NASA 25 Hours of Thunderhill

I crewed for the defending class champion #40 RA Motorsport at the 25 hours of Thunderhill over the weekend. RA Motorsport as a team had won the E3 class the the past 3 years running. The team entered 4 Mazda Miatas, three as spec Miatas in the E3 class (#27, #35, and #40), and one heavily modified Mazda running an Ecotech motor in the E0 class (#50).


The night before. Still a lot to be done on each car (wiring radios and identification lighting, fixing electrical issues, fixing exhaust leaks, etc.)

 

On the grid, pre race. Starting #1 in class, #32 overall:

Race morning. Most everything ready:

Saturday afternoon, running strong with a mostly clean start.

Sometime during the night (between 1 and 3:30 am), the #50 retired due to something involving brake duct work (I never did catch up on the story).

Routine fuel and driver change stop for the #35:

Unfortunately, with an hour to go, the #35 threw a rod and retired.

The remaining RA Motorsport cars (#40 and #27) on the front straight to take the checkers in formation. #40 P1 in class!

Post-race, looking a little less new than when we started (it didn't look new when we started):

The winning drivers that brought the car home in one piece:

It was exciting to be part of the winning team. There aren't more pictures because it was a rather busy 36 hours from wake up to the race end, with less than 2 hours of sleep. Overall the race was great, with nice (but very cold) weather, relatively few on-track incidents (there were 3 full course yellows to do the corner marshal shift change, then one when a safety truck under local yellow spilled a toolbox on the track). I would say the race went like clockwork and the win went to the E3 team that ran into the fewest issues, but also just happened to be the fastest, too.