NASA Southeast’s Will Stukas is familiar with Road Atlanta — familiar and fast enough to put his car on pole for the Championships race. He was followed on grid by Florida’s Patrick Wehmeyer in second and Terry Mathis, also of NASA Southeast, in third.
By lap three, Wehmeyer had gotten around Stukas to take first place, but Stukas didn’t stand for that for long and retook the lead, followed by Scott McKay and Mathis. Then, 17 laps into the race, Stukas suffered contact and he began dropping back. He ended up being eight laps down at the finish. McKay took advantage and vaulted into first, but it was not all unicorns and rainbows for him, either.
“About five laps to go, a cylinder started going out in the car and I started losing power,” said McKay, who won the race. “So we were running on seven cylinders, looking in the rearview mirror trying to make sure we have enough of a gap on the guy behind us. They were catching us quick, but in the end, the Ford Mustang brought it home. Thanks to Carbotech brakes for giving us a great set of brakes and everybody else who helped us out along the way.”
Mathis was the guy in McKay’s mirror.
“We had a bad race Thursday,” said Mathis. “We broke the first lap, so Saturday, we had to come from 22nd to third. Today was a good day. We were able to come up to second. Of course I hated what happened to Will. He was first and he broke, but that’s racing.”
At the checkers, it was Robin Burnett who finished third. However, Burnett was later disqualified by the race director for passing under yellow. That moved NASA Texas’ Michael Patterson into the third spot.
