The finale night of the 2009 NASTE season brought a field of 20 racers to Bill Bostic's Too Bad Raceway in Fairview. Included in the group were a few new racers. The cars for the evening's IROC entertainment were Racer Ferrari 250 LM's graciously loaned to us by Tony of Fantasy World fame. The Racer cars are well known for their stunning beauty but that's not their only charm. The cars Tony sent us run like little champs!
Since the rubber on the Racer's NSR tires was getting a little thin the warm-ups were all done using the Carrera Aston Martins we had previously raced in Eugene. And they proved to be slippery little devils that were pretty hard to manage. But once the racing started and the Racer cars took to the track it was night and day different. The Racer's gripped the track perfectly and soon most everyone was getting in the groove.
While the competition was hot and heavy on the track, Victoria held court at the Scrabble table, Dictionary at the ready, with a rotating game of four. Players came and went as the kibitzer's ran wild. Words were used and seriously abused.
Back at the track our host, Bill Bostic, was busy putting in a first set of runs that no one could top earning surprisingly enough the first victory at his home track! Coming in second more than a lap behind was Monte 'Big Smooth' Saager, followed closely in third by Jeff Courtney.
At the conclusion of the evening, the NASTE season trophy was awarded to this year's champion Bryan Trachsel. Bryan was a dominating force this year winning 4 races while no other racer was able to win more than once. Bill Bostic, Monte Saager, Jeff Courtney and AJ Locati rounded out the top 5.
A special thanks to Bill and Diane Bostic for hosting a great race and keeping us very well fed. And also thanks for Dorothy the hammer Abbot for the great chocolates.
In retrospect, 2009 was a great year for NASTE with a total of seventy different racers competing at 10 different events. Thanks for your support and we'll look forward to seeing you all again next season.
Bill Bostic and I made the trek south to Eugene to participate in the ninth race of the NASTE 2009 season at Kimm Marshall's beautiful Heidelberg Raceway. There we were joined by seven local racers to do battle IROC-style in two different scales.
Since Kimm has both 1/24 and 1/32 scale tracks we decided to race on both and use the full-Monte style where you could count whichever race you did best in - thankfully!
We ran the 1/24 scale track first using NASCAR Flexi's. The track in not the easiest for newbies since the four drivers stations are setup at the individual corners so it's more like learning four different tracks. I did pretty well in the first set of 3-minute heats and was 4th a whopping .2 laps ahead of Bill. But after a short intermission, almost everyone did much better and Bill ended up 5th, nearly 3 laps ahead of me in 6th. Kimm drove the track like he owned it but barely squeaked past Ron as both turned 136.4 laps with Kimm winning the tie-breaker. Mike was almost 3 laps back in third.
Next we moved over to the 1/32 scale track to race Carrera Aston Martin's Bill had specially prepared. And they ran great, mostly. We ran one set of 5-minute heats and I was smoking their bacon until the last two minutes of the very last heat when something else started smoking. Hey, is that my car? NUTZ! The race was finally stopped while Smokey the Time Bandit was replaced. They generously awarded me two laps for pain and suffering and we completed the heat.
Finishing first was Mike, with Ron once again in second but almost a lap and a half behind. Another two laps behind in third was Smokin' Monte. Bill was 4th, about 6 laps behind my blistering pace.
Bill and I had a great time and hope we can go back again next year. They are a fun and friendly group.
February 28th will show
in the record books as the day NASTE went Digital. Nine racers were on hand to
give this new style of slot racing a go. And boy did we go.......off the track,
over other cars, into the beautifully landscaped infield, etc., etc. But I was
surprised at how well everyone started doing once we all had a little practice.
Compared to the conventional type of slot car racing, this digital stuff seems
to require a lot more strategy. One thing I learned early on was the
"NASCAR" style of the "bump and run". OK, well maybe my
version was more of a "BASH and run", but it did work when passing
was a necessity, and a lane change was not an option!
As far as the racing went, at the end Bryan Trachsel came out on top. I swear
this guy can win no matter what you're racing!
We all had a great time on Monte and Victoria's SCX Digital track. They have
done a beautiful job of landscaping on their newest track! And as usual for a
NASTE event at the Saager's, the treats, snacks, and pizza were excellent! Thank
you guys for another fantastic time!
And a suggestion regarding digital racing.......I think you might want to move
away from IROC races...............after another one your cars may end up
Digi-totalled!
For the second race in a row a large group of eighteen racers came out for the seventh race of the NASTE season on Saturday evening in Portland at Jeff Courtney's Hemi Heights Raceway Park.
Jeff had prepared a group of four semi-identical Flexi's for the group to race. They proved quite exciting with each having its own distinct personality something akin to driving your own private Christine. Let's see, the yellow one is frightening at any speed, the red one doesn't have brakes, the blue one wanders, the white one is dialed, and so forth. It was great fun watching the drivers adjust, however in fairness, as you progressed through the lanes, each car got better. There was also the occasional pit stop for car repairs. As for the track, the traction was great and the corner marshal's attentive. And that was a good thing. At these speeds someone could get hurt!
Putting the big hurt on the field tonight was Bill Bostic who set a blistering pace with 144.8 laps including one heat of 37 laps that had the crowd buzzing! More than a lap behind was home-track favorite and today's birthday boy Jeff Courtney. Battling it out for third was Flyin' Bryan Trachsel coming in just about one lap ahead of Jeff's son Jake Courtney. Those Courtney's drive like they own the place!
Prior to the race, we surprised the nifty-fifty birthday boy with a new ride - his very own private Christine. Yes, it's a shiny new Carrera Plymouth Fury - the perfect car for mister furious.
A special thanks to Jeff's wife Cathy who kept us extremely well fed. I particularly liked the bacon thing. And thanks to Terry for bringing some more of Dorothy's chocolates especially the almost-healthy ones. Yum!
A fabulous crowd of eighteen racers and six spectators came out for the first race of the New Year at Autumn Hills Raceway on Saturday evening in Hillsboro. Greeting the throng was a revamped Autumn Hills track complete with fresh paint on the track and guard rails plus the copper taping of the track rails. The changes provided a great deal of improvement over previous years. The power was now extremely smooth with nary a ripple in the track surface. However, since the track had not been run much, the early heats proved quite slippery for the Ninco NC-1 powered Porsche 356A coupes - very reminiscent of the tail-swinging ride of an actual 356A. But as the heats progressed and the cars started laying down a little urethane, the surface improved greatly and the lap counts showed it. Drivers that were struggling to get 16 laps were turning 20!
Monte Saager had specially prepared the Ninco cars with some added weight, axle tubes to restrict the front travel and a set of John Mitchell supplied Myron-elli tires on the rears. And the cars once again proved stable and reliable as drivers ripped off lap after lap. The race was decided on the best two of your four 3-minute heats - two in each lane. And of course as the cars laid down rubber and the surface improved, everyone's later runs were better than the earlier ones.
Putting the finger to the trigger better than the rest was once again Flyin' Bryan Trachsel followed closely by home track favorite Big Smooth Monte Saager. Coming in a close third was Byron Karate Kid Stumman.
A special thanks to Victoria Saager for keeping the crowd well fed and providing entertainment for those not racing. One TV was showing Grand Prix, the other was involved with Wii boxing, bowling and golf. In between racers sampled the new SCX Digital track. What a night!
For the six racers that braved the elements to get to Hemi Heights on Saturday, the real battle was on the track! The hardcore slot racers fought the extreme cold, wind, snow, and freezing rain to get their fix of electrically motorized competition. Hemi Heights is a very fast track that provides opportunities for a lot of action! From the wide open throttle action in the bank, to the gotta-get-'er-slowed-down-in-a-hurry hairpin, this track is a riot! The competition was very intense and close, as was the contact between cars.
Jeff Courtney had prepared four Dodge Daytona IROC cars based on 4 inch flexi type chassis. NASTE employed the "yellow flag" type racing format as used at TooBad Motorplex last season. This format allows the use of a minimal amount of turn marshals, in fact as little as none! Along with this format comes the one main rule, the Too Bad rule! This rule is pretty much self explanatory.
It was good to see Jake Courtney return to race with the NASTE group. Jake is one of the original NASTE members and was there at the beginning. But on this cold wintry day it was all Flyin' Bryan! Even my efforts at punting and nerfing him at every opportunity did not keep Bryan from posting an impressive win! How do you stop this guy?
So it was cold, but man was it a great time! Thanks Jeff for a great race, it was definitely a BLAST!
The fourth NASTE race of the 2009 season was held Saturday, November 22, at the recently renovated Marshall Field Raceway in Beaverton, Oregon.
Twelve racers showed up to hit the track with a pair of IROC offerings that Randy and Byron Stumman had prepared. The first heat offered a special treat - Ninco Karts. For those of you that haven't had the chance to race these phenomenal speed demons, just imagine a 1/32 scale car being powered by an HO motor. Slow? Yes! However, it did provide for close competition as the girls kept pace with those hard-charging guys. And after battling it out over a set of two-minute heats, Monte 'Big Smooth' Saager proved to be the Kart Master barely beating out Flyin' Bryan Trachsel by a mere tenth! But the competition was so close that a mere 4 laps separated the entire field.
It would be down to the second set of heats to bring out the winner. And up for the second set was the far more powerful Falcon-powered Saleens. And it was amid all the flying cars and mangled sections of track fencing that the home town crew squeaked out the win.
Coming in first was he of the flying fists, Byron 'Karate Kid' Stumman followed closely behind by his dad 'Racin' Randy Stumman. Flyin' Bryan finished just behind in third with the 'Kart Master' falling to fourth.
A special thanks to Randy and Byron Stumman and especially to Myrna for keeping us all so well fed. And Dorothy's chocolates are always a treat!
The third NASTE race of the 2009 season was held Saturday, November 8, at the Cape Horn Speedway in Washougal, Washington. A group of 7 hearty racers braved the crossing of the mighty Columbia to do battle with another 4 members of the local Cape Horn group, basically the hot shoes , on the tight and fast 6-lane 1/24 scale track referred to as a red bow-tie . Racing would prove to be both fast AND furious!
NASTE member Bill Bostic supplied the cars for the IROC duel. Six, well seven Flexi's actually. All dressed as NASCAR demons. Unfortunately one car was so badly damaged during racing that it had to be retired, permanently. The carnage was so great in fact that at one point the racing action HAD to be stopped, red flag thrown, hold it right there! A pileup had occurred involving all 6 cars. Imagine that, every car on the track in one heap. How can that happen, you ask? A lot of skill combined with some bad luck. Or as we like to say in NASTE: too bad!
And among all the crashing, bashing, laughing and crying an amazingly good time was had. Having the best of it at the finish was NASTE's own Flyin' Bryan Trachsel, followed by host Rick Branum in second and Jim Reshonie, another one of the Cape Horn hot shoes right behind in third.
We're also proud to say that NASTE members filled in the next 4 positions greatly redeeming their miserable showing from the previous month.
A special thanks to Rick and his wife Gail for extending the invitation and especially to Gail who saw to it that we were all well fed. And Lynette's cookies (brought by Larry) were a great treat too.
The second NASTE race of the 2009 season was held Saturday, October 4,
at the Pelican Park Speedway in Eugene. A group of 6 local racers made
the trip south and were joined by 13 local racers to form a great field
of 19. We were not only treated to some great racing but also some
excellent food prepared by members of the Eugene group.
Using
our standard IROC format, the Pelicaneers wasted no time showing us the
value of their years of experience and promptly took us to task.
By
the end of the afternoon the 6 local racers occupied the 6 bottom
slots. Leading the blitz was dancin' Todd Messinger, with Doug Haynes
in second and the legendary Bob Hanna in third.
Off the locals,
Bill Bostic was the head of the class with Jeff Courtney right behind
and Monte Saager a close third. And that's about all we're going to
say about that. We'll see if they offer us a rematch next season.
A good showing of sixteen racers turned out for the 2009 NASTE Season opener. The race was hosted by Bryan Trachsel at his Butterdish Speedway. The cars of the night were HO T-Jets specially prepared by race-master Bryan.
The first race of the evening featured the younger members with Ethan Word showing that a little experience can go a long way. Finishing second in the kids category was surprising newcomer Gabby Locati slipping past Elliot Word and Gabe by a couple of laps.
Jumping up to the big dogs it seems the new boss is the same as the old boss. The night's lap leader was last year's champ John Bostic. John managed to stay calm, fast and most importantly, on the track while running 4 more laps than second place finisher - track owner Bryan!
The racing was tight between second and fifth with fifth place finisher me (!) coming in just about one lap behind second and only .2 laps behind HO legend Bill Bostic. Sneaking in ahead of Bill by about three quarters of a lap and finishing third was another one of our HO experts, Terry Abbott.
Thanks to Bryan and Monica Trachsel for a fine evening full of great food and good friends.
First Sunday at the Pen Sunday August 01, 2010 Penguin Point's First Sunday Series if open to all. Current cars are Fly Classics. More information is available here.
The finale night of the 2009 NASTE season brought a field of 20 racers to Bill Bostic's Too Bad Raceway in Fairview. Included in the group were a few new racers. The cars for the evening's IROC entertainment were Racer Ferrari 250 LM's graciously loaned to us by Tony of Fantasy World fame. The Racer cars are well known for their stunning beauty but that's not their only charm. The cars Tony sent us run like little champs!
Bill Bostic and I made the trek south to Eugene to participate in the ninth race of the NASTE 2009 season at Kimm Marshall's beautiful Heidelberg Raceway. There we were joined by seven local racers to do battle IROC-style in two different scales.
Next we moved over to the 1/32 scale track to race Carrera Aston Martin's Bill had specially prepared. And they ran great, mostly. We ran one set of 5-minute heats and I was smoking their bacon until the last two minutes of the very last heat when something else started smoking. Hey, is that my car? NUTZ! The race was finally stopped while Smokey the Time Bandit was replaced. They generously awarded me two laps for pain and suffering and we completed the heat.
February 28th will show
in the record books as the day NASTE went Digital. Nine racers were on hand to
give this new style of slot racing a go. And boy did we go.......off the track,
over other cars, into the beautifully landscaped infield, etc., etc. But I was
surprised at how well everyone started doing once we all had a little practice.
Compared to the conventional type of slot car racing, this digital stuff seems
to require a lot more strategy. One thing I learned early on was the
"NASCAR" style of the "bump and run". OK, well maybe my
version was more of a "BASH and run", but it did work when passing
was a necessity, and a lane change was not an option!
For the second race in a row a large group of eighteen racers came out for the seventh race of the NASTE season on Saturday evening in Portland at Jeff Courtney's Hemi Heights Raceway Park. 
Putting the big hurt on the field tonight was Bill Bostic who set a blistering pace with 144.8 laps including one heat of 37 laps that had the crowd buzzing! More than a lap behind was home-track favorite and today's birthday boy Jeff Courtney. Battling it out for third was Flyin' Bryan Trachsel coming in just about one lap ahead of Jeff's son Jake Courtney. Those Courtney's drive like they own the place!
A fabulous crowd of eighteen racers and six spectators came out for the first race of the New Year at Autumn Hills Raceway on Saturday evening in Hillsboro. Greeting the throng was a revamped Autumn Hills track complete with fresh paint on the track and guard rails plus the copper taping of the track rails. The changes provided a great deal of improvement over previous years. The power was now extremely smooth with nary a ripple in the track surface. However, since the track had not been run much, the early heats proved quite slippery for the Ninco NC-1 powered Porsche 356A coupes - very reminiscent of the tail-swinging ride of an actual 356A. But as the heats progressed and the cars started laying down a little urethane, the surface improved greatly and the lap counts showed it. Drivers that were struggling to get 16 laps were turning 20!
For the six racers that braved the elements to get to Hemi Heights on Saturday, the real battle was on the track! The hardcore slot racers fought the extreme cold, wind, snow, and freezing rain to get their fix of electrically motorized competition. Hemi Heights is a very fast track that provides opportunities for a lot of action! From the wide open throttle action in the bank, to the gotta-get-'er-slowed-down-in-a-hurry hairpin, this track is a riot! The competition was very intense and close, as was the contact between cars. 
It was good to see Jake Courtney return to race with the NASTE group. Jake is one of the original NASTE members and was there at the beginning. But on this cold wintry day it was all Flyin' Bryan! Even my efforts at punting and nerfing him at every opportunity did not keep Bryan from posting an impressive win! How do you stop this guy?
The fourth NASTE race of the 2009 season was held Saturday, November 22, at the recently renovated Marshall Field Raceway in Beaverton, Oregon. 
The third NASTE race of the 2009 season was held Saturday, November 8, at the Cape Horn Speedway in Washougal, Washington. A group of 7 hearty racers braved the crossing of the mighty Columbia to do battle with another 4 members of the local Cape Horn group, basically the hot shoes , on the tight and fast 6-lane 1/24 scale track referred to as a red bow-tie . Racing would prove to be both fast AND furious!
The second NASTE race of the 2009 season was held Saturday, October 4,
at the Pelican Park Speedway in Eugene. A group of 6 local racers made
the trip south and were joined by 13 local racers to form a great field
of 19. We were not only treated to some great racing but also some
excellent food prepared by members of the Eugene group.
A good showing of sixteen racers turned out for the 2009 NASTE Season opener. The race was hosted by Bryan Trachsel at his Butterdish Speedway. The cars of the night were HO T-Jets specially prepared by race-master Bryan.