Last year's Lime Rock winner -- and 2012 Trans Am champ -- Simon Gregg at the top of the Uphill during a practice session Friday. He'll start third in today's 67-lap feature race.
Practice sessions for all four race series were a mix of dry and wet, but when it came to qualifying for the two open-wheel championships, the boysand girlslathered on the Rain-X and went for it.
In Formula F/F1600, Indianas Adrian Starrantino grabbed his Mygale-Honda by the cams and stuck in a 1:05.101 lapabout 10 seconds slower than his dry sessionsto nip Paul Alspachs identical car by seven-one-hundredths of a second for pole for Saturdays race one. Aaron Telitz and Sam Chastain snagged row two, also in Mygale-Hondas, while the third row is going to be Jake Eidsen in a Spectrum-Honda and Ayla Agrenthe young woman phenom of Scandanavian descentin a Mygale-Honda.
In F2000, a series used mostly by young drivers on the way up the racing ladder, you gotta love this... 50-year-old Tim Minor put a major spankin on the young uns, taking pole in his Citation-Zetec. Alongside is fellow oldsterhe can count having lived for more than four decadesSteve Bamford, in a Van Diemen-Zetec. Next-quick was another 40-something, Matt McDonough (Radon- Zetec), so you have to go to grid position four to find a driver just a couple years out of high school: Kyle Connery (Van Diemen-Zetec). Saving face for the just-started-shaving-their-faces crowd was teenager John McCusker, who qualified fifth.
Both Formula F and F2000 have two races on Saturday; the grids for the second races are based on each drivers fastest race-lap in race one. Cool.
Trans Am officials changed the qualifying session into a practice session and will grid Saturdays race by points. In TA, the line-up for the first three rows is Doug Peterson, Tony Ave, Simon Gregg (all Corvettes), Cliff Ebben (Mustang), Amy Ruman (Corvette) and Allan Lewis (Corvette).
In TA2, Cam Lawrence and Robert Huffmaster are up front, both in Camaros; Tom West (Mustang) and Tony Buffomante (Camaro) are row two; and Kurt Roehrig and Gregg Rodgers, both in Camaros, make up row three.
The weather Saturday is looking better than Friday's was, but it's likely to see showers coming through.
