Coming into the final race at Mosport, I was shooting for a big result. After the last weekend I knew I had the pace to challenge for a podium, and I know Mosport much better than I know Calabogie, so I was determined to make this weekend a good one and mix it up at the front of the pack.
I got off to a strong start in qualifying. The car was feeling amazing on new tires and I felt comfortable really quickly, setting some times that I was pretty happy with, but I was not expecting to come off the track and see that I was only a few hundredths off pole.
Unfortunately, it was only good enough for fourth on the grid, but that just went to show how insanely close the qualifying was; there was only half a tenth from first to fourth. I think I can speak for all four of us when I say that we were all super excited for what was looking to be some incredibly close racing.
The first race started very early the next day, but to my surprise I was starting third on the grid. Apparently, one of the other leaders, Gavin Sanders, was disqualified from qualifying for being underweight and would start at the back. It was really unfortunate for him, especially considering his championship fight with Jake Cowden, but I had to focus on what that meant for me. Now that I was starting third, all I had to do was keep up the pace I was showing in qualifying and I was almost guaranteed a spot on the podium.
The race started off cleanly at the front, all three of us getting away well. Jake and Kenny Riedman, who started second, were fighting hard for most of the first lap, letting me keep it nice and close to them off the start. I tried to use their fighting to look for a move on one of them, and almost had a look up the inside of Kenny as we came to the start of the second lap, but didn’t quite get a good enough run on him to go for it. After the first lap though, I started to fall back as the lead two got their heads down and started putting down serious pace. I was taking it cautiously at first, thinking that since Gavin was starting so far back, I had the podium in the bag so long as I didn’t make any big mistakes.
But I was taking it a bit too cautiously. Behind me, Owen Clarke was getting right on my bumper, and threatening to make a move at any moment. I did my best to keep it clean and not give him any opportunities, and despite him still being all over my mirrors, as the race continued I got more and more comfortable, and less nervous about messing up. Eventually, I started getting back up to my proper pace, and pretty soon I built a comfortable gap to Owen.
The rest of the race came and went uneventfully for me, and so, by the end of the thirty minute race, I came across the line to score my first podium in a Radical. It was an amazing moment, and it felt so good to finally have something to show for the efforts I’d been putting in all season. But there was no time for celebrations; there were still two more races in the weekend, so we put our heads back down and got ready for the next one.
For the second race, the grid was set by each of our second best times in qualifying, and I ended up starting second, with my teammate Jake starting on pole. Off the start, I wasn’t really looking to challenge Jake for the lead, and instead I was mainly focusing on keeping Kenny, who started third, behind me. I kept it as far alongside as I could as we came to the green flag, and tried to hold it around his outside in turn one. The idea was that if I could keep it on the outside of Jake through turn one, Kenny would have nowhere to go and I would be able to hold the inside for turn two.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t quite carry the speed around the outside, and so Jake was able to get on power early and was ahead by the exit, but even still, I’d done a good enough job that I managed to keep Kenny behind me by turn two. After that, I just got my head down and followed Jake as best as I could, falling back bit by bit every lap but still staying ahead of Kenny. At least, that’s how the first few laps went.
The race was turned on its head, though, when the safety car was brought out a little under halfway into the race. All of a sudden, we were bunched right back up, and I was going to have to play it smart again if I wanted to keep second off the restart. After a few more laps behind the safety car, all of us doing our best to keep our tires warm, the pace car came in and the green flag went out, and I once again tried to keep as close to Jake as possible. As we navigated the first three corners though, something was feeling off.
It didn’t click at the time, but what had happened was the Nascar Pinty’s had done a session right before we went out and left a ton of rubber on the track. The Pinty’s rubber, though, was a much less grippy compound than we ran on. It was fine at the start of our race, but for whatever reason, about midway through our race the rubber started to lose almost all of its grip. Long story short, I wasn’t ready for this at all, and it caught me terribly off guard.
By turn five, I was still trying to get my rhythm back and figure out the new level of grip, and Kenny seized the opportunity to dive down my inside between the first and second apex, and I had to give up the place. Eventually Kenny caught up to Jake at the front, but for me, the rest of the race went pretty uneventfully, and I came home to take my second podium of the weekend.
Sunday morning came, and our third and final race of the weekend was about to start. The grid was decided based on finishing position of the second race, so I was starting third, with Kenny on pole and Jake beside him in second. This race was set to be a lot more challenging for me, though, as Gavin, having clawed his way up from the back of the field, was starting in fifth.
To top it off, while the top three of us had used our one set of new tires in the second race, both Gavin and Owen, who was starting in fourth, had saved theirs for this race. Holding on to a third podium was going to be very difficult here, but either way, I was prepared to give it my all. The race once again started cleanly, all of us at the front getting away without incident. Gavin, on his new tires, was able to get them fired up much faster than I could, and so almost immediately he was past Owen and crowding my mirrors.
I kept it tidy through the first lap, but the leaders in front of me were fighting through the whole lap; normally, that would be great, but in this case it meant I was still driving through tons of dirty air, which is something that I still have very little experience dealing with.
Coming into turn two, I didn’t compensate for the dirty air well enough and caught a lot of understeer, giving Gavin a huge run on me towards turn three. I defended the inside but Gavin held it wide on the entry, giving him a much better exit, and he was able to get on my inside into turn five, forcing me to give up the place.
For the next few laps, Gavin kept up his momentum, building a big gap that I’d have to pull back if I wanted to fight for the podium. So, as my tires came fully up to temp, I put my head down and started doing exactly that. I was pushing harder than I had the entire weekend, trail braking deeper, keeping my foot in the throttle even as the rear started to step out in almost every corner. And it was working. Slowly but surely, I was reeling Gavin in, the sight of the gap shrinking pushing me even harder. But just as about to get in reach, his throttle got stuck going into turn five and he went off, crashing into the wall and bringing out the safety car.
With Gavin out of the race, I was promoted back to third, which part of me was honestly a little disappointed with. Obviously, I wouldn’t exactly complain about another podium, but I was looking forward to fighting a driver as good as Gavin for it. Either way, there was nothing for me to do about it but focus on the rest of my race.
Unfortunately, though, my race was about to end in just about the same spot. As the race restarted, I would only make it about half the lap before my throttle cable snapped in turn five. I was able to use the clutch and the idle of the engine to limp the car part way up the back straight, and there I parked it, watching the rest of the race from the side of the track.
It was an unfortunate end to the last weekend of the season, but overall, I was super happy with how the weekend went. After a season of bad luck and misfortune, it felt amazing to finally get to show everyone how good I can really be behind the wheel. Now, with two podiums to cap off the year, it’s time for a long winter of training to come back even stronger next year.
