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4M Industries/PUB Racing hit the track again last weekend at Waterford Hills for Race 5, following up a successful race weekend at Mid-Ohio two weeks back. It was a bit of a hot weekend, and plenty muggy, but the cars were on the pace as ever, and turned in great results as usual!

The 77 car needed much attention, and in a hurry; after setting a record lap time and winning down at Mid-Ohio, the car was a bit used up. We had thought all we had to do was to bleed the brakes, change the oil, and get back on track. However, on firing up the car after the oil change, the car was obviously not right, firing on only 3 cylinders! We thought it might just be that we'd go the timing belt on wrong - having just replaced it - but more thorough investigation showed no compression on #3! This in addition to finding that the header was holed, cracked, and rusting apart.

We pulled the cam cover to run a leakdown check on it, only to find the #3 intake valve stuck open. Well, we pulled the head off, expecting a bent valve - but it turned out only to be stuck due to a cracked lifter. In fact, all 8 lifters in the head were cracked! Bad news, and no doubt due to some serious overrevving at Mid-Ohio, but much less serious than a bent valve.

We replaced the lifters, installed a replacement header, and got the engine back up and running perfectly in only a few days - practice makes these things go quickly!

Fortunately the 55 car was in much better shape, needing only routine maintenance - though it also reported in as being down a bit on power now, after all the hard use at Mid-O. Hopefully Mazuro Motors will be coming through with a new motor for it soon, as there's not much left under the hood! So out to Waterford, where we spent some time at practice on Friday helping a friend, Stu Delaney, set up and tune his Formula Vee car to prepare for the race weekend.

Qualifying went fairly well, with the 77 on ITB pole as usual with a very respectable time of 1:19.6, stopping early to avoid traffic, and the 55 in 3rd, only a 10th off the pace of the 2nd place Mustang of Dave Cordier! The Saturday race went almost as smoothly, the 77 remaining strong in 1st, but the 55 dropping back a couple of spots to 5th as the #81 of Todd Lincoln recovered from troubles during qualifying and fought his way back up to his usual 2nd place finish.

Sunday morning class race was more of the same, maintaining position with Chris in the 55 fighting hard with the 88 Mustang of Bob Hagemann Jr., eventually regaining 5th place. In the process of trying to pass, at one point during the race, the two got together as Chris locked up the brakes into Turn 6, doing a number on the left front fender! However no serious damage (suspension or other) was done, and the crack crew of PUB Racing's panel-beaters was able to straighten out the fender in time, and the car looked almost untouched on the grid! Sunday's feature held on for more of the same, but Chris was unable to get back around and in front of Hagemann after a strong start by the Mustang.

With the Saturday win, we've locked the 2008 ITB Championship for the season, with such a lead (49 points) over the 2nd place car of Todd Lincoln as to be insurmountable! Chris, meanwhile, was 5th coming into the weekend; while the points haven't been officially updated yet after the weekend, our calculations show him as moved up to 4th place over Bill Strong, and only 3 points behind Bob Hagemann Jr. for 3rd place behind Todd Lincoln!

Race video and photos are still to come; we hope to get them uploaded this weekend, along with more video from Mid-Ohio.

Thanks again to the excellent crew from 4M Industries PUB Racing team - Gregg, Angela, Erik, Merritt, and Alex and Tommy! We've survived the season - even if it's not over yet! All that's left now are for Chris to clinch 3rd at Race 6, then the Fun Run, and the Awards Banquet in November! For now, we rest up and look for more race gear stickers for the left front fender of Chris's racecar...
_________________
Vaughan Scott
Webmeister
'79 924 #77 SCCA H Prod racecar
'82 931 Plat. Silver
#25 Hidari Firefly P2 sports prototype