Weekends with the family

The definition of "Spending quality time with the family" seems to vary from house to house but what's important is that everyone must enjoy themselves. While Jon is building his newest ride, that being a BMW Spec E30 which is quickly becoming one of the hottest new spec classes with what will most certainly be a huge success my wife and I took the time to go spend the weekend with our son Will at his place of work... Thunderhill Raceway. Naturally, as long as we were going to a track we decided we might as well take along a race car so why not take Lucky?

On the way home Mari Chris and I stopped by the Pleasanton Car Show and swap meet to look around and while . We had some lunch and looked at lots of great rides and while there I found a new Shelby GT350R model car that I just had to add to my collection.




The weather was awesome and as usual the NASA crowd is always fun and exciting to hang out with. Besides getting to visit with Will and see his new office located in the top of the main building overlooking the track which by the way was just repaved I spent most of my time either racing Lucky or visiting with friends old and new.




Lucky is always a blast to drive and thruout the day Will and I enjoyed spending time together tweaking on Lucky until he was faster and faster. Getting a car to handle and perform better is great but doing it with your son is the best part of all.





Lucky dives inside a Cobra to make the pass in turn 10.


In between races we had time to sit with other friends and spectators in the stands which sit in the shade of some trees overlooking the new modifications made leading onto the straightaway. For the first time Will was trying out someones BMW in the new Spec E30 class and it was one hell of a race too. Will and Jon wanted to learn as much as they can about the characteristics of these cars to help in the building of Jon's new car. As usual Will catches on pretty fast (No pun intended) and even though Will was driving a car with a LOT of miles on the engine against his good friend Donny Edwards in a car with a fresh motor they both set new lap records on the fast new surface and in the process left the entire rest of the field so far behind it looked like they had left. From what I saw this is going to make for some awesome racing.

Donny Edwards telling his mechanic what he needs changed.

One of the cars I enjoyed watching run this weekend that run at the same time Will's race took place was this beautiful new version of Factory Five's Super Unlimited car which by the way, whipped all the high dollar whale-tale Porsches and there was a bunch.





Mari Chris always has fun where ever she is but both of us enjoy riding our bikes in the paddock which helps work off some of those calories from the free NASA barbeque on Saturday nights.

NASA events are always a lot of fun not to mention anytime I get behind the wheel I am smiling but this weekend was made even more rewarding for me when I looked up and saw my buddy Tom Dragoun of 7's Only Racing setting up next to me. Even though I have known the guys at 7's Only for years, Tom and I became good friends last year when he used his tractor trailer rig to haul cars down to Mexico to run in La Carrera Panamericana. Since Tom and I were in the Coyote Convoy all the way to the bottom of Mexico we had lots of time to form a great friendship. Tom will be hauling about 11 cars again this year and being their team support as well one of which is our friend Carson Scheller and his Original Panam Ford.



Man, seeing Tom and his truck sure brought back some wonderful memories.

One of the guys I got to meet is Gregory Clough, president of FUN CUP INC. I had the opportunity to spend time with Gregory and learn about this new racing venture that is quickly taking over in Europe and America. Don't be fooled, like the old saying says, do not judge a book by it's cover. These awesome little "VW Bugs" are anything but slow. Will's boss, Dave Vodden recently went to Europe to drive these little creatures on steroids and has nothing but great things to say about them.