At NASA SoCal’s June event, a Spec Miata field of 16 cars took to the grid minus points leader Rob Burgoon, whose car suffered suspension damage at the previous race and had not yet been repaired.
That left the points race open for Matt Million, Will Rodgers and Dave Varco. On Saturday, Dakota Dickerson scored the pole position followed by Mason Filippi and Nick Sommers in third. Temperatures soared into triple digits for that weekend’s racing action.
At the start of the race, Sommers leapt into the lead and held it for a couple of laps only to lose it to Filippi, who nearly looped it in the Star Mazda turn.
“He went in a little too deep and started to spin, but saved it and he backed up quite a few positions and gave me back the lead,” Sommers said. “And for the rest of the race I basically held off the rest of the field.”
Sommers’ fast lap was a second slower second-place finisher, Filippi, who was part of the lead pack all race long. Starting from second, Filippi had the lead briefly till his miscalculation in Star Mazda, which dropped him back to fourth.
“We ended up swapping places throughout the race and I ended up in second place,” Filippi said.
Starting from pole, Dickerson had a less-than-stellar start, dropping to fourth, but was able to regain the lead until late in the race when he had a spectacular off and save in the Bus Stop.
“I braked a little bit too late and the rear end got around on me and I went off track,” Dickerson said. “I was going to try to get right back on, but there was no traction and the escape route kind of saved me and I was just barely able to get back on before the next left hander.”
On Sunday, Dickerson avenged his fate on Saturday by taking the win, followed by Matt Million in second and second-place finisher at the Western States Championships, Matthew Cresci, who did not race Saturday because he was attending commencement ceremony at Santa Clara University.
After Buttonwillow, Matt Million leads the points race, followed by Will Rodgers and Dave Varco.
