By Tom Suddard and Andy Hollis

We declared “Mission Accomplished” last night, but we were still a long way from the finish line: Six tracks stood between us and a Tire Rack One Lap of America Presented by Grassroots Motorsports finish, and our goal was to put our stock Hyundai Elantra N as far up on the leaderboard as possible.

But we’d survived the snow storm and made it past the halfway point, so we were in high spirits as we rolled into Motorsport Park Hastings. This Alan Wilson-designed track in Hastings, Nebraska is dead flat and in the middle of nowhere (its closest neighbor is a grain silo), and sight lines range from “terrible” to “pretty great” depending on what crop is growing in the middle and how far it is from harvest.

The perfect venue to challenge a field of sleep-deprived One Lappers like us!

After yesterday’s excitement at High Plains, our goal was to have as boring of a day as possible: Go on track, drive in circles, then throw our bags back in the car and start the 687-mile transit to Road America. The less drama, the better. 

Andy went out in the morning session, and did exactly what he’s famous for: Robotic precision, tidy lines, and a gentle, generous relationship with his tires that ensured he, the car and the Bridgestones all reached their peak just as he crossed the finish line. 26th overall and first in class–just what we needed.

Then it was Tom’s turn, and his lack of track knowledge showed. Tom only had three laps of experience at MPH, which meant some, uh, artistic lines on his early laps with a few dropped wheels to show for it. Despite the chaos, though, Tom finished 27th overall while still landing first in class. Case closed, book finished, bags packed–we lit the afterburners and started our 10-hour-long transit.

But some of our fellow competitors weren’t so lucky. One Lap is a marathon, not a sprint, and the paddock was filled with desperate asks for impossible parts.

One near miss was Andrew Brownfield’s detour through the grass in the Toyota PE Motorsports Supra, filling his radiator with more weeds than a SweetGreen before completing his session down on power with coolant temps spiking. After a lengthy cleanup operation, the team seems to have avoided any permanent damage. 

Among other calamities, the team Goodyear Porsche 911 Turbo lost, well, its Turbo, sidelining the team while they threw themselves at the mercy of the closest Porsche shop in Denver. It’s still unclear if they’ll be able to rejoin the competition. 

And speaking of expensive parts, Team Michelin’s C8 Corvette showed up hours late to High Plains Raceway, and they were missing a wheel: After breaking an OEM carbon-fiber wheel on a highway expansion joint, they limped the car to the shop of Mike Pettiford, a longtime Colorado SCCA racer, and found an alloy replacement wheel.

After swapping their tire over to the new wheel, they sped back to the track and made it on course with minutes to spare, taking a penalty for running out of their assigned group, but narrowly avoiding a DNF.

Not to be outdone, Dave Marcus and Mike King had an even bigger issue with their C8 Corvette ZR1 when they stripped the tread off their Pirellis so spectacularly that it attracted a dozen onlookers in the paddock and spawned a flurry of social media posts.

We’re still not exactly sure what happened, but something about 1000+ horsepower and MPH’s surface meant they got to the creamy nougat center in only three short laps.

Last we heard, they were limping the car a few hours to Omaha, Nebraska, where they planned to pick up a set of the OE fitment Michelin PS4S from a Chevy dealer. They’re not going to get too much sleep tonight.  

We completed our 10-hour transit without incident, walking into our hotel at about 11 pm. Other teams weren’t so lucky. Animal strikes, police, road debris and potholes slowed some teams to a crawl, with 1, 2 or even 3 am arrivals inevitable. 

At least we’re not all racing at one of the fastest tracks in the country tomorrow…oh right, we are. 

 

Tire Rack One Lap of America points: A quick explation

What do the points mean? Is a 150-point lead on the next car in a class a lot? Here's what the One Lap rulebook says:

A variation on the NASCAR system, which awards points deep into the field, is best suited for One Lap.

For each event, first place is awarded points equal to 5x the number of official entrants. Each succeeding position is awarded 5 points less than the previous. Thus, if there are 95 entrants, then first place for a particular event would be awarded 475 points with second place receiving 470, third 465 and so on.

Similarity, class points for a particular event are awarded with first place receiving points equal to 5x the number of official entrants in that class.

Thus, if there are 10 entrants in SSGT1 class, first place at each event would receive 50 points, second 45 and so on. A DNS (Did not start) or DNF (Did not finish) receives 0 (zero) points.

To be overall winner and class winner will be determined by the total high scores accrued from each of the contests along the route. Ties will be decided by the total elapsed time in competition events. Trophies will be awarded for overall standings and class winners.

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