Monday Morning Rundown: Just Plugging Along

It is Easter Monday and some of you are at work and some of you are at home.  I am home after putting in 4-nights of shift work.  I will be completely honest with you.  I am not in the writing mood this fine day so I will give you the just the basics with some pictures and video to look at this Monday.  Let’s get started…….

The 2nd Annual Defrost Meet will be taking place Sunday April 22nd here in Regina.  We will be completely honest with you and let you know that we haven’t been able to confirm venue and therefore we haven’t released the final details.  So if it seems like we are holding out, we are…..sort of.  Hopefully the snow and cold will stay away and warm weather makes it back into the forecast.

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RyanB tells me his Nissan Fest video will be ready this week.  Keep your eyes open for it.  He tells me it will be ‘cray’.

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Round One of the 2012 Formula Drift season has come and gone and probably one of the biggest surprises of the weekend is how successful Ryan Tuerck was in the Retaks S13.  Tuerck seems to be happy going back to his roots in the LS3 powered Nissan.  Tuerck Qualified first overall but ended up getting eliminated in the Great 8.

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Daigo Saito didn’t disappoint.  The 2008 D1GP champion produced a 3rd place podium finish after eliminating Matt Powers in the 3rd Place battle.  Not bad for Powers considering his team was out at Willow Springs at 4am Friday morning testing before qualifying Friday afternoon.

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Here is the Final Results from the day along with the current season points tally courtesy of FormulaD.com:

Round 1: Streets of Long Beach Event Results

1. Pawlak, Justin Falken Tire Ford Mustang Winner
2. Yoshihara, Daijiro America’s Tire / Falken Tire Nissan S13 Second Place
3. Saito, Daigo Achilles Tire / Bridges Racing Lexus SC430 Third Place

Formula DRIFT Professional Championship 2012 Point Standings After 1 Event

1. Pawlak, Justin Falken Tire Ford Mustang 106 Points
2. Yoshihara, Daijiro Discount Tire / Falken Tire Nissan S13 92 Points
3. Saito, Daigo Achilles Tire / Bridges Racing Lexus SC430 78.50 Points
4. Powers, Matt Need for Speed / Nitto Nissan S14 69.50 Points
5. Tuerck, Ryan Team Retaks Nissan 240SX 66 Points
6. McQuarrie, Tyler Mobil 1 Camaro 64 Points
6. Millen, Rhys Hankook / Rhys Millen Racing Hyundai Genesis Coupe 64 Points
8. Forsberg, Chris NOS Energy Drink / Hankook Nissan 370Z 63 Points
9. Gushi, Ken Scion Racing Scion FR-S 62 Points
10. Moen, Kenneth Lutz Performance Nissan 350Z 61.50 Points
11. Grunewald, Conrad Hankook Tire Chevy Camaro 57 Points
12. Aasbo, Fredric Need for Speed / Papadakis Racing Scion TC 57 Points
12. Kado, Ryan Ryan Kado Racing Nissan 350Z 56 Points
14. Mohan, Kyle Nexen Tire / Mazdatrix Mazda RX-8 55 Points
15. Bakchis, Aurimas “Odi” Bakchis Motorsports Nissan 240SX S14 54.25 Points
15. Yoshioka, Toshiki RS*R Nissan Silvia S15 54.25 Points

Round two of the 2012 season takes place May 11-12 at Atlanta.

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Move over Miss Patrick there is a new girl on the track.  Cyndie Allemann drives the #21 Hitotsuyama Racing Audi R8 LMS in the Autobacs SuperGT Series.  the Swiss Allemann has a driver diary up on Motorsport.com and it is actually an interesting read about her time in Japan.

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Motorsports at a Glance:

IndyCar – Long Beach Grand Prix – April 13-15

Formula One –  Chinese Grand Prix – April 13-15

WRC Argentina – April 27-29

FormulaD – Road Atlanta – May 11-12

GRC – Charlotte, NC – May 26th

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Last but not least I leave you with Marino Franchitti taking the Nissan-powered Highcroft Racing Deltawing out for some public action last month at Sebring.  The DeltaWing is a special 56th entry at this year’s 24 Hours of LeMans June 16-17th.