JordonMusser

Front Page News



Well we are back after a LOT of work. The crew here at Momentum Autosports put in nearly a month of 12+hr days with only one day off. The last 3-4 days were working around the clock, a few of us only got 3 hours of sleep over the final 60hrs. We had the cars done and loaded at 5:55am, our truck driver showed up at 6am to head to MSR-C for pre St Pete testing.

Testing went flawless, we killed 2 sets of tires over our 2 day test with out any problems. Cars are good for the mid 2:teens at MSR-3.1 mile.

After packing up from MSR-C, we haded to St Petersburg, FL for the first World Challenge race. Right off the bat Alec Udell (who just turned 15) was in the top three in practice. He later clicked off a lap good enough for an easy third in qualifying. We were all really happy. The cars weren't even running 8 days prior, and we had never seen the Pirelli tire until we showed up in FL. Unfortunately the line lock stuck on Alec during the first race start causing him to get shuffled back. In lap 3 he tagged a wall which broke the strut. 2 laps later he lost control of the car due to a failed strut and hit the wall- hard. Even after turning only 5 laps he ended up with the 3rd fastest lap of the race. On Sunday we had the car put back together after a late night, be we were never able to get the power steering system 100% back together right and Alec lost power steering on lap 3 and had to retire.

Ardee our beloved elder driver(snicker) wadded the car up in the first practice. But to his credit he shook it off and we got the car put together for Qual. He never put a wheel wrong the rest of the weekend and finished with two top 10s.

The cars were awesome for so little testing. Alec probably had a shot at winning, and definitely a podium. Look for big things as the year goes.

Due to conflicts, we won't return to World Challenge until Mosport in May. We are hard at work improving the cars and testing until then... oh, and straightening them back out

Interested in a T-shirt??!!
http://www.shopmomentumautosports.com
and click on Apparel.

Want to see the awesome pics from St Pete?
http://momentumracegroup.com
and click on galleries, then St Pete.

We will have video up of the test soon, and the race (on-board and the like!)

Be sure to visit our facebook page, www.facebook.com/momentumautosports and "like" it as we update it all the time during the race weekend with pictures and results, etc.

2010_5thgen

put the car in the wall on the first race? ouch. hope things go better next race. and....shirt please!

JordonMusser

Ardee put it in the wall with in the first 5 laps, at least Alec waited till the first race *snicker*

2010_5thgen

man, all that work to get the cars up and running, and out in the first race. how long to fix the damage?

JordonMusser

40-60 hours i am guessing. That is racing! esp on a street course.

2010_5thgen

wow. isnt there a way to design things so the time gets cut down more? or is it already designed to be quick assembly/ disassembly?

jcamere94z28

Wow guys... well... that's racing anything can happen! Get those puppies ready for the next one.

I guess it is part of racing a "Stock'ish" car? I mean.. this isn't Nascar we are talking about.

jcamere94z28

Wow guys... well... that's racing anything can happen! Get those puppies ready for the next one.

I guess it is part of racing a "Stock'ish" Production car? I mean.. this isn't Nascar we are talking about.

2010_5thgen

yeah but theres gotta be a way to make the rebuilding process quicker by making easy connect and disconnect of things. unless its in the rules. i dont know.

JordonMusser

Correct, this is a stock unibody. 40 hrs isn't all that much to disassemble the front end, straighten frame, re assemble with new parts (and hammer straight some stuff) and then re align. We also will be doing our normal post and pre race maintenance (another 40hrs per car).

jcamere94z28

^ I don't know much of inner workings of racing but it you say it isn't much then I'll take your word for it.

I am sure they got some tricks figure out by now.... i hope!

JordonMusser

I might add that we can repair a car much faster in a rush. Ardee crashed @ 9am and we had him back together by 3pm.

jcamere94z28

now.... why can't dealers work that fast???

2010_5thgen

so this wreck was more severe than a fix and get back out on the track the same day, right? are you allowed to repair the car during the race and get it back out on the track?

JordonMusser

Race is too short to worry about fixing and getting back out there. we actually got the car repaired, but the power steering had issues that we didnt find out about until it was too late to find the correct parts. We carry a LOT of spares, but we didnt have what he needed. We had already used several back up parts on the first wrecked car.