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| FFR
Nationals 2003: Car Show, Autocross, & Awards Dinner |
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Check out the
new 60 sec video from Nationals! |
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Car
Show, Autocross, and Awards Dinner |
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FFROG Car Show Judges
(left to right) Tom, Russ Thompson, Wayne Presley, Don DePontee |
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Gathering of the Faithful
Even though the FFR Nationals didn’t start
until the weekend, many Factory Five owners and racers began arriving as
early as Tuesday to check out the SEMA show.
The crew from FFR was in attendance at the SEMA show all week,
displaying all the latest new products and ideas. |
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| SEMA wrapped up Friday
night just hours before the FFR Nationals was scheduled to begin.
The weekend long nationals event got off to a shaky start as the
Friday evening cruise was cancelled due to the sheer logistical
challenge of trying to get 125 + FFR’s out of the hotel and down the
strip from the smaller than expected entrance of the Treasure Island
resort. |
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FFR's
Dave Smith answers the questions...
"So where's the rally dude?" |
Art
Totten (blue shirt) and Mary Borden grab some late night Vegas
cuisine Friday evening. |
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| Worse yet, the
organizer Bill Peirce from FFROG.com (President of the FFR Owner’s
Group), who was in charge of the rally, was waylaid in Texas and had to
cancel at the last minute. |
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| More
FFROGs hit the midnight buffet while the car show moves into the
parking garage. |
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Typical though of FFR customers,
folks made the most of the night, some gathered for an impromptu
car show and hang-out in the hotel/casino’s parking lot while
others found something else to do for the evening (not too tough
in Vegas…).
Friday evening turned out to be not so bad as
people hung out in the Casino putting names and faces to
internet call tags. Most
everyone set their sights on the morning car show and Nationals
race event scheduled for the next day. |
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Concourse Car Show (Saturday Morning)
The sun rose on a perfect desert morning.
The 55 degree chill of first light melted into a comfortable
60’s all day long, sunny with nary a chance of rain or trouble.
The FFR team was out at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway facility
setting up the displays and working with the owner’s group
representatives to ensure everyone was ready for the masses of rolling
tube steel due to arrive by 9:00 am. |
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| Cars
and Spectators began to arrive around 9:00 am. FFR crew
were ready to greet them... |
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team from Roush arrived to set up a nice display. |
FFROG
director Wayne Presley was on-hand to help out. |
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| As the day progressed
over 125 cars had arrived from as far away as the East Coast to attend
the two-day event, along with about 40 FFR spec cars looking for a
chance to run the Las Vegas Motor Speedway Track.
During the morning hours people spent time with registration,
introductions and catching up with old friends. |
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| The event was split
into three areas. The car
show and vendor area was at the main entrance to the track. Just across
from the car show area (100 feet) was the autocross (open to all FFR
customers). The race area
and paddocks for the Championship race was down the hill by the track
pit about ¼ mile from the car show. |
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| Left:
Art Totten served duty in the FFR Tram while (right) Chris
Richards sets up for the fun day ahead. |
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| There was a non-stop
tram that was available to take folks down to the track throughout the
day so that people could check out the racing action of the FFR Spec
Series being held concurrently at the outdoor roadcourse just south of
the car show and autocross event. |
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| The car show was
underway by 10 am. |
Just one of over
a hundred beautiful street rides... |
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| Fara
Snook and company unload their show winning designs (left) while
customers wait to sign up for the Racing Adventures Autocross
rentals. |
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| As the morning progressed, vendors set up their
booths and the judging for the customer car show had started.
The weather warmed and the party was underway. |
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| FFR's Mark Weber
was available to answer questions along with 17 other FFR
employees! |
Stewart
Transport had a display set up next to the FFR booth for folks
who want to have their kits shipped to them direct. |
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Parade Laps
Just about every car in the show evacuated the
area at noon and headed down to the race track for Parade Laps.
Since there were women and children taking touring laps of the
track, hot dogging and racing were not on the menu for the lunchtime
session. |
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| At
noon the car show (left) took a back seat to the parade laps
(right) that got everyone out on the LVMS track. |
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| The Parade laps
were a lot of fun and gave folks the chance to take their cars out on
the same race course that would later be host to the FFR Spec car
Nationals finals. The
roadcourse is over three miles long and there was fewer than 100 feet
between cars the whole way around!
Seeing this many FFR’s driving at once was beyond
description… Simply AWESOME.
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Norm
the track photographer was on hand to take photos of people and their
cars. Check out the full
list of photos at the end of this story.
If you want to purchase one you can log onto headonphotos.com
and buy them direct from Norm.
New GTM Supercar Intro!
The FFR display had the new GTM Supercar
prototype and chassis on hand for folks to check out. The display also featured the test design on the new 4.6
powered Mark III roadster and a stunning red Spyder GT. |
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| FFR's Steve
Dutton sets up the booth. |
Customer Gary
Cheney's wife took a break from her supermodel schedule to check
out the GTM. |
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| The feedback on the
GTM and the Mk III were very positive. The plans for both kits are a
2004 release… More details as they become available. |
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Customer
Autocross and Results
The competition was intense and the event was
fun. There were some big
surprises as well. The
autocross event gave everyone a chance to compete in a venue that was
safe and easier on the cars |
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| Two
Gals at the forefront... Left: Rebecca Robertson enroute to a 7th
place in the Pro Class. Right: Mary Borden takes the guys
to school. |
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Mary Borden stomped
the boys, being bested only by her relieved husband Dave. The street class saw some VERY close action as only six
hundredths separated 2nd place Glen DiOrio from 3rd
place Art Ehman and only THREE hundredths separated Luke Lucas (4th)
from Scott Peterson (5th).
Special note here. Both Mary and Dave Borden donated their winnings to the CF
Foundation (Team Jenny). The
Bordens are the best of people and everyone knows it. |
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| A beautiful blue
and white roadster (driver unknown) |
Buzz Ryzcamp in
his green beauty at speed. |
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Here’s
the way the final results came out…
Pro
Class
Name
Time (sec)
Award
1st
Place
Dave Borden (big surprise)
20.712
$500 and trophy
2nd
Place
Mary Borden ( Take that guys)
22.041
$350 and trophy
3rd
Place
Chuck Robertson
23.264
$250 and trophy
4th
Place
Gary Cheney
25.113
$150 and trophy
5th
Place
Bob Zook
25.944
$100 an trophy
6th
Place
Ted Johnson
26.166
$75 and trophy
7th
Place
Rebecca Robertson
31.123
$50 and trophy
Street
Class
1st
Place
Wayne Presley
22.582
$500 and trophy
2nd
Place
Glen DiOrio
23.226
$350 and trophy
3rd
Place
Art Ehman
23.285
$250 and trophy
4th
Place
Luke Lucas
23.712
$150 and trophy
5th
Place
Scott Peterson
23.741 $100
an trophy
6th
Place
Ralph Button
23.954 $75
and trophy
7th
Place
Barry Mattingly
24.045
$50 and trophy
8th
Place
Derald Rice
24.207
$25 and trophy
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*
Special award for “Most Blatant and Senseless Slaughter of
Innocent Cones” went to Wayne Presley who ought to be ashamed of
himself for mowing down more cones than were hit during the entire 2003
SCCA autocross Nationals. He
did, however, manage to clean up his act enough for one clean run for
time to win the street class.
FFR-NASA Exhibition Race
The 2003 FFR-NASA Challenge Series, in its fourth
season, witnessed more cars than ever vying for the National Title.
The format this year was fun.
Saturday would be an exhibition race with visiting VIP’s and
drivers racing for bragging rights only. |
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| The
pace was notched up a level from autocrossing (left) when the
exhibition race took to the track (right). |
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A
lot of customers got the chance to watch the exhibition race from the
top of the car show area. Others
chose to ride the tram down and watch the action trackside.
Either way, the race was fun and exciting to watch.
More than a few folks understood the historical significance of
the race. There have never
been so many cars like these racing at one time.
Watching Bondurant dice it up with Dick Smith and Larry Parker
from Roush was entertaining as well.
Folks drove to vintage racing (no-contact) rules
and Bob lead the race until his power steering pump gave out.
Just a side note: If anyone wants to know just how good a driver Mr. Bondurant
is, consider for a moment that he jumped on the pole and lead the race
without ever having driven the track or even practicing!
That my friends, is talent and a real great example of how fast a
real race driver can learn a course! |
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| The exhibition
race was the highlight of the day for many race fans. |
Close
wheel-to-wheel action with famous drivers on a track that was
great for spectating made it a fun race to watch. |
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After
40 minutes of racing, the pack spread out only a bit with furious
battles for places throughout the field.
In the end Bryan Dobyns won the exhibition race as he would
repeat the next day in the finals.
Check
out the entire story here.
Next
year’s Nationals are scheduled for VIR in Danville Virginia for Labor
Day weekend 2004.
Car Show Winners and Saturday Awards Dinner
There were a thousand untold
stories on the day but time came to retire to the Treasure Island Resort
and Casino for the awards dinner. The
track action was over by 5:00 PM and the dinner began at 6:00, giving
everyone a chance to clean up and enjoy a nice evening of drinks, food
(not enough) and fellowship (in abundance). |
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| FFR crew:
Dougherty, Tara, Liz, and Weber were there to make sure things
went smoothly. |
The dinner hall
was beautiful with killer food and three cash bars. |
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| Over
350 people attended the awards dinner!
It was great to catch up with some good friends we hadn’t seen
for a long time. It was
also fun to put names to faces, and in many cases, names to internet
faces. |
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| The
tickets were sold out a week before the dinner at 350
attendees! Food ran low as the night ran on... (That was a
real bummer, one of the only let downs of the really fun
evening). |
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| Russ Thompson (superffrog). |
Bob Bondurant,
Dave Borden and Dick Smith keeping the racing tradition alive. |
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| The
dinner was served and the drinks flowed.
FFR president Dave Smith served as the emcee, introducing VIPs
Bob Bondurant and Dick Smith. Dick
and Bob kept us riveted with their stories of 200 mph in an original
cobra and The early days of LeMans and American Roadracing.
Those lucky enough to be there to hear these guys talk will never
forget it. |
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| Left:
FFR's Dave Smith. Middle: 200 MPH legend Dick Smith.
Right: World Famous Bob Bondurant |
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| Following
the speeches, The FFROG (Factory Five Racing Owners Group) presented
awards for the car show as well as the free kit drawing and other awards. |
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| Chuck Robertson
wins "Best-in-show" overall. |
Ralph Button
wins the FFR Legacy Award. |
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Car
Show Awards and Prizes
Best
in Show Over-all
Chuck
Robertson
$1,000 Cash
Best
Use of Chrome
1st
Place
Sergio Trejo
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
Steve Moriarity $150 and trophy
3rd
Place
Rick Leyva
$100 and trophy
Best
in Show FFR Roadster
1st
Place
Glenn Diorio
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
Bob Zook
$150 and trophy
3rd
Place
Al Solomko
$100 and trophy
Most
Innovative Design
1st
Place
Bart Carter
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
Dan Zoil
$150 and trophy
3rd
Place
Tom Austin
$100 and trophy
Best
In Show FFR Coupe
1st
Place
Tony Popish
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
Lance Green
$150 and trophy
High
Mileage Award
1st
Place
Ralph Button
$250 and trophy
2nd Place
Dave & Mary Borden
$150 and trophy
3rd
Place
Paul Gellespy
$100 and trophy
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Best
Paint
1st
Place
Bruce Kaesen
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
Mike Easton
$150 and trophy
3rd
Place
Jim Olsen
$100 and trophy
Best
Engine
1st
Place
Ramona Cornell
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
John Peterson
$150 and trophy
3rd
Place
Bob Farris
$100 and trophy
Best
Interior/Details
1st
Place
Rich Calhoon
$250 and trophy
2nd
Place
Buzz Ryskamps
$150 and trophy
3rd Place Larry Johnson
$100 and trophy
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| Special thanks to all
the people who made this year’s Nationals a GREAT success. We have
scheduled the 2004 event for Labor Day Weekend in Danville, Virginia at
the world famous Virginia International Raceway.
We hope to see you there! |
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See
ALL the Photos (over 200!) of this event! |
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Watch the new video of this event! (3 Megs) |
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Check
out customer reports of the event on FFROG.com (hundreds of pictures and
posts)
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Check out the rest of the weekends events from the 2003 FFR
Nationals: |
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FFR-NASA
Championship Race 2003
FFR
Nationals: Car Show, Autocross, & Awards Dinner
SEMA
2003 Car Show
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