Last weekend was the Michigan Dirt Oval Championship race at Dukes Proscale Raceplex in Fruitport Michigan.  For Michigan dirt oval RC racers, it's the biggest race of the summer.  As far as competition goes, this one did not disappoint.

Once again, Duke tried to go all out for the racers by throwing down food on both Friday and Saturday night.  The highlight was on Saturday when Duke (with some help from someone who can actually cook) put out a barbecue with several side dishes and topped off with cookies and a cake which I hear was phenomenal. He also provided beverages for all of the racers.  Where else does that happen?

With all of the money he put out for trophies, food, gas, TQ and probably a bunch of stuff that I didn't see directly, I would be shocked if he made very much money from the event.  I don't know of any other race track owner that gives more back to the racers.  If you run into him, make sure you thank him for putting that race on.  It was a lot of work I'm sure.

Custom Works drivers Arnie Fie and Rob "Wolfman" Mulvaney were in attendance and provided a ton of assistance for the local racers, who almost exclusively run CustomWorks cars at the Raceplex.  It was a great honor to have those guys come and race with us. 

Arnie Fie did a dirt oval chasis seminar that was worth the price of admission alone.  He explained how different adjustments acted on the race car and gave some great tips for tuning your car to the track conditions.  Some of the more valuable advice I received was to start by setting the car up for equal weight in the front and to keep the ride hide the same at all four corners of the car.   Much of the stuff I had done in the past on my setup was really more geared for a high bite environment, which really doesn't apply at Dukes until about 1 am.

As far as racing performance, I really didn't have any speed in any of the classes I ran.  I think it might have had to do with me completely changing my setup on all three then not really having the time to dial in the changes before racing.  

In Sprints, I jumped on the 7 inch wing bandwagon because everybody was doing it.  I have no doubt that it creates a ton more downforce, but I struggled to get the balance back into my car after putting it on there.  In hindsight, I probably should have left the six inch wing on there for this race, then added it later.  Chuck Lonergan and Rob Mulvaney were predictably fast, but Nick Landon had a ton of speed in his car too.  I'd like to grab Rob's setup if he's willing to share it.

In 2WD Late Model, I'll admit I took a look at Arnie Fies car and immediately changed the springs to match his.  Unfortunately, I took a fairly good ride and turned it to crap until I got it set right.  In the end, I had a pretty good handling car, but couldn't figure out the gearing needed to go fast running in blinky mode before the mains.  Jodi Flipse ended up with TQ and Arnie Fie took the main.

In Dominator class, I managed to qualify dead last.  I haven't done that in any class for a long time, which shows not only my lack of experience, but also a completely shitty handling race car.  I think I had a few things playing against me.  First, even though I had Andrews setup on my car, it didn't handle anything like Andrews car.  It just wouldn't turn at all.

I tweaked and tweaked and with some help from Rob and Andrew was able to get it driveable at least.  I was never able to actually get any speed in the car.  I'm still not sure if it was the setup, the gearing, my driving or all three.  I am now officially on the fence as to whether or not to continue running Dominators even though they look like a blast with Andrew Knapp winning with TQ.

Overall, I had a great time at the race and I'm already waiting for the date to be announce for next year.  I don't want to miss it.

On another front, BFG is now set to build a new indoor oval at the same location as the current track. Work is supposed to start on Monday night.  I'm hoping that it gets done before the indoor season starts.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

I've seen the plans for the track and it looks to be about the same configuration and distance as the current track although it does look like it's going to be a little narrower in both the straights and at the ends.  I'm not a fan of making the lanes narrower, but there are some space considerations.

I would post more, but I'm tired.

Until next time.........