May 18 and 19 marked the second weekend of the season for NASA Racing at Putnam Park, Ind., a Great Lakes/Midwest crossover event.
For qualifying on Saturday, the racers had a damp but drying track. American Iron Extreme driver Chris Griswold with his fox body Mustang(1:18.321) and American Iron driver TJ Bain in his Pontiac Firebird (1.19.890) both ripped off a flyer on the last lap to take pole positions in AIX and AI, respectively. The times were good for second and third overall behind the ST1 Viper of Mark Kirby. The grid was set by time for the race later that day with Bain outside Griswold in the second wave.
The race was close between Bain and Erik Sjoblom, but Bain was able to work his way through traffic and pulled out the win and fast lap with a 1:18.424. The order at the finish was Bain in first, Erik Sjoblom in second and Robin Burnett third.
In AIX, Chris Griswold took the win with a fast lap of 1:15.408, followed by Todd Rogers and Jeffrey Henderson. Team Dominy took first in the first Spec Iron race held at Putnam Park and set the track record at 1:23.955.
Qualifying Sunday had great weather as Erik Sjoblom got the AI pole with a 1:18.424 in his Ford Mustang over Bain and Todd Rogers in his Mustang. All were within .1 seconds of one another. The start of the race had Sjoblom slip in behind Griswold at the start with Bain, Rogers and Burnett close behind into Turn 1. The top three were within a few car lengths for the entire race. Rogers eventually grabbed second from Bain and challenged Sjoblom for the lead, but could not make it stick. The AI race finished with Sjoblom crossing the line in front of Rogers by only .150 seconds and Bain just another car length behind. Burnett took fourth, Todd Davis fifth, and Mike “Sunday” Sarsfield sixth. Todd Rogers took the best lap time with a 1:19.214.
In the AIX class Chris Griswold got the pole and won the ensuing race with Michael Gerowitz taking second and Henderson taking third. Henderson was only able to race three laps and had to retire early due to a broken oil pump pickup. Griswold’s power steering pump fitting broke halfway through the race, so he had to run the second half with no power steering.
