Kakashi's Joe DiMinno Blows 'Em Away At Watkins Glen!

Watkins Glen July Sprints 2007

Kakashi Racing's Joe DiMinno wins flag-to-flag from the pole at Watkins Glen. Joe DiMinno:

"What can I say? the perfect weekend. In many ways other than just the weather.

The forecast called for rain both days and it never showed up. It was very hot and humid; though the car felt flat the driver was pumped and ready to go.

Saturday was two qualifying sessions where they take the best of the two sessions for the starting position. We headed out for the first morning session: the car felt OK, but grip levels and HP just didn’t feel up to par. I ran about five laps and the session ended. Nothing exciting happened just a solid session. I later checked the results and found to my surprise I had the overall pole of 20 cars in class and 49 cars in the group. Wow, never expected it...

Session Two was just as uneventful, for me at least. This time I only ran three laps before the session was black-flagged for a wreck going into The Boot. Michael Reese in his ITB Rabbit had tagged the Armco going down into the boot. Damn, that car was wrecked! From what I hear he wasn’t hurt except for his wallet. So, instead of sitting in pit lane in the Very Hot weather waiting for the incident to be cleaned up I decided to park and pretty much go off of my first session time. Later, when checking the results, I found I had bested my first session time by a few tenths and was still on pole. I not only had pole, the next car, an SSB Camaro, was 2 seconds slower and my closest ITA competition was almost 3.5 seconds back! Shall I say WOW again! My first ITA pole and overall pole in a convincing fashion...!

Race day. Given that a higher-hp heavier car had qualified next to me I knew I would have to hold him off until braking and handling prevailed. That is exactly what I did. The green flag flew and I got a good jump the Camaro, slightly edging ahead by Turn One, and I had the inside advantage. We went side-by-side through One, me keeping him out wide. We remained side-by-side through Two, and I was able to pinch him enough through the Esses to where he had to lift. I took a middle-of-the-road defensive line down the back straight, giving him plenty of room to pass on the outside or inside under braking into the Bus Stop. But, I knew that wasn’t going to happen: trying to out-brake a 2500lb with a 3000+ lb car was very unlikely. It all went as planned. Once I got through the Bus Stop I opened up a comfortable lead.

Now it was time to put my head down and drive. After about 2 laps  didn’t even see anyone behind me anymore. So once again going back to the HPDE days (I have been doing this a lot lately) I drove a clean line and finished the race.

It was a commanding victory. I had gapped the next car by 20+ seconds in only 11 laps. It was great to have my first pole-to-checker win, but disappointing in a way. I like to race for the close competition, not just to win. But, I’ll take a win any time, but I prefer them to be a bit closer.

This makes three ITA wins in a row with two NASA PTE wins in between. The #01 Kakashi Racing Nissan Sentra SE-R is on a roll! Lets see if we could keep it going at the next event the big IT fest at Mid-O.

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