2012 Racing Season Starts with a Crash
Jason Tower
The 2012 car racing season got off to shaky start for our intrepid SpecE30 car and driver. The driver, Jason Tower, is still not back 100% after surgery to repair a torn ligament in his hand, but none-the-less headed to the Virginia International Raceway to try his luck at a weekend of SpecE30 racing.
The first race on Saturday was a disaster after a series of mishaps:
“… a car went off in turn 3 on the first lap which summoned the
emergency vehicles to the spot. The next time around another car
failed to see the yellow flag, went in too hot, and spun once he
finally saw what was happening. The car behind him had to take
evasive action to avoid contact so he drove off track and smashed into
the wrecker, damaging it and totaling his car. “
Since track authorities take a dim view of crashing into their wrecker the entire race field was banned for the rest of the day.
The second day started out with promise and then evaporated as Jason was forced in the grass to avoid hitting a car that wasn’t even in his race:
“… a slower out of class car offered me
a clean line around the outside of turn 15 which i gladly accepted.
however he was unable to hold his inside line, drifted outside towards
me, and i was forced to drive off track to avoid contact. As a result
I spun across the track (fortunately no one was behind me), nearly
flat spotted my tires, and wound up deep in the wet grass. By the
time i got back on track i was hopelessly behind the leaders and had
little choice but to circulate the track in relative solitude until
the checker flag. Despite all this rotten luck i still managed a
sixth place finish thanks to attrition and a couple of late passes on
the last lap.”
Inside the car view from Sunday’s first race:
2012 vir march madness – spec e30 from jason tower on Vimeo.