Monday, 6 November 2017
It was a rain plagued weekend at the AC Delco East Coast Thunder nationals with Mother Nature causing havoc on the event proceedings.
Friday’s qualifying went reasonably well with rain only coming down lightly in patches delaying the schedule by around 2 hours.
In Super Stock/ Pro Turbo, Mario Rehayem ran 7.312 @182.75 off the trailer in his first qualifier, looking to better his current pb of 7.261 @183.
On his second and final qualifier for the day, Mario would get off early to 9.9 second et but his 7.3 pass was enough to secure him 4th place in qualifying.
In Factory Xtreme, Sam Meintanis in the Queen St Customs BMW ran well in his first qualifier with a 6.963 @194 off the trailer.
George Rehayem in our Mazda 6 SP rolled over the finish line with a 8.390 @112 after letting off at half track.
The second round of qualifying saw Sam matched up against George in a Pac vs Pac battle. With both cars ready to stage after the burnout rain started to fall again and the cars were pushed back to run their qualifier later in the night to allow for the group 1 classes to run first. When it was time to race again it was all George with the Mazda 6 launching to a 6.870 @168 after an early shut off. Sam left a little late but ran a respectable 7.067 @187.
With the second qualifier delayed we had a short turn around to be ready for the third qualifying session. A minor issue with the car unfortunately ruled Sam out for the last qualifier but the Mazda 6 was ready to go. In staging George bumped in too deep rolling past the beams so the time wasn’t recorded but he staged again and raced down the track to what looked to be a good run.
On Saturday’s race day the rain caused major disruptions with the Sydney Dragway staff drying the track multiple times only to have it rain again. With no racing happening we fired up the BBQ and relaxed waiting for the weather to clear. The rain finally cleared enough for the track to dry and racing kicked off again at 3pm.
Mario’s first elimination round was run at 7.30pm where he lined up against Tony Polito in the Ford Probe. Polito got the hole shot and raced down the track to take the win with a 7.77 @156 on his 7.43 dial in. Mario almost ran him down with a 7.57 @172 on his 7.20 dial in but just fell short.
With the Factory Xtreme class not deemed a priority by the officials we were told we would have to wait until after 10.30pm to race our first and only eliminator. After waiting all day and with the track conditions deteriorating the decision was made at 10pm to pack up and leave.
We were disappointed with how the weekend panned out but we now look forward to our next event which will be the APSA Pro Street Nationals to be held on the 18th of November @ Sydney Dragway. We hope to see you there!!
posted 06-11-17
