That title made it sound like this thing was gonna get weird, but it isn’t going to be any weirder than usual. After I told him to only send me twenty images from the Utah 6 Hour, he sent me twenty-two! TWENTY-TWO!!! HOW DARE HE! Anyway, because it’s easier to upload all of the photos in a folder than it is to not, here’s his oversized gallery from the Utah 6 Hour.
More NASA Utah and Utah 6 Hour goodness! Fast cars, bright lights, and possibly the most dramatic photo of Jeff Burton anyone has ever taken!
I’ve got the photos for sale! Purchase one, or several, and help keep this crazy ship afloat.
Michael Wells sent us over some photos from the last NASA Utah weekend, including the Utah 6 Hour. Check em out!
It was the beginning of the best ten days on this year’s calendar. Acting as the meat in a sandwich where the delicious bread is a Salt City Drift event and Pirelli World Challenge, and the condiments are a NASA Utah weekend, was the annual Utah 6 Hour. Now a staple on the NASA Utah calendar, the Western Endurance Racing Championship stop provides a unique opportunity for the drivers and fans to drive into the night, and see nothing but lights piercing the dark Tooele night. And if you were out around turn 5 around 10:30-11, you would’ve seen me with a string of LED lights strewn about my torso. I was easily identifiable, for safety! Anywell, let’s talk about who took home a trophy!
Lyfe Motorsport was out with one of their own Spec Z’s (the Towne Storage Z) and supporting the #99 DLG Racing Z. Showing that 350Z is life, the Lyfe backed teams finished 1-2 in E0! The Towne Storage Z completed 147 laps in the 6 hours, with the DLG Z four laps behind them.
In E1, completing 153 laps in the allotted time, was the #65 E46 BMW of Strom Motorsports. It was the teams second win of the day, having taken the win in the GTS5 class during the Lightning sprint race earlier.
The Fit is fucking go! The #12 Honda Fit of Honda Performance Development completed 143 laps in 6:01:09.257, and probably had to stop for fuel once.
It was a battle of the Miatas in E3: the mighty and legendary Paul Mitchell versus the bug-eyed RJ Racing Miata. I mean bug-eyed in the nicest way. Look at those lights! Those lights lit the way for 147 laps, and lit their way to victory.
The ENP had one entrant, the Valkyrie Autosport Elan NP01. Despite the teams best efforst, the little prototype went behind the wall after 29 laps.
This was a battle: the TruSpeed Autosport 997 Cup car versus the Makes & Models Huracan Super Trofeo. A tried and true chassis versus a sprint race car. WERC class leaders one win away from clinching their championship versus a team with multiple regional championships under their belt? If you’ve been paying any attention to how these posts go, you know that by seeing the picture of the TruSpeed car that they won. Not only did they win the Utah 6 Hour, they locked up the ES Class championship. Congratulations to them!
Now we arrive at the car I was most excited to see running. Toby Crawford, driver of the Pink Ribbon Racing/Makes & Models Subaru BRZ, told me that there was a Ginetta G57 at UMC and that it was racing in the enduro. It was the Ryno Racing team, sponsored by Design Masonry. The G57 is based on Ginetta’s LMP3 design, and is probably a lot the same.* The big difference is that the LMP3 spec Nissan engine, rated at 420bhp, has been replaced with a Chevrolet LS3, which makes 150 more horsepower than the LMP3 engine. I was excited to see and hear the 900kg prototype tearing through the night, but unfortunately the car was retired after just 72 laps.
And there it is, another six hour race in the books! I’m already looking forward to next year. A tremendous shout out to all the race officials, corner workers, and safety crew for sticking it out until midnight. A big thank you to the family, friends, and well wishers who came out and watched the race and cheered the teams on. And all of the congratulations to all of the drivers and crew members for racing in the longest race on the NASA Utah calendar! There were over thirty cars entered in the race, and they all took the green flag. It was, as always, an amazing experience.
We can’t wait for next year.
YES! After… However long it has been, there will be some new content! Specifically coverage of some killer events. On Saturday we had NASA Utah racing, where we saw Tom Kaminski debut his new, HKS inspired livery.
On Friday night the Salt City Drift season soldiered on, and we saw David Curtis break out his Corolla.
And on Saturday night we had the Utah 6 Hour, a Western Endurance Racing Championship race that ran deep into the night. Makes & Models pitted their Super Trofeo Huracan, a car that normally runs sprint races, against the field and the clock.
We’ve got a ton of coverage of all of those events coming up this week! KEEP YOUR INTERNET BOX POINTED IN OUR DIRECTION!
The beach is dumb anyway
We love having Michael Wells contributing photos, because he sends us stuff like this. Plus he’s a great guy to hang out with at the track.
It’s been quite a week here: NASA Utah AND WERC endurance racing coverage, and a more sobering post reminding us all that a good day of racing can turn very quickly. We’re getting ready to spend the weekend at Miller Motorsports Park, covering the Pirelli World Challenge races. To tide you over until we get our coverage ready, we’ve got a bonus gallery of NASA Utah Round 6 and WERC 6 Hour photos by Mr. Michael Wells of MCWells Photography. Both Michael and myself, along with such favorites as Gavin Pouquette and Chance Hales will be out there this weekend, and you should join us. General Admission tickets are only $20 a day, or $30 for the weekend. More pricing info is available on the MMP site. We’re hoping to see you out there!
It comes once a year, and everyone looks forward to it. It’s a night full of excitement and fun that lasts into the wee hours of the morning. Usually some bad things happen throughout the course of the evening, but everyone looks back on the night through rose colored glasses.
Halloween? New Years Eve? That one guy Bill’s birthday rager?
Hell no! It’s the Western Endurance Racing Championship six hour endurance race! A rare chance to see racing under the serene and black Tooele night sky. And also pit stops, something you don’t normally run across at your usual NASA weekend. All very exciting stuff!
Since starting in the middle of the night and running til sunrise is a generally bad idea (how ready to go are you at midnight?), this started at 6PM and ran until midnight. The fading golden hour light allowed those gathered to spectate a chance to see the cars in some dramatic light.
DRAMA! Anyway, on to some sweet, sweet pit lane action!
Things were the same, no matter who was coming into the pits: one person hops the wall, and adds fuel while someone stands a few feet away and points a fire extinguisher at them. A fresh driver and another crew member hop the wall to get the old driver out and the new one in. Someone might clean the windshield, and there was usually one photographer hanging around. However, not all pit boxes are created equal.
There were small teams, with only the bare minimum crew.
Then you had the GMG pit box, which was a full on, pro level pit stall. A lot of crew members, an engineer, racks of tires, fuel hoses and lens flare!
But most teams were like Paul Mitchell and Team Unfair Advantage: crewed almost entirely by the drivers.
The QMD/034 Motorsport even had Gavin Pouquette with them! Say hi Gavin!
*sigh* moving on…
The action shifted back to the track after the teams cycled through their pit stops.
Where some people were not adjusting to the creeping darkness!
Not everybody was having brake issues though. Heading into Black Rock, almost everyone was lighting up their brake rotors!
With the light practically gone it was time to break out the tripod, open up the shutter for longer and longer periods, and take a stab at who was flying past you in the blackness.
Some cars were easy to identify. That blue streak was from the LED strip one the B-pillar of the QMD/034 Motorsport A4. However, most cars were just noise points of light.
LED light bars are cheap, and readily available. That means most everyone was running them so they could cut through the nearly impenetrable night. This also meant that anyone, or anything, looking into the oncoming traffic was treated to brief periods of blindness. The trails that the hyper white LEDs cut into the darkness were impressive, but looking away from traffic provided and even more impressive display. I didn’t stick around to see the checkered flag, but I do know who won!
In EO, the #61 BMW completed 153 laps, which put them one lap up on the #44 Inverter Technology/Achilles M3 and secured the win.
The #65 BMW, representing Bullet Perofrmance took home the win in E1.
The QMD/034 Motorsports A4 was the sole E2 competitor, and therefore took home first AND last. Impressive.
E3 was the deepest class with eight competitors, it was also extremely diverse. In a field that included several Miatas, an Audi 90, and even a E90 BMW M3, it… Well, to be honest it came as no surprise that the HPD Race Club Fit took the win. It completed 140 laps, and probably had to stop for fuel once.
The GMG R8 LMS Ultra completed 169 laps in the six hours of the race, and recorded a 1:54.514 lap during the race. Suffice it to say, they won their class, and the race overall.
AND FINALLY, we come to ESR. ESR, like E2, only had one competitor. However, the Competitive Edge car managed to record the 5th quickest lap of the race!
And there you have it folks, six hours of racing condensed into less than 1000 words. This might be easier to digest, and more convenient to read while at work, but this does not compare to actually being there. As soon as we have the schedule for next year, we’ll let you know, and we’ll all have a little party while out there! It’ll be fun!
GUESS WHAT!!!! We’ve got Round 6 coming up this weekend! How could it get any better? you might be asking yourself. Perhaps an endurance race would sweeten the weekend? Hold on to your butts folks, because we’ve got a 6 hour Western Endurance Racing Championship event happening on Saturday!
Calm yourselves! To tide you over until then, we’ve got a gallery of shots Michael Wells sent our way. ENJOY THEM! And we’ll see you this weekend.
