After a rough showing in Saturday’s qualifying, Robin Burnett had to start at the back of his group because his car’s engine blew up and he borrowed someone else’s. It didn’t matter because he climbed eight spots to bring home a NASA Championship presented by Toyo Tires. He jumped two positions within seconds of the start and started picking his way forward.
Burnett fended off Spec Miata veteran Jay North, who finished just 1.616 seconds behind him. Spec Iron produced the kind of racing that spec classes were designed to deliver. The front five cars were all within sight of one another for the duration of the race. North finished second with a fast lap quicker than Burnett.
“It’s kind of a blur to be honest,” North said afterward. “I have to watch the video to see what happened. But got up to third really quick and then it was just a dogfight all the way through, with Chris Williams in front of me. Both Kao Phillips, Jay Andrew, Robert Miller behind us. We were just nose to tail the whole time. It was fantastic. I mean I came from Spec Miata and this is like Spec Miata with horsepower.”
Bringing home third place was Christopher Williams, who started from second in the nine-car field. Williams said traffic really played a role in a race that went the full 45 minutes without a full-course caution.
“I took the lead at the start, then shuffled back to second when Robin came up through and held second for the majority of the race and then a CMC car just about drove me off the track and Jay was able to sneak by me for second place,” Williams said. “So it was a lot of action out there. So we’ll take a third place today. Got the podium and the car’s in one piece. I like it.”
