Text 92, 221 rader
Skriven 2006-07-04 18:41:00 av Mike Powell (1:2320/105.0)
Ärende: Records fell at Pikes Peak
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Electricity Was in the Air 
Records fell at Pikes Peak, but not the big one 
 
 (link wrap!!!)
 
http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060703/FREE/60703006/
1036/FREE
 
By MARK VAUGHN 
 
AutoWeek | Published 07/03/06, 9:05 am et
 
Yes, electricity was in the air at Pikes Peak. It was also in the hair.
 
?Dude, check out your hair,? said a colleague as we stood on the 14,115-foot
summit of Colorado?s 31st-highest peak, lightning striking nearby ridges all
around us.
 
Indeed our hair, and that of everyone else?s up there in the clouds, was
pointing out in all directions like a bad science project. Static electricity
from the rolling black clouds was snap-crackle-popping, too. This was dangerous
and we weren?t even driving a race car.
 
Recalling our high-school science, we were supposed to either duck-and-cover,
roll on the ground until the fire was out or find an ungrounded vehicle that
would not conduct electricity from lightning. We chose the latter and wound up
in the unlocked 15-passenger van rented by Baja Pro Trucks. If science was
right, and we hoped it was, the rubber tires of the van would insulate us from
an imminent bolt-zapping.
 
We survived?no lightning struck the actual summit?but the top half of the
12.4-mile Pikes Peak International Hill Climb course was swamped. Race
officials wisely closed the course just as yet another ripping storm unloaded
snow, hail and rain in almost the same breath of Mother Nature.
 
It was unfortunate, because the bad weather came after a spectacular morning
for the motorcycle riders at this year?s Hill Climb, the 84th in history and
the 90th anniversary (no races were held during the war years). Bikes or quads
broke five records on the peak, including the first-ever motorcycle run in less
than 12 minutes. 
 
Gary Trachy rode his Husqvarna 660 up the hill in 11:42.841, despite a broken
clutch cable. Former record-holder Micky Dymond on a KTM did this year?s climb
exactly one second slower. Both rode in the big-bore 750 cc class.
 
?I hope he got the record,? said Dymond at the summit, before the times were
announced. ?Now Gary can have it for a year and I?ll take it back next year.?
 
The second-fastest motorcycle class had records, too. Davey Durelle rode up
the mountain in 12.00.007 to break the record in the 450 cc class, riding a
bike he had borrowed the day before from second-place finisher Greg ?Chico?
Chicoine. 
 
?Hey man, he?d?ve done it for me,? Chicoine said of the loaner bike. ?We?re
all brothers.?
 
It was looking like a day for the record books?cool weather, a fantastic road
surface and the 1000-hp carbon-fiber-bodied, tube-frame Suzuki Grand Vitara of
Nobuhiro ?Monster? Tajima. It looked like all that was necessary to break Rod
Millen?s all-time Pikes Peak Hill Climb record of 10:04, set 16 years ago, was
for the sky to not rain, snow or hail. 
 
Of course, the sky immediately did all three.
 
And it did it just as the serious open-wheel and unlimited categories were
getting ready to go.
 
Race officials first red flagged the course to wait for clearing weather. Then
they let a handful of other runners ride up a few at a time during patches that
looked deceptively like clearing weather. Finally, after about an hour and a
half or maybe two hours, they gave up on the upper reaches of the race course
and moved the finish line three miles down the mountain to a spot called The
Devil?s Playground. That shortened the course to about nine miles.
 
The fastest run to the top at that point was by veteran Leonard Vahsholtz,
patriarch of the Pikes Peak racing family of the same name. He drove his Ford
truck to a time of 12:06.599 in the Open class. Vahsholtz strode about the
summit sans jacket looking like a racing version of Pa Cartwright, snow
collecting on his Vahsholtz Racing cap as he relayed course information down
the mountain to race officials.
 
By that time the top third of the course was a slithering mud bog. We can tell
you it?s no fun negotiating this in a big ungainly press bus at 10 mph and we
can?t even imagine what it would be like at 100 mph or more in a rippin? race
car.
 
The mud was only bad on those upper reaches, however. The bottom two thirds of
the course, just about to The Devil?s Playground, werestill drivable,
especially the lower third, almost half of which was paved. So the fastest race
cars were set loose on the shortened track in the drying but still-muddy
conditions. 
 
Almost right away the Dallenbach Boys went one-two in the Open Wheel category,
driving apocalyptic monster-winged, purpose-built DR1 and DR2 race cars, the
same kind Paul Dallenbach drove to the overall title three years ago. This year
Wally Dallenbach took first in Open Wheel with an 8:22.84 while Paul took
second at 8:24.23. That?s on the shorter course, remember.
 
After the open-wheelers, mighty Nobuhiro Tajima, the only entry in the
enticingly named Unlimited category, was last to run. His twin-turbo
all-wheel-drive Suzuki wailed like Godzilla as it flung gravel from Pikes Peak
all over southern Colorado. One big stone cracked the windshield of the
live-broadcast KRDO radio announcer who screamed at 1240 megahertz, ?Holy
Smokes! Holy Smokes! Holy Smokes!? as Monster roared by. 
 
Tajima was clocked at 126.5 mph by the radar gun at a spot called The Picnic
Grounds, 14 mph faster than the closest Dallenbach. He flew across the line at
The Devil?s Playground so fast and so loud that the soaking-wet race fans
forgot about hypothermia and cheered madly.
 
His time was 7:38.88, almost a minute quicker than the next-closest
competitors, but three miles short of the overall record. That evening we asked
him if he was happy nonetheless.
 
?I am 50 percent happy, 50 percent not so, because now the weather is so
good.?
 
This year, as in a similarly wet 2002, officials declared co-champions:
Vahsholtz and Tajima. Both vow to return. 
 
You can watch the whole wild event in an upcoming show on the Outdoor Life
Network, produced by the Dallenbachs and producer John Corser.
 
?I just looked at some of the footage and I?m just excited,? said Wally
Dallenbach of the segments shot in-car, on the road and from two helicopters.
?It?s not just cars going fast, there are stories here.?
 
One story is the latest mile of pavement laid down on the mountain. Pavement
is replacing dirt on Pikes Peak at the rate of a mile a year and the whole road
will be paved by 2012. Will that be the end of racing on Pikes Peak?
 
?We have to adapt,? said race director Phil Layton. ?Just like it?s different
now from what it was 15 years ago, it?ll be different in the future, too. I
think you?ll see things like Trans-Am cars as the pavement creeps farther up,
then, once it?s all covered, maybe even Indy Cars.?
 
And by then, someone will surely get up it in less than 10 minutes. Unless it
snows. 
 
Race Results
 
Pikes Peak International Hill Climb
12.4-mile road course
July 1
 
Exhibition
1. Randy Schranz, 12:18.480; 2. Mike Ryan, 12:43.667; 3. Shane Chapman,
13:36.322; 4. Ed Gaven, 15:49.106
 
Exhibition Bike
1. Casey Yarrow, 12:20.951; 2. Simo Kirssi, 12:27.037; 3. Ron Kirkman,
13:04.633; 4. Arlo Englund, 13:20.042; 5. Kent Peterson, 14:07.350
 
Quad 450
1. Carl Smith Jr., 13:55.587; 2. Victoria Behmer, 14:29.680; 3. Anthony
Medina, 14:31.303; 4. Kenneth Stouffer, 15:09.618; 5. Richard Medina, 15:18.007
 
Quad 500
1. Jim Goertz, 12:07.985; 2. John Angel, 12:13.119; 3. Mike Ell, 12:40.221; 4.
Travis Tollett, 12:48.405; 5. Theodore Bernhard, 12:50.220
 
Side Car
1. David Hennessy, 16:24.404; 2. Allan Wenzel, 16:26.071; 3. Stephen Hennessy,
16:35.341; 4. Lance Brown, 0 (did not finish)
 
Vintage
1. Eddie Mulder, 13:32.454; 2. Mickey Alzola, 13:45.435; 3. Marc LaNoue,
15:07.790; 4. John Hornbrook, 15:50.336; 5. Robert Spann, 16:01.446
 
250cc
1. Jeff Steinberger, 12:43.963; 2. Mark Miller, 12:47.417; 3. Chuck Lee,
12:50.197; 4. Kevin Magner, 14:07.636; 5. James Buchner, 14:20.428
 
450cc
1. Davey Durelle, 12:10.477; 2. Greg Chicoine, 12:42.587; 3. Darryl Lujan,
13:06.638; 4. Mark Woodward, 13:14.276; 5. Trent Johnson, 13:26.850
 
Supermoto
1. Greg Tracy, 12:00.007; 2. Michael Cusack, 13:16.932; 3. Brain Stephenson,
13:31.192; 4. Brain Scollon, 13:52.282; 5. Tim Buhler, 13:59.073
 
750cc
1. Gary Trachy, 11:46.841; 2. Micky Dymond, 11:47.846; 3. Rick Gunby,
12:50.124; 4. Glenn Cox, 13:01.835; 5. Michael Van Bibber, 14:52.400
 
Exhibition VW
1. Mark Miller, 14:08.917; 2. Ryan Arciero, 14:47.954; 3. Danny Sullivan,
14:51.272
 
Baja Pro Truck
1. Charles McDowell, 14:32.968; 2. Gustavo Vildosola Jr., 14:33.964; 3. Jason
Voss, 14:36.271; 4. Rob Reinertson, 14:38.722; 5. Rick Johnson, 14:39.023
 
Pikes Peak Open
1. Leonard Vasholtz, 12:06.599; 2. Jasen Waples, 13:42.399; 3. Dave
Carapeytan, 14:27.651; 4. David Schmidt, 15:28.909; 5. Martin Mennig, 15:52.764
 
Super Stock Car
1. Clint Vasholtz, 12:16.395; 2. Bobby Regester, 12:45.721; 3. Lynn Cowan,
12:56.040; 4. Layne Schranz, 13:00.195; 5. Steve Goeglein, 15:16.402
 
Championship
1. Butch Hardman, 13:43.995; 2. Brian Hardman, 0 (did not finish)
 
Mini Sprint (to Devil?s Playground only)
1. Todd Cook, 8:43.290; 2. Trevor Stewart, 9:36.390; 3. Steven Bennett,
10:30.310; 4. Richard Rychetsky, 0 (did not start)
 
Open Wheel (to Devil?s Playground only)
1. Wally Dallenbach, 8:22.84; 2. Paul Dallenbach, 8:24.23; 3. John Guynn,
8:49.61; 4. Jimmy Keeney, 9:04.21; 5. Steve Grieggs, 9:47.78
 
Unlimited (to Devil?s Playground only)
1. Nubohiro Tajima, 7:38.88
 
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