Year-End Competition Tightens at November Autocross #12

Cal Club Autocross returned to Auto Club Speedway in Fontana on Sunday, November 12 for its second-to-last event of the 2017 season. Over 100 people took to the Matt Ales designed course highlighted by an efficient use of space with a tight and tidy layout.

Morning runs witnessed some come-from-behind victories in a couple of classes. In B Street action, James Yom hit a total of 12 cones in his first three runs before cleaning up his act on the fourth run to best Tom Tanquary by almost six-tenths. Stephen Yeoh was the early leader in Street Touring Sport, but Kai Hur had other plans as he improved in each of his four runs to edge Yeoh by .168 in the final lap.

Anthony Scopelli led the five-driver Street Touring eXtreme class after three runs, but fell back to third place as Matthew Gonzalez dropped over one second from his third to fourth runs to leap up to the top. Terence Chang also laid down his best time on his last run to finish six-tenths back of Gonzalez, and .005 ahead of Scopelli.

Neelu Yeoh came out of the gate strong in PAX Ladies and cruised to a 1.2 second victory over Lisa Berry, while George White stood on his third run to win Super Stock R by half a second over Cathy Strovers. Brian Howlett improved in each of his four runs to win Historic 1 by nearly six seconds over Cal Woolsey.

Driving ‘Dark Matter’ (aka the 350Z), Jeff Stuart shot to the top in PAX class—a class with eight national champions no less—pushing past early leader Anthony Porta for the .342 win (Stuart could have extended his lead even further but coned his fastest run). Jonathan Lugod moved up to third place with a fast fourth run, falling shy of Porta in second by just .072.

Following the lunch break, two junior karters took to the course. After driving in Junior B for all of this season, Samuel Barrish made the transition to Junior A for the first time, and finished second behind Robert Ekstrand.

Greg Nelson had the advantage in Classic American Muscle Contemporary after three runs, but Scott Mullens put in a flyer on his fourth run to scurry past Nelson for the .726 victory. Chad Ryker took the lead in Classic American Muscle Traditional on his third run, and extended his lead even further in the last run by nearly nine-tenths over Efrain Diaz.

Randy Gonzalez led wire-to-wire in A Street, standing on his second run to win the four-driver class by 1.1 seconds over Danny Castillo. In California Street Touring, ru

mor has it that Brandon Porambo secured the year-end class championship with his .340 victory over Jonathan Hartendorp.

Michael Yanase was going 11/10ths right from the start in Street Touring Roadster, combining for six cones and a DNF in three of his four runs. Despite just one clean run, Yanase managed to hold on for the win in the eight-driver class, besting Reed Gibson by .176. Matt Ales finished in third place with Bob Endicott in fourth.

Cleaning up a dirty first run, Julian Manolov claimed top honors in Street Mod Combined with a .769 victory over Matt Davis. Myles Wakayama set the pace in F Street on his first run, en route to a 2.3-second win over Robert Kuykendall. E Street was another close contest that came down to final runs, as Leonard Cachola went faster in each of his subsequent runs to edge Dennis Hubbard by a mere .036.

Cal Club Autocross concludes the 2017 season on Sunday, December 3 back at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana.

We would like to thank Randy Gonzalez for being event master, Matt Ales for designing course, Tom Tanquary for being our safety steward, Neelu Yoeh as worker chief, Rick Brown as timing and scoring chief, Kai Hur as tech chief, Maggie Jardine as registration chief, gate chief Kevin Pao, and our novice coordinator Leonard Cachola for their hard work this weekend. These volunteers are the people who made this event possible, and if any of these positions interest you, let us know so we can get you more information!