To those who didn't make it, you missed a fun weekend. Tough competition, a bit too much humidity
(for me anyway) and good people made for a fun weekend well worth the drive.
The Ogburns started out the event with some drama and scrambling. Their beautiful 350Z broke a lug stud on a front wheel and the race
(no pun intended) was on to get them ready for their runs. After a couple of false repairs, Dave and David were able to get out on track and have some fun. Once again the sense of community in Autocross came out in spades to help the Ogburns with their trouble. Special thanks to Jim Robinson
(a regular down in Virginia Beach, a fellow 350z pilot, and an all around great guy) for jumping in and getting dirty on behalf of the Ogburns so they could play.
Since this was part of the Commonwealth games medals were awarded instead of trophies.
I am trying to remember the winners off the top of my head so don't freak if I forget someone.
1st in ASP (Gold Medal) Rod McGeorge
([sarcasm on] what a surprise[/sarcasm off]
)1st in STS (Gold Medal) Jeff Chenery
1st in HS (Gold Medal) Scott Hoffman
1st in GS (Gold Medal) Brent Carson
2nd in GS (Silver Medal) Kenny G. (Err I mean Daniel Goelke)
3rd in GS (Bronze Medal) Ray 'Schumaker' Schumin
4th in GS (No medal awarded) Rick Carson
(And of course GS was 1st Mini Cooper S, 2nd Mini Cooper S, 3rd Mini Cooper S, and 4th Mini Cooper S. It isn't until you get down to the fifth spot that you find a soul brave enough to try and field something other than a Mini in GS and that was an 05 VW GTi (Deutschland Represent)1st in CM (Gold) Dave Cutchins
(not sure if he is a VMSC Member)2nd in CM (Silver) Stan Vann
(ditto on the membership)Virginia Tech had one of the stoutest formula SAE cars I have seen in a while. As far as I know it didn't break down once!
1st in ESP (Gold) Dale Blankenship
(Not sure he is a member but he is a good guy, solo chair of the ODR SCCA down in VA Beach and comes up to our events frequently.)2nd in ESP (Silver) Stephen Powell
(Ditto on the membership but has been a regular prior to college taking him down toward the beach to live.)Dave and David took the topless 350 to respectable finishes with the elder proving the value of experience over youth winning both days against Dave and finishing the weekend .351 ahead
(to be fair, it is my underdstanding that the quick repair to 350 was hitting on something under cornering so the Daves took it easy on Saturday until a more appropriate repair could be made).2nd in BS (Silver) David Ogburn
3rd in BS (Bronze) Dave Ogburn
(for those that are curious, the Ogburn game in behind Brian Hertwick (An excellent driver) in a Mazda RX-8)2nd in SS (Silver) Keath Marx
(ya me)3rd in SS (Bronze) Lynn Combs
(not a member but a great guy (with an equally great wife) and the chairman of this event)4th in SS (No Medal
) Donna Marx
(Donna ended up pushing some fancy Porsche Cayman S'es down the results list 
)As for Audie Chenery---Err, uhmm. More to come on that subject.
All in all it was a great weekend, run by a great bunch of people, attended by a great bunch of people and with good weather.
The only negative I have to report from the weekend is a very disappointing Best Western experience. The pool had green algae growing in it (apparently someone left the heater on high for 2 days and it was up to nearly 90 degrees) and both the Chenery's and our room stank. Ours horribly so. I must say the lady at the front desk was very gracious once we asked to check out so we could move to the sleep inn and gave us no hassle on refunding our money for that night.
