 Team MGR Racing-WOT Performance
Wins Again at California Auto Club
Fontana, CA, July 13, 2008. Just four weeks after a dominating weekend at Miller Motorsports Park in Utah, Team MGR Racing-WOT Performance was back at WOT’s home track to consolidate their success in the ASC Unlimited Class this season.
Without the benefit of a test day, it took Manuel Gil del Real just three laps around the renowned California Auto Club (formerly known as California Speedway) 3 mile road course to record the fastest lap of the weekend and take the pole position for Saturday’s race.
“The car was very good right off the box. We had a slight understeer condition in the slower right hand corners, but in all the other faster turns it felt very good. I really like this track, especially the wide open throttle high speed oval section,” said Manuel Gil del Real. It should be noted that the WOT Performance #27 Ford Taurus pole time of 1:45.15 was a full two seconds faster than the team’s pole position time for last year’s race at the same track. Although during the last few laps of the race, Manuel had to drive with a loose right rear caliper that was causing the same rear tire to lock up under hard braking, he still went on to win his third race in a row by a comfortable margin over second place finisher, Bryan Hintz.
 On Sunday morning, the entire team was very relaxed. In the early practice session, Manuel once again, was the fastest of the ASC Racing drivers, still in the 1 min 45 second range despite driving on older practice tires. But no matter how fast the car is, Pete Andreas, the team’s technical director, always keeps working on it and checking everything out. And good thing he did, because he found out that a section of frame where the rear suspension mounts had a significant crack that could have caused the entire rear axle assembly to come loose under strong lateral forces. Definitely, not something you want to see happening turning around the oval at 150 mph.
Sunday’s race start was delayed more than one hour and you could see all the ASC teams, crews and drivers, starting to get a bit antsy about the whole situation. These long delays break the teams’ concentration as they start worrying about missed flights, delayed trips back home and other consequences while they still have a race to race.
When the race finally started, Manuel took the lead right away, albeit, being consistently followed by Bryan Hintz in a repeat of Saturday’s race. This time however, the #27 WOT Performance Ford felt even better than the previous day. No more brake issues and no more understeer in the slow corners. Manuel’s lead kept increasing lap after lap and Bryan Hintz started to drop back a little unable to keep up with him. But as it frequently happens in racing, one second you’re great and the next second you find yourself wondering what went wrong… In Manuel’s case, his clutch disc broke in the middle of the front straight just five laps before the end of the race. His retirement while on the lead, was the only sour note to an otherwise very successful weekend. Nevertheless, Team MGR Racing-WOT Performance still earned two poles, two fastest race laps and one race win; not too bad after all.
After a well deserved summer break, ASC Racing returns to action on Labor Day weekend at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California. For more information about the Team's 2008 schedule, please visit www.MGRRacing.net
Team MGR Racing – WOT Performance would like to thank Rancho Performance Machine, DT Graphyx, Perma Cool, AFE (Advanced Flow Engineering), Inland Driveline, T-Phlo, and all the folks at Keystone Automotive Operations for their support throughout the season. We also want to thank the hundreds of fans in the US, Europe and beyond that have followed the Team's performance this year.
About WOT Performance:
Based in Riverside, California, since its inception in 2001, WOT Performance (WOT) has had the privilege of working directly with celebrities' cars, fleets and individuals to provide services from oil analysis and speed limiting to wheels-up drag racing to wheel to wheel short track, dirt, and road racing. Among other features, WOT's facilities include Fuel Injection services and a chassis Dyno bringing their passion for technology and custom tuning to continue "Taking Performance to the Next Level".
© 2008 MGR Racing. MGR Racing and the MGR Racing logo are trademarks of MGR Racing. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
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