Ken Rupp of Carrolton, Georgia manhandled his silver E-Stock Toyota
Celica to the overall win at Atlanta Region SCCA's Summer Saturday
Shootout sponsored by LTBMotorsport.com and AutomationDirect.com held at
Turner Field in Atlanta, Georgia on June 9th, 2001.
Rupp qualified as the number one seed and never looked back as he won his
bracket, undefeated. Then he proceded to the Overall bracket managing to
wheel his way through the other 5 drivers, undefeated, once again.
Rich Shafer, of CP fame, designed the course which features two
start/finish straightaways parallel to each other with the start/finish
lines in a straight line so everyone can clearly see which driver
finishes first. Both drivers negotiate exactly the same course but start
at different places. Qualifying runs established this course as a mid-50
second length. But bracket competitions are done without clocks. The
first car back to his/her own finish line wins the round.
The Shootout competition is unique, in autocrossing, pitting driver
against driver in a double elimination tournament bracket format. Each
driver got 4 qualifying runs, set up just like a typical Solo II
(autocross), to establish the "seedings." These times were handicapped
using the 2001 RTP index and each driver was ranked according to his
qualifying finishing position. These "seedings" determined who each
driver would start out the competition against. The top seeds ran against
the bottom seeds and so forth.
The bracket tournaments are where everything gets exciting. Each class is
assigned a mathematically calculated delay based on the RTP index and
upon the best RTP time in qualifying. This delay time is put into a
computer device (developed by Dave Hardy, Tom Simon and Barry Saney) that
delays the "christmas tree" starting lights. The car in a faster class
and with the longer delay waits longer for the green light to come on
than a slower class car. This way, any class car can compete against any
other class car. This also makes it possible for any class car to run in
any bracket.
The top three qualifiers were, Ken Rupp, Alex Muresan in a G-Stock Acura
Integra Type R (shared with Shane Metzgar) and Ben Thatcher in a B-Street
Prepared 86 Corvette (shared with Kent DeJarnett after DeJarnett's tires
corded on his Mustang in qualifying). These drivers were the "top seed"
in each of the three brackets of 14 drivers, each.
In the first bracket of the day Thatcher handily swept through the first
three rounds winning over Jorge Flores (FS Mustang), Kyle Berg (SSL
Corvette) and Tom Crowley (STS Subaru). Meanwhile, Shane Metzger was
working his way through the bottom of the bracket defeating John Hodge
(SM Eclipse), Patrick Cammack (ES Sentra) and Kate Soundararajan (CSPL
CRX). Metzger prevailed in the battle with Thatcher sending the Corvette
to the loser's side of the bracket to run 3 successive matches (leading
to smoking brakes and 250 degree water temps), then losing to Tom Crowley
(STS Subaru) in the final loser's bracket match. This pitted Crowley
(STS) against Metzger (GS) for the bracket with the win going to Metzger.
Both Crowley and Metzger qualified for the Final Bracket for the overall
win.
Alex Muresan (GS Integra Type R) sat atop the second bracket. He had
incredible luck through his rounds after handily winning the first round
against Russ Schoneberger (SS RX7). Paul Barros (SS Corvette) was slower
than Muresan but Muresan had picked up a cone early in his run, then came
the late call that Barros had coned also, so the round went to Muresan
(if both coned then whoever finishes first wins). Muresan defeated Tim
Harte (HS Civic who coned) to go to the final winner's bracket match.
Meanwhile, Brett Howell (FSP Civic) was cruising through the bottom of
the bracket winning over Dedric Ramsey (GS Prelude), a bye then Barry
Saney (HS Civic who coned) only to lose to Muresan in the winner's side
final. Meanwhile Tim Harte (HS) ran against Tony Schultz (STS 240SX) on
the loser's side. Schultz coned letting Harte into the loser's final
against Brett Howell. Harte's and Howell's match was too close to call so
they reran it and Harte won the loser's side to go against Muresan for
the bracket win. But Harte shot himself in the foot in the bracket match
hitting 3 cones and losing to Muresan anyway.
The last regular bracket was headed up by the top seed, Ken Rupp (ES
Celica) who cruised by Jeff Gilbert (BS Miata), Bob Wolf (OSP Volvo) and
Chris Towne (DSP Integra) on the winner's side. Meanwhile, Joel Fehrman
(HS Civic) worked his way past three Corvettes Ed Foerschler (SS), Kent
DeJarnett (BSP) and Mark Berg (SS) to face off against Rupp. Fehrman
coned his run to try to work his way back on the loser's side and handing
the winner's side to Rupp. DeJarnett got on a tear in the loser's bracket
defeating Tom Simon (GS SHO who coned), Dave Hardy (FSP Civic) then Rich
Shafer's overheating CP Trans Am, Chris Towne (DSP Integra), and on to
the final on the loser's side against Joel Fehrman (HS Civic) who managed
to cone once again to put DeJarnett into a runoff with Rupp.
Unfortunately, DeJarnett's Corvette was running 300 degree oil and 250
degree water temps so the decision was made (by the owner, Ben Thatcher)
to concede the win rather than blow up a motor.
The top 2 drivers from each bracket met in an Overall Bracket to see who
would be the overall winner. Rupp versus Harte (but Harte withdrew)
sending Rupp on down the winner's side. Muresan versus DeJarnett saw
Muresan winning and Metzger against Tom Crowley and Metzger won. Notice
that Metzger and Muresan are in the same car. In the second winner's
round it is Rupp against Muresan. Muresan cones and heads to the loser's
side while Rupp remains perfectly unruffled. Metzger drew a bye into the
winner's side final against Rupp. But Rupp keeps his cool and perfect
manners to win the round sending Metzger to the loser's side.
On the loser's side Muresan (GS Type R) eliminates Crowley (STS Subaru).
DeJarnett (BSP Corvette) gets a bye into the round with Muresan but cones
his match with Muresan to put the loser's side decision into the
situation in which co-drivers have to meet head to head. Since this is
impossible to do in the same car at the same time, Brett Howell offered
Metzger a ride in his FSP Civic to run against Muresan. Metzger had never
driven this car before but drove it to a very close loss to Muresan
putting Muresan into the overall final against Rupp.
In the final it looked like Muresan won the overall crown when he came
back to the line first, but it turned out that Rupp had stopped on course
for a downed cone, so the match was run again with Rupp getting the big
win by a photo finish.
The second round of the LTBMotorsport.com/AutomationDirect.com Summer
Saturday Shootout will be July 7th at Turner Field in downtown Atlanta,
Georgia.
[Many bytes of badly formatted stuff deleted. It may have been the results
or something, hard to tell. mjb.]
Ben Thatcher
Apex Benefit Services & Motorsports
Stockbridge, GA
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