American Iron saw several new competitors, new cars and faster laps than ever in March. Dennis Ramsey and Craig McIntyre successfully completed NASA comp school in their S197 builds and Richard Bailey brought the beautiful No. 26 car, a fresh new body-style build from Iconic Mustangs. The smooth, 2.21-mile track provided a great arena for pony car exercise with safe passing zones and 14 challenging corners. Patrick Wehmeyer and Scott McKay brought the red fox bodies to duel with the field of newer Mustangs.
When the green flag dropped for qualifying, Bruce Byerly put the No. 77 Boss 302R powered FR500S Ford on top of the field with a 1:38.876 second time around the club course. Wehmeyer edged out McKay for the outside front row. In McKay’s first visit to Homestead with the carbureted No. 71 Ford, he battled Wehmeyer and came out on top while Byerly motored away from the fray for the win.
In the second feature race, Wehmeyer started up front after running the quickest race lap, but Byerly bolted after running door to door with the familiar No. 95 lightweight car followed by McKay, Ramirez and Pace.
On Sunday, Ramsey got up to speed quickly in his first day of NASA racing with a qualifying time of 1:41.7, less than a second behind Ramirez. No. 95 Wehmeyer ran quickest to out-qualify Byerly and McKay. The top three qualifiers would battle it out and finish with Byerly racing to the win, with Wehmeyer earning the fast lap award. Traffic and caution flags played a role and allowed the hard-charging fox bodies to close the gap despite McKay driving on undersized Toyo RA1s that looked left over from a half-decade-ago Factory Five season. Wehmeyer did some farming, which finally claimed the splitter on the unique removable front end of the No. 95 car.
Sunday saw McKay bring home the win with the fast lap award and Jose Ramirez on the podium solidly in second. Ramsey earned his first podium in his second AI race.
