 16.24. I plan to upgrade both SR2 and SR3 to version 17.34, which is currently the latest version available.
Kevin and I figured out after the racing last Saturday that this issue was caused by the latest version install, which seems to corrupt the TrackConfig file by removing the Pit Detection setup. Once we realized this was happening, we updated the TrackConfig file, and Boom! All was good!
So, the bottom line is that we’ll test the fuel management features during a future racing event and see if the latest version solves that pesky refueling problem most of us have experienced in the past. Let’s hope so!
StewartRaceway.org Web Site Unsecure or Not Secure Notices
I didn’t realize this was causing people to stop using our site or become concerned that the site was somehow potentially harmful.
All this means is that keystroke data going to/from the site is not encrypted via SSL [SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and its successor, TLS (Transport Layer Security), are protocols for establishing secure links between networked computers.]
StewartRaceway.org is not an eCommerce site. To utilize it, you do not enter private or sensitive financial or other information anywhere on the site, and it does not collect or store that sort of information.
Unless you’re concerned about a remote possibility that somebody out there may be able to capture the keystrokes your computer sends to the site when leaving a comment on the site, for example, there is no threat to you or your computer/network. This is no different than any other site you use that doesn’t utilize expensive SSL/TLS technology.
StewartRaceway.org can conduct eCommerce activities, but we don’t sell or buy anything on the site today. No financial or personal/private information is collected. If that changes, of course we’d employ SSL/TLS technology to make sure those transactions and associated data was secure and protected.
So, please don’t fret about this message. I don’t think Russians, government agents, or other bad guys are snooping around StewartRaceway.org. And if they were, all they’d find out is that we’re having a lot of fun racing little cars for no money!
Well, so much for testing, driver development, and working on cars. We raced all day!
We had eight races total, nearly all IROC, ending with a Viper SPEC STOCK tuner’s race. I think we ran four races on the SR3 Fast Esses road course and four races on SR2’s Straight road course.
Sadly, we didn’t get to run any fuel races since a monitor was failing on SR3 and some sort of bug on SR2. Both problems are resolved and we’re good to go for the next event. Bug fixed on SR2 and new 50″ monitor on SR3. Now the monitors on SR3 are the same size.
Summary Of All Races
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
1
Kevin Webster
822
170
8456.623
2
Aaron Castro
781
165
7399.218
3
George Peters
337
144
2695.61
4
Jordan Walker
316
127
2738.839
5
Eric Lane
217
91
1838.66
6
Jerry Pearson
218
82
1875.337
7
Brad Sandahl
117
49
1097.331
8
Carrie Sandahl
95
34
1051.222
9
Steve Stewart
951
238
8313.851
Of course, the above is just a summary of points for all races run. Not all drivers ran every race. Only Kevin, Aaron, and Home Cook’n competed in all the races.
It was a fabulous day, and it was finally great to get back to slot car action at Stewart Raceway. We raced on SR3, about four races, and finished the final four on SR2.
A couple of notable races: The first was an IROC race utilizing Jag Hobbies NC2 chassis with AutoWorld Mustang hard bodies. I screwed that one up and didn’t get the minimum lap time set correctly. As a results, a few drivers were exceeding the minimum lap time and not scoring laps. Oh well, in the end, the two fastest drivers could not keep their lap times under the minimum and handed that race to Aaron, who was way down on laps with a lousy car but managed to win the race.
The second notable race was when Aaron, running on SR2, hooked up in the wrong lane for a heat. There were just three of us racing, and Aaron was supposed to be in the White lane but mistakenly hooked up in the Blue lane. Aaron actually led that heat from start to finish but did not log any laps or points—oops! Kevin bagged second in that one!
All in all, it was a fun day of pretty much all racing. Aaron finally got to run on SR2, which he adapted to extremely well.
Hopefully, we can get back to our routine now. I’m hoping to have another open track day this coming weekend and start a new racing series the following weekend.
Okay, I finally updated the driver stats on the site. A few interesting metrics are available at the moment:
Driver average placing for both races and heats/segments, and driver’s total laps, for each track and layout.
Driver total race wins.
Driver total heat/segment wins.
I think I have a good system for doing this now so I should be able to keep this data updated going forward. Please let me know in the comments section below if you can think of any other interesting metrics to report. I’m no SQL guru but I love dinking around with this stuff.
So who’s the most prolific driver in our group? If you exclude our expert drivers, junior driver, Abe Maddox has the most race and segment wins.
Wow, what a barn-burner day. This was the final round of this long-running series and it sure wasn’t short on drama.
Going into final round, Jordan Walker and Kevin Webster were separated by just 11 points in the Sportsman classification. Some big hardware was up for grabs by either driver for winning the series points chase so we all knew it was going to be a dogfight between those two drivers. The winner would not only take home a huge trophy but they would also advance from the Sportsman class to the Expert class ranks going forward.
Junior driver, Abe Maddox, had asked just prior to the first of the four races on the day whether he could win the series prize by winning the first race. No surprise there, since Abe had won many races leading up to the series finale. Sadly, I was the one that had to break the news that he could not secure enough points to take home the Mondo series trophy.
Abe took that bit of information in stride and clipped in for the first segment of the first race in the Yellow Lane, the very fast Viper SPEC RACER class.
Round 5 Short Story:
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
*
Steve Stewart
478
64
2056.569
1
George Peters
466
50
2181.169
2
Jordan Walker
452
40
2059.462
3
Kevin Webster
426
23
2101.951
4
Eric Lane
414
20
2087.702
5
Jerry Pearson
228
18
1107.964
6
Abe Maddox
214
13
1091.765
7
Shaylin Maddox
208
8
1190.751
Race 1: Viper V-SPEC Lexan (SPEC RACER) (15v)
Home Cook’n, George Peters, Jerry Pearson
Abe didn’t seem to care that he couldn’t win the series. When the first segment went green, Abe quickly took the lead and would swap it with Expert driver, George Peters several times before winning segment 1. Abe also clicked off the fastest lap of the first segment. In fact, Team Maddox set the fastest laps of the race in both the Blue and Yellow lanes, with Mom, Shaylin, clicking off a blistering 3.178 in the Blue lane.
In the end, it was Home Cook’n just 2 laps ahead of George Peters with steadily improving Sportsman driver, Jerry Pearson, just behind and bagging the final podium spot in third. Abe amazingly finished in fourth overall. Kevin Webster bagged two 2nd place finishes but lost five laps in the red lane and would have to settle for fifth and just one point over Jordan Walker in sixth. Detailed Results
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
1
Steve Stewart
120
16
501.24
2
George Peters
118
13
504.73
3
Jerry Pearson
115
11
500.258
4
Abe Maddox
107
7
493.01
5
Kevin Webster
107
6
506.64
6
Jordan Walker
103
5
499.299
7
Eric Lane
103
4
502.194
8
Shaylin Maddox
102
3
574.754
Race 2: Viper V-SPEC 1.7 Indy Lexan (IROC) (15v)
Home Cook’n, George Peters, Jordan Walker
Since Abe and Shaylin had to bail out early on the day, we decided to stack the Viper races to give Abe a shot at a race win before he and his Mom had to leave. This IROC set of way fast cars is courtesy of Sportsman driver, Eric Lane, who donated this 6-car set of V-SPEC Vipers to Stewart Raceway earlier in the year. These are full-on Viper V-SPEC, Level 4 cars with 1.7 Lexan Indy bodies instead of the very fragile plastic Indy bodies that they usually ship with.
Abe Maddox came out swinging again in the second race of the day. He loves Vipers and these cars were very close to what he’s used to. Abe would end up with two 2nd-place finishes and a 3rd place–very impressive! Abe’s Mom, Shaylin finished just one lap behind Abe with one 2nd place finish and two 3rd place finishes plus the fastest lap of the race T 3.277 in the white lane–amazing!
Jordan Walker knew what he had to do and would finish Race #2 just behind 2nd place finisher and expert driver, George Peters, bagging 11 points and padding his lead over Kevin Webster who would only collect 3 much-needed points. Mr Consistent, Jerry Pearson, would collect the 4th place points just missing the last podium spot by 2 laps. Shaylin and Jordan both hold the current track records for this new class on SR2, Shaylin at 3.277 in white and Jordan at 3.346 in yellow. Detailed Results
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
1
Steve Stewart
120
16
475.604
2
George Peters
116
13
573.481
3
Jordan Walker
115
11
464.487
4
Jerry Pearson
113
7
607.706
5
Abe Maddox
107
6
598.755
6
Shaylin Maddox
106
5
615.997
7
Eric Lane
105
4
472.813
8
Kevin Webster
104
3
510.164
Race 3: MegaG+ 1.7 Indy/F1 Support Class (18v)
Home Cook’n, George Peters, Jordan Walker
As usual, this class is amazingly competitive. Even Home Cook’n couldn’t bag a perfect score and would lose one lap by overshooting the pits. Kevin Webster bounced back and gave Jordan a lot of pressure but did not come up with the points needed to thwart Jordan’s march to the series win. With Jerry Pearson and Team Maddox exiting the field halfway through the event, points would get a bit easier to collect. Jordan sealed the deal in in this one with a very nice 3rd place finish, just one position ahead of Kevin but secured four more points that would make it impossible for Kevin to overcome. The top three spots were very hotly contested with just 2 laps separating each driver in the end.
With Jordan and Kevin chasing each other and both on the verge of being Expert drivers, the effectively lone Sportsman driver in the field, Eric Lane, would find it more difficult than usual to work his way through the field. Eric did manage a 3rd-place segment finish with a best lap of 4.188 in blue, which showed he could put the hammer down. Jordan clicked off the fastest lap of the race at 3.899 also in the blue lane. Detailed Results
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
1
Steve Stewart
119
16
580.522
2
George Peters
117
13
591.233
3
Jordan Walker
115
11
583.594
4
Kevin Webster
110
7
571.422
5
Eric Lane
104
6
608.389
Race 4: Wizzard Storms (IROC) (18v)
Home Cook’n, Jordan Walker, George Peters
This very cool IROC set was provided by Webster Motorsports and, while noisy, they are very fast and stick like glue to the rails. Even at 18v they are very nearly drone cars but not quite, as many of us found out the hard way.
This final race was a dog fight between Jordan Walker and Home Cook’n. Not sure why Jordan fought so hard but I think he was on a mission to solidify the fact that he was now an Expert class driver. I think George spent much of this last race cheering and coaching Jordan on.
In the end, the battle ended on the same lap with Jordan coming up just a few feet short of the win–close! George finished a few laps down but was very pleased with Jordan’s results on the day. When this kid focuses on the task at hand, he’s unstoppable—congrats to Jordan on winning the Sportsman points chase and advancing to the Expert ranks!
While Kevin Webster didn’t come out on top in the final race, he did manage to set a new lap record for this car in the blue lane with a 3.755—nice! Detailed Results
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
1
Steve Stewart
119
16
499.203
2
Jordan Walker
119
13
512.082
3
George Peters
115
11
511.725
4
Kevin Webster
105
7
513.725
5
Eric Lane
102
6
504.306
2023 50/50 Racing Series Overall Results
Place
Name
Laps
Points
Total Time
*
Steve Stewart
1999
489
13436.37
1
George Peters
1957
417
13210.23
2
Jordan Walker
1839
310
13702.08
3
Kevin Webster
1592
282
12982.72
4
Jerry Pearson
1075
164
7470.777
5
Abe Maddox
388
90
2739.394
6
Fred Ebert
189
79
1658.412
7
Shaylin Maddox
376
74
2705.481
8
Eric Lane
1101
71
6481.973
9
Shaun Lee
466
51
1629.418
10
Martha Elderon
411
29
4115.863
11
Tim Bisson
126
6
1366.187
12
Jake Bisson
89
4
1250.72
That’s a wrap for this year’s 50/50 racing series. Jordan Walker advances to the Expert ranks for the next series, which means both classes should experience an increase in competition. I don’t think we ever determined who the 2022 season Rookie of the Year was but this season’s ROTY is still up for grabs while Abe Maddox pretty much has the Junior of the Year award all but in the bag.
Thank you all for supporting the racing program so far this season! Kathy and I really appreciate your support and interest!
Stay tuned for details on our next series and open track days coming up soon.
Well, so much for testing, driver development, and working on cars. We raced all day!
Driver average placing for both races and heats/segments, and driver’s total laps, for each track and layout.
Wow, what a barn-burner day. This was the final round of this long-running series and it sure wasn’t short on drama.
