I sat with Katie and her mom while the PC took the RR shock off her car and
then pored over it for what seemed forever. You could see Katie was upset
but keeping a stiff upper lip. My wife suggested any number of delicious
revenge scenarios, but Katie seems inclined to the high road.
At one point we were discussing just how guilty she could possibly be, and
Dan Pedroza came over and shot police mugshot photos of her, complete with
prisoner number, in an attempt to lighten the mood. I think it helped do
that some. Would not be surprised to see the pix pop up in NAP.
As I recall, the shock mounting was deemed to be "out of spec" by the amount
a rubber bushing gets deformed after a few thousand miles of use (Lucy is
Katie's daily driver and she drove the car to Topeka!). The PC put a note on
the protest form that such finding does NOT give everyone license to go
deform their bushings. The ignition protest was then withdrawn.
What seems kind of a bummer is the protestor was Kevin McCormick, also a San
Francisco Region member who Katie runs against all year at their local
events, including at the NPDiv Divisional. IMHO, the sportsmanlike thing
would have been to raise the question at any of a number of opportunities
back home, not wait to ambush her half a continent away at the premier event
of the year.
Katie did a great job behind the wheel. 2nd after the first day! 5th o/a out
of 51 cars.
--Rocky Entriken (never been protested; obviously I am not fast enough)
-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Ashcraft <ashcraft2@home.com>
To: Hottvr@aol.com <Hottvr@aol.com>; autox@autox.team.net
<autox@autox.team.net>
Date: Sunday, September 19, 1999 8:06 PM
Subject: Re: Katie Kelly protested?
>I wasn't there so this is second hand. I didn't hear who did the protest
>but the first pass was for illegal shocks ( perch position). The guy who
>told me said he helped take the shocks out of the car and sure enough they
>measured within .001 of the stock position so that protest didn't stick.
>Next the same person protested the ignition timing. I haven't heard how
>that came out. Anyway, I'd love to hear what really happened. I can't
>believe that anybody out there really believes that ignition timing ( a
>really fuzzy spec on Miatas) makes the difference between a great driver
and
>someone who can't handle being beat by a better driver. Just my $.02
>Steve
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