The 54th annual Electrical Group Training Westernationals proved a tough one for Scratch & Match Motorsport, with both Daniel and Lisa Gregorini battling a succession of issues on and off the track.
Things looked up early for Daniel with a nice run of 5.770 seconds in the first qualifying session. The second qualifying session proved even quicker, until the motor in his Camaro kicked two rods due to a broken wrist pin.
“We didn’t get the spare block back from some lengthy repairs until the day before qualifying so we were already under pressure,” Daniel said. “It was pretty much an all-nighter pulled by my team to get an engine ready and in the car, between our main engine and our spare engine.”
For Lisa, the problems began early in the event with a crank trigger failure causing the motor to misfire in the first qualifying session. Back in the pits, the trans-brake decided to also cause issues, but the team worked hard to get the car fixed and ready for the second qualifying session, where the car shook the tires and Lisa abandoned the run for a 12-second time slip after a quick 0.957 60 foot time.
As both teams thrashed to prepare for race day, news came through that it would be Daniel vs Lisa in round one! Hoping to put on a great show for the thousands of fans at Perth Motorplex, Lisa’s race came to an early finish once again when the car fell silent after fire-up.
“The converter was making the engine hunt and after putting the car into top gear for the burnout and starting to roll forward the car stalled,” Lisa explained. “The crew rushed over to re-fire but were advised by the starter we were not allowed to as we had moved forward out of the fire-up box and deemed to be in the hands of the starter, meaning we were no longer able to re-fire.”
The bad luck for Lisa was at least a win light for Daniel, who took a 5.837-second trip down the track.
“It was going to be a great race between me and Lisa,” he said. “I rolled out a massive three-quarter track burnout to give Lisa as much time as I could but when I reversed back she wasn’t there. It was a bit disappointing as the rules are far from clear in a re-fire situation, but we will have that covered if it ever happens to us again.
“The run I made was the first time we have used a different design Noonan head on the car. I nozzled it the same as my usual cylinder heads but at 5.1 seconds it banged the burst panels and number eight got a little hot. We had no further damage so we just changed the panels and got the blower back on. I got the guys to take the oil pan off to check the number eight bearing and that was when we noticed we had pulled a main stud in the block.”
The only thing Daniel could do for the rest of the night was to fire-up the car for the remaining two races to take minimum points. Fortunately, Lisa’s situation improved and the second round of racing saw the highlight of her weekend — a holeshot win over John Zappia. Lisa’s 0.096 reaction time and 5.772 elapsed time defeated a 0.125 reaction time and a 5.763 elapsed time from Zappia.
“We took a stab in the dark, hoping for the car to make a representative run despite not having any data,” Lisa said. “We knew I would need to cut a good light as John had been running consistently fast and it was amazing to get the win on a holeshot, even with lifting a little early on the run.”
The pair were re-matched for the final round, where Lisa once again had the better reaction time. This time her Camaro overpowered the track and Zappia took the win light.
“The Westernationals was a great event, just not for our team’s on-track performance,” Lisa said. “We still had lots of positive feedback, with people claiming our race against Zap was the best contest of the meeting.”
Back in the pits, Scratch & Match Motorsport were doing their part to raise funds for the National Breast Cancer Foundation. The ‘Team Orange’ fundraiser contributed $825 to a great cause.
Lisa will be competing in the final perth meeting next weekend while Daniel will be taking a break to regroup before returning for the next round of the Australian Top Doorslammer Championship at The Bend Motorsport Park in April.
“We have a lot of damage to be fixed so unfortunately we won’t make it to the local Summer Slam meeting in a fortnight,” Daniel said. “But we will put the time to good use to make sure we are in the best position for the national tour in a few weeks.
Major sponsors :
Scratch & Match Autocolour, Consolidated Group, Oil & Energy Pty Ltd, Kerb Doctor, Westcoast Siteworks, S&S Industries, Dalisa Estate Winery
Supporting sponsors :
Applied Automotive Performance Engines, Signbiz WA, FuelTech Australia, FuelTech USA, Harness-Tech, RACIN, G-Force Race Cars, Resolution Racing Services Inc, Dirty Detailing, Final Drive Engineering, DMPE INC, Kinetic Engineering.
