2002 Quaker State 500 Grand Prix at Chandler Motorsports Park

The day started off with a brand new course design. The previous courses were comprised mainly of sharp hairpin turns with medium length straightaways in between and a very long unobstructed front straight. Due to an unexpected number of natural obstructions in the course, the design had to be modified for the safety of the competitors. Also, a chief complaint from the previous events was that the combination of hairpins and straights was killing battery life due to all of the time spent accelerating rather than cruising at high speed or cornering under part throttle. Event Organizer Brady Dohrmann and Timing and Scoring Chief Brandon Smith set out to design a course that would be fast and safe. The result is depicted in the course map below.

There was some debate as to the placement of turns 2 and 6 since there would be cars moving at full speed through turn 6 in close proximity to the braking and turn-in area for turn 2. Although it appears they are quite close in this map, there was sufficient room between them to keep incidents to a minimum. The course was again set up with the plastic semi-conical devices which were used for the last event as well. These seemed to work well as long as sufficient care was taken in the fastening of the devices. This permitted both a minimum of damage to the course and also as little disruption to the cars as possible. While sometimes hitting the turn markers would cause the vehicles to flip, a competitor could often times simply get up on two wheels, or even fly clean over the marker without losing control. The markers were able to function very well for the first half of the event and after a course sweeping and additional taping session, the markers never failed during the entire second half of the event.

As is typical for events hosted at Chandler Motorsports Park, the day started off with the competitors setting up their equipment in the cold pits and charging up their batteries for practice. Both the HPI and Team Associated All-Wheel Drive electric R/C cars are capable of speeds in the 35-40mph range (real, not scale) which is really moving. They are highly tuned and although they're impressively durable, they almost always need some form of maintenance before any big event in order to be reliable. After about 2 hours were spent setting up the pits, course, and getting all the cars prepared, open practice began. Initial tuning was done with the bare chassis in order to permit quick adjustments while dialing in the cars.

Ben's TA car (foreground) and Brian's HPI car (back)

Brian's HPI as seen from above

Brian's HPI car showing how low these cars are to the ground

Scoring Table
Position	Points
1st	10
2nd	7
3rd	5
4th	3
5th	2
6th	1
DNF	0

After practice was completed the first event of the day took place. Although scoring hadn't been finalized at the time, I decided to score all of the events in an F1 style of points assessment for each event and awarding the event championship to the entry with the most points. These points will then carry on to the next event in the series which will be scheduled at a later date. The points are awarded with 10 points for first place, 7 for second, 5 for third, and so on as seen in the table at the right. The first event was a combination time trial and qualifying for the second and third events. The competitors would be permitted to use a single battery pack for the first and second events, so after completion of the first event, the vehicles would proceed to the impound area where they could be observed and protested by other competitors.

The format of the time trials was that each competitor would be given a single lap to round the course to warm up, and then timing would begin as the car crossed the start finish line. They would then have 5 laps to try to achieve the fastest possible lap time. Because of the nature of the course, cars would often times fail to circle the course markers correctly. Rather than score such runs as DNC (Does Not Count), it was decided that as long as the car either circles the marker on the correct side or makes contact with the marker with one or more wheels on any side of the marker, there is no penalty. The reasoning behind this is that although there would be a distance advantage in circling the course on the "wrong" side of the marker, the incredible risk of upsetting the chassis by hitting the marker offsets any possible gain. If the vehicle cleanly misses a marker but is within at least 1 foot of the marker, a one second penalty is added to the time. Blatant course deviations or failure to come within 1 foot of a marker result in scoring the run as a DNC. The final results are seen below.

So for the time trial event, Brian Peters managed to take first place with a comfortable margin of about seven tenths of a second over the next closest competitor, Brady. Brady had a similar margin of victory over Ben, who was likewise a similar distance ahead of the stock-motor car of Rob. The second event was a drag race event of first and third place, second and fourth place, and then the top two cars of each that won their heats. The bottom pair of cars would also go head to head to determine finishing order. Although Brian protested the validity of this event, arguing that it was largely just a matter of who had the fastest motor, launching a powerful car with an 8 inch wheelbase can take a certain degree of skill, plus there was the possibility that highly geared cars, or cars which depleted their batteries in qualifying would be at a disadvantage. In the end, the fastest motor car (Brady's BMW M5) did turn out victorious, however according to the scoring records, Rob's stock motor car did eek out a victory over Ben thanks to Ben's car nearly veering completely off course on the launch. Still, to reflect the fact this event was much less involved than the others, it was scored at half points. Fractions of a point were rounded up.

Brian (left) faces off against Ben (right)

Brady's BMW M5 with 14-turn motor crushes Rob's stock motor Ford Focus

Rob's superior launch control earns him the win over Ben's Ford Mondeo

So after two events, Brian Peters had the lead with 14 points, followed by Brady with 12 points, Ben with 7 points, and Rob with 6 points. The next two events would be scored at their full points values and would truly prove who could be the best at navigating the course in a full field of competitors. After the second event, open practice resumed so the competitors could get their cars dialed in for the 5-lap sprint race in event number three. Brady swapped out his BMW body for his Civic Si body during practice so the BMW would be fresh for the race. During practice, Rob managed to cross paths with Brady's ultra fast Civic and suffered massive body deformation. Although the car was repaired afterwards, ARCRL is considering mandating the use of foam front bumpers and NASCAR side-impact bars in order to improve safety out on course.

Once it was time for the sprint race, the competitors lined up in qualifying order for the start of the 5-lap race. Brian maintained his lead early on, but a rash of vehicle contact and cars launched into tumbles from the course markers lead to quick lead changes and by the third lap, Brady had moved into the lead. He maintained his lead through the third and fourth laps then stopped his car after crossing the start finish line at the end of the fourth lap believing he had just won the race. I announced that he and Brian were on the final lap, not completed with the race just as Brian passed Brady in turn 1 to regain the lead. Brady's powerful M5 was able to regain some ground after this crucial error, but it wasn't looking good as brian had at least a 2 second lead going in to turn 3.

Event #3: 5-Lap Sprint Race
Place	Driver	Points Earned
1st	Brady	10
2nd	Brian	7
3rd	Ben	5
4th	Rob	3

Turn 3 turned out to be where the race was decided however as brian early apexed the turn and flipped his white BMW several times after making hard contact with the course marker. He eventually came to rest on his wheels again, but all the time lost while tumbling off course gave Brady enough time to catch up and move in to the lead. Brady ran a clean race for the remainder of the lap and crossed the finish line just ahead of Brian. Ben's Mondeo took 3rd place, and Rob's Focus crossed the line in 4th.

So after 3 events, Brady had moved in to the lead with 22 points, Brian moved to 2nd with 21 points, Ben held on to third place with 12 points, and Rob rounded out the top four with 9 points. There was only 1 point separating Brian and Brady at this point and the final event would be the most challenging yet. The drivers would be given enough time to charge up a fresh battery and then compete in a 10-lap Sprint race. With the lap times averaging 14-15 seconds or so for the leaders due to traffic, a total race time of 2.5 or more minutes was to be expected. This would keep the event short enough that the drivers would have to be sure to try and run a clean race, but not so long that battery life should be an issue.

With the sky starting to dim as the sun dipped below the housetops, grid order was free for the final event. Ben sat on the pole with his silver Mondeo followed by the white BMW of Brian, a blue Peugeot 206 of Rob's, and finally Brady's M5. Brady's strategy was to hang back for the first few turns while he let all the cars in front of him crash and go flying off course, pass them and run a clean race to the finish. Ben's strategy was to use his position to reach the first corner before anyone else and thus get through the corner while everyone behind him crashed and went flying off course. Rob and Brian both went for the compromise and wishful thinking approach which involves being close enough to the front to have a positional advantage while relying on random chance to assure that everyone except them gets involved in a pile-up in the first turn.

As it turned out, everyone managed to get through the first turn without any incident. After that it became something of a free-for-all however as I did my best just to take note of who crossed the finish line and mark down that they had completed another lap. After the first two laps, it appeared the Brian had gained the early lead with Brady in hot pursuit and Ben close behind. Rob's car seemed to have mechanical problems by the second lap however becoming stranded at the far end of the field. By the third lap Brian made contact with something and exclaimed that his body was jiggedy-jacked and causing the body to drag along the ground. This not only cost him straight line speed, but also had some derelict effects on handling as well. After struggling through a full lap hoping the body would correct itself, Brian was forced into the hot pits to make a quick emergency fix.

Event #4: 10-Lap Race
Place	Driver	Points Earned
1st	Brady	10
2nd	Brian	7
3rd	Ben	5
4th	Rob	0 - DNF (mechanical)

Seconds later he was out and away, but the damage had been done. Although Brian was able to work his way through the field and keep Brady within sight, Brady ran a clean race and finished the 10 laps without incident with Brian a half lap down. Ben was approximately one and a half laps down at the finish time and completed his 10 laps without any problems. Rob was forced to retire the event with three laps completed and was scored as a DNF. During the cool-down laps, Brady's front bumper snagged the pavement and was nearly torn clean off. He was forced in to the pits where the bumper was removed so he could continue his post-race victory laps. Although the Focus had previously been in the running for the Certifit Most Abused Car award for the day, Brady was able to secure victory in this as well for sustaining truly irreparable damage.

Thanks to his clean first place finish in the final event, Brady was able to extend his lead and secure first place for the event with a total of 32 points for the day. Brian finished in a close second place with 28 points followed by Ben with 17 points and Rob with 9 points. Brady celebrated his victory by retiring his winning setup and transferring his motor and electronics over to an entirely new chassis - a rear wheel drive Mini. The Mini only drives half as many wheels as his RS4 chassis, but it's lighter, simpler, and smaller which could potentially give the Mini an advantage in some courses. After the transplant Brady took the mini for a test drive and had nearly uncontrollable power on tap. In it's current configuration it didn't have much more top end than the RS4 but thanks to it's lighter weight, he may be able to gear it up for higher top end and still be able to come near the acceleration of the heavier RS4. Unfortunately, the car's exceptionally narrow track also seems to generate enough grip to spontaneously roll over in some corners which may ultimately limit the Mini's competitiveness.

Although the schedule of events has not yet been set for 2002, more events at Chandler Motorsports Park are planned as well as possible special events at SRS in Scottsdale or Hobbytown in Gilbert. One of the most highly anticipated is the planned 7-minute enduro race at CMP, which will bring motor, gear, and battery selection in to play as it might be possible to finish the event without a battery change on a tall geared stock motor car, but the lap times might be so slow that a faster modified motor car will still be able to make up the time from the pit stop to swap batteries. Points will be carried over from event to event with an ultimate champion to be named at the conclusion of the season some where in the May timeframe. If you are interested in joining the ARCRL, please email to series organizer Brady Dohrmann with a description of roughly where in town you live, what chassis and motor you have, and when you'd like to get started in the series. With any luck, there will be some roadgoing Team Associated RC10's joining the series next month and possibly some brand new 4WD entries as well.

Gridded for the final race of the day	Brady's M5 overshooting turn 1	Brady's Bumperless M3, Brian's M5, and Ben's Mondeo
Earlier in the day, Brady's M5 at the Start/Finish line	Also early in the day, the Mini before it's electronics swap	Brian's BMW M3 and spare race bodies

Quaker State 500 Grand Prix Final Points Tally
Place	Driver	Chassis	Body	Points Earned
1st	Brady	HPI	BMW M5	32
2nd	Brian	HPI	BMW M3	28
3rd	Ben	Team Associated	Ford Mondeo	17
4th	Rob	HPI	Ford Focus	9