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Saturday brought
beautiful weather for racing, and it was good to see all of the attendees together again after several months off. There were nine TCC competitors: five traditional, three prepared, and one T1. With 57 cars in the run group, including many very fast cars, the track was a busy place, to say the least. The fifteen-minute qualifying session was interrupted with a black flag all for several incidents, and TCC did not escape damage. One out of control car hit Chuck Burns trying to pass him going through the uphill esses early in the session. Body damage was the result, but Chuck was able to race later in the day with a highly modified right rear quarter panel. Qualifying resulted in Craig Gelston on the Prepared pole followed by Bill Lex, and in the Traditional class Ed Gelston had the pole, followed by Tom Kriner.
Saturday's Race was no less exciting, with 53 cars taking the green flag, a few less then qualifying because of damage. About mid race someone blew an engine near the end of the back straight, leaving oil on the racing line and in the braking zone. With no time to avoid it, several cars were the immediate recipients of the oil-slicked brake zone. The most significant incident was to a stock car, which ended up about 6 feet in the air backed up on the tire wall and into the worker station on the left just before entering “hog pen”. No one was hurt, but damage to the car was significant. TCC Prepared finishers were Craig Gelston followed by Bill Lex, then Gary Nickerson. The closeness of the racing is reflected in the best lap times of the three, separated by only .491 seconds. For Traditional, it was Ed Gelston, followed by Chuck Burns, then Dave Walter. Joe Danner and Tom Kriner encountered problems that prevented them from completing the race. Dave Sanders took T1.
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