The Introne Family: Steve Wins Twice at NHMS

This last race weekend was an interesting one. The weather on Sat. was horrible - cold and pouring rain all day. Only 7 cars had registered for Steve's group, which is low (usually there's 10-15.) On Sat, only 4 had shown up, and for qualifying in the morning, just 3 went out on the track - Steve, our good friend Kevin, and Carl. 4 laps into qualifying, Kevin was following Steve through turn 2, hit water running down the track, spun and hit the concrete wall. He was going 95mph when this happened. His car was extremely mangled, and he was taken off in an ambulance. Thankfully, he was ok - just a bad headache. (His helmet hit his camera mount on the rollbar and dented his helmet.) The workers cleaned everything up, then sent Steve and Carl back out. Not 2 laps later, Carl is following Steve through the same turn, hits water and goes into the concrete wall himself! Again, mangled car and Carl taken off in an ambulance - he was ok.

So for Saturday afternoon's race, that left Steve as the only car. In all our years of racing, we have never seen a 1 car race in SCCA! Steve went out, did his pacelap, then got the green all by himself. After 10 laps, they called the race, gave him the checkered flag and wrapped it up. Steve wins! Not a very exciting win - but hey, he was the only one that kept his car on the track in one piece during qualifying... sometimes, that's all that matters!

Here's Steve doing his one-car pacelap to start the race. =)

Steve wins! They even sent him out to do a victory lap - after he just drove 10 laps by himself! HA!

On Sunday, Don - the 4th car, entered the race with Steve. So there were actually 2 cars in the race. Whoo hoo! Too bad it still wasn't much of a competition. After about 4 laps, Steve was way ahead and Don couldn't catch him. So again - Steve won!

What's ironic, is that Kevin had the regional championship sewn up until this all happened. Now that Steve adds 2 wins to his points total, Steve takes the lead. It all comes down to the last race in 2 weekends. Depending on how Steve and Kevin each finish, will determine who takes home the championship. Same thing happened last year, and Kevin inched out Steve. Will Steve be able to inch out Kevin this year?

Here's Steve's victory lap on Sunday.