VARAC 41st Vintage Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park – June 16th to June 19th Race Report

The Enhanced Performance, Good Cars Only, Gabo Solutions, STANMECH Technologies, Melanoma Canada #77 Formula Mazda Team had an outstanding weekend at the VARAC 42nd Vintage Grand Prix, held at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park (CTMP). We were placed in the Formula Classic Race group (Group 6). We had registered our #77 Formula Mazda in the VARAC Formula Classic group. There was a total of 31 cars in our race group including, Formula Fords, F2000’s, F1200’s, a Super Vee and several Formula Mazda’s as well as a few other historic open wheel cars.  The weather ranged from raining to beautiful sunny days with temperatures ranging from 20°C to 27°C. 
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Over the course of Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, we were on track a total of 9 times; 3 on-track practices during the Thursday test day, followed by one practice and on qualifying session on Friday, Race 1 & 2 on Saturday and Races 3 & 4 on Sunday. Our race class included some very nice open wheel race cars.

Tom Pixley's 1978 Wheeler Super Vee

On the Thursday test day, the weather was mixed with some sun in the morning and some amazing rain in the afternoon with a high of 20°C.  Take a look at this YouTube link !!!!

Our best lap for the test day was a 1:24 – pretty respectable lap time with older tires from our 1st race weekend of this year. 

Friday morning, the weather was quite nice for the majority of the day – we went out for practice on sticker tires with the objective of scuffing them in, so we weren’t really looking to set a very fast time. As a result, we set a time of 1:29.132, which was still the best time for the session of all the other cars. During our qualifying session, we ended up with a fair qualifying time of 1:24.654, placing us in P1 in our race group and 1st in class.

The weather on Saturday was sunny and quite cool with a high of just 17°.  During Race 1, we installed another new set of tires to scuff those in for the weekend. We pulled away comfortably from the field on the first lap, we finished P1 in our race group and P1 in our class with best lap time of 1:27.274. During Race 2, once again we pulled away from the field on the first lap and finished P1 in our race group and P1 in our class with a best lap time of 1.25.535. 
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The weather on Sunday was just beautiful with sunny skies and a high of 23°.  During Race 3, we set a best lap time of 1:24.879 finishing P1 in out race group and P1 in our class.  During Race 4, the lead from flag to flag setting a fast lap time of 1:24.454, finishing in P1 in our race group and in our class. All in all, a superb race weekend!

​This is our 1st race weekend raising money for Melanoma Canada, we are proud to say that we collected $420 on behalf of this charity. Please click on this link for more information regarding our partnership with Melanoma Canada.

​A special thank you to our guest crew chief for the weekend Jack Brokenshire.  

And thanks to Bill Davis & Shirley Vallis of Vallis Motor Sport for their trackside support during the VARAC VGP and to Canadian Tire Motorsports Park for hosting such a fantastic, safe event!!  And last, but certainly not least, we want to thank our long-suffering family which allows us to continue to race……….