Canadian Touring: Rain and snow in Shannonville

The Castrol Canadian Touring Car Championship was the premiere “show” at the Deutscher Automobil Club Trillium Trophy Races at Shannonville Motorsports Park this past weekend.

Saturdays race was run under sunny cool conditions providing a clean dry track where the competitors could really put the power down on Shannonville’s "Full Track" configuration.

From the pole Super Touring Class Andrew Wojteczko took a demanding early lead and never really looked back. Try as they may Lombardi Honda’s Nick Wittmer, Jean Francois Dumoulin and Mathieu Audette in his Acura RSX had their work cut out for them and try as they may they never could reel him in.

Wittmer finished a distant second place 12 seconds back with Audette 22 seconds behind the leader.

The top five Touring Class drivers diced amongst themselves for the entire 20 minute race as Anthony Rapone piloting his Honda Civic SI held Mini Cooper driver, Alain Lauziere, at bay until Lauziere's clutch malfunctioned sidelining him with only four laps to go.

Nigel Heron put his Auto123.com Acura Integra in the second spot securing him an outside pole start for Sundays 40-minute feature race. In third place, 16 seconds back, was Aldo Lombardi.

Sunday morning, as the drivers made their way to the front straight of the track for pre race gridding procedures, a light rain began to fall that quickly turned to hail then snow followed by freezing rain. The drivers were already committed to running their dry "slicks".

Pole sitter Andrew Wojteczko would cross the start/finish line first. Nick Wittmer held the lead for the first lap after the two full laps yellow, but only to be overtaken along the long back straight by Wojteczko.

Nigel Krikorian, 2008 ST Class champion used his all wheel drive to fight his way up from his 9th place starting position to second place overall in four short laps after dueling with Audette and Wittmer as the track quickly went from dry to slick later in the race.

From his 6th place starting position Greg Pootmans had his hands full dealing with Honda driver Gary Kwok and Jean Francois Dumoulin for a few laps before securing third place for the balance of the 14 laps.

Vaudreuil, Quebec’s and 2007 Touring Class champion, Alain Lauziere was a man on a mission in Touring Car, after being sidelined after seven laps during Saturdays race with a clutch slave cylinder failure in his MINI Cooper. Being true to his form he came from the back of the 36 car field to not only challenge and pass all 12 Touring Class drivers but to take the lead away from class leading Anthony Rapone with two laps to go.

Andrew Bearss (Honda) and Nigel Heron (Acura) diced back and forth for 11 laps when Heron lost control exiting the carousel turn allowing Bearrs to relax a little and secure his third place finish 30 seconds back from class winner Lauziere.

Unfortunately for Bearss the third place finish was awarded to Heron after he was penalized one lap for a pass under yellow flag infraction.

The teams now have two short weeks to get their cars ready to compete in Round three of the 8 event championship where they will be returning to Mosport International Raceway for the Mosport High Octane Weekend June 13-14 2009.

Round Two Results

Saturday May 30th Heat Race

Super Touring Class
1st Place Andrew Wojteczko Caledon ON Lexus
2nd Place Nick Wittmer Montreal, QC Honda
3rd Place Mathieu Audette Ste-Annes-desLacs, QC Acura
4th Place Jean-Francois Dumolin Trois Rivieres, QC Honda
5th Place Etienne Borgeat Montreal, QC BMW, etc.

Touring Class
1st Place Anthony Rapone Thornhill, ON Honda
2nd Place Nigel Heron Verdun, QC Acura
3rd Place Aldo Lombardi Paris, ON Honda
4th Place Roger Bowes Kingston, ON Acura
5th Place Tom Kwok Markham, ON Honda, etc.

Sunday May 31th Feature Race
Super Touring Class
1st Place Andrew Wojteczko Caledon ON Lexus
2nd Place Nigel Krikorian Markham, ON Subaru
3rd Place Greg Pootmans Toronto, ON BMW
4th Place Jean-Francois Dumolin Trois Rivieres, QC Honda
5th Place Mathieu Audette Ste-Annes-desLacs, QC Acura, etc.

Touring Class
1st Place Alain Lauziere Vaudreuil, QC MINI
2nd Place Anthony Rapone Thornhill, ON Honda
3rd Place Nigel Heron Verdun, QC Acura
4th Place Frank Blanchet Mississauga, ON Acura
5th Place Patrick Seguin Rockland, ON Honda, etc.