Hamilton, Ontario – December 4, 2008 - In its last event of the 2008 season, a six-man Cameron Motorsports/CRG lineup headed to Las Vegas a week ago for National Guard Superkarts! USA SuperNationals XII at the Rio Hotel and Casino. In a fitting close to a stellar campaign, the weekend ended with a podium performance once again. The run came from reigning ICC National Champion Michael Vincec in SuperPro as the familiar #5 took fifth on Super Sunday. It capped a strong recovery run for the weekend’s work, four days where Vincec and tuner Trevor Wickens were hustling in perhaps the deepest SuperPro field in SuperNationals history. “Practice started off well, but in the final couple of sessions we struggled a little,” Vincec set in replaying his start to the weekend. Qualifying followed, and the pair had some work to do going forward. “P13 wasn’t what I was hoping for,” he said. “I was in the 5 spot until the last few minutes, then in the final minutes of the session I couldn’t get a clean lap together.” It was a common problem on the temp track, as fellow Cameron/CRG SuperPro Curtis Fox met the same fate. “We definitely left a lot on the table in qualifying,” Fox said upon his return. “I had trouble finding space on the track. I was definitely capable of doing an eight or a nine, but it just didn’t happen.” World Champion Jonathan Thonon put CRG on pole with a lap of 40.629 seconds, leading a Euro-charge of the top of the grid, many coming from factory pilots. While Vincec was less than happy, he matched fellow North American CRG star Gary Carlton at 41.0, and though Fox was at 41.124, his half-second off pole pace led to P17! The SuperPro field of 29 was simply incredible. Three heat races followed, the first on Friday and the next pair on Saturday and including night racing once again. While Vincec battled his way to 12, 13, 9 finishes, things went much worse for Fox. “The first heat was a disaster,” the veteran said of his initial run. “I just had nowhere to go in corner two and got caught up with Carlton and we were both basically out. In heat two I hit Leesmann, so all-in-all I never made it past corner two in the first two heats! From there it was just all-or-nothing for me. I knew I would have a horrible starting position so I had nothing to lose.” As if proving forces were working against him, when Fox did put a strong run together in the third heat Saturday night, other problems appeared. “The third heat was okay,” Fox continued. “I was up to P8 but my steering wheel came loose! It made the kart very difficult to drive and was very distracting so I fell back to 11th.” As he expected, Fox would be starting from deep in the field Sunday while Vincec was on the outside of row four. “The plan going into the final was to get to the lead pack and stay there,” Vincec said of Super Sunday. “I fell back off the start, and slowly climbed my way back up. I managed to close the gap to fourth, but in the final laps I couldn’t stick with the group anymore. Still, I’m very happy with the result considering where I started from and finished in the heats. Also considering it’s racing against the Europeans and the best in North America.” Meanwhile, the nightmare continued for Fox, before ending completely on lap five. “Just my bad luck continued,” Fox said of the final. “I got hit in corner four, completely out of my control, bent the kart and that was it.” The same corner ended the weekend for Scott Saunders after the Australian led the Cameron/CRG contingent in TaG Senior. After qualifying P19 in a field very near one hundred, Saunders was bounced in heat one going 33, 13, 7, 15 through his heat races and to the main event. Looking to add a SuperNationals Top Ten to his Race of the Americas win earlier in the summer, Saunders was out on lap one, turn four. Cameron/CRG JICA driver Miles Maroney made his senior debut at SuperNats and after clocking P51, drives to 13, 19, 14, 13 followed. The strong heats led to the main event, and the rookie senior finished in 21st, though his transponder quit with two laps to go. It’s a strong debut for sure, and bodes well for the 2009 Stars season for the Californian. Cameron Hogg was making his SuperNationals debut a week ago and for the first time in his career racing among the quickest on the continent. After qualifying P78 at 44.5 seconds, Hogg visibly grew more comfortable in the lofty surroundings as the weekend progressed and worked his way forward into the B-Main. His best lap in the final run of the weekend was nearly a full second better than his qualifying time, and Hogg was 16th to wrap things up on Sunday. Continuing the theme of debuts, Reid Arnold made his with the Cameron/CRG at SuperNats and had a top ten run derailed by red flags. After matching his number plate and qualifying P23, Arnold ran 17, 14, 16 in the heats and was dialling in for the main event. In the main he carved forward to eleventh and his rubber was just coming in when the red waved at lap fifteen. It was another run that showed much promise for the year ahead. SuperNationals XII completed the 2008 season for Cameron Motorsports/CRG. The team would like to thank all who competed under the tent in 2008, in both the United States and Canada: Michael Vincec, Curtis Fox, David Carmendy, David Ostella, Addison Rayner, Derek Tillett, Scott Saunders, Enrico Menotti, Darren White, Eric Simon, Michael DiMeo, Cameron Hogg, Melissa Curran, Michael Lennie, Miles Maroney, Jeffrey May, Chad Grunow, Cory Luciano, Dylan Oribine, Adam Lemmon, Ayrton Triolo, Ethan Livingston, Alex Aldred, Teagan Poles, Mitchell Boyd, Kurtis DeBoer, Nelson Learn and Vanessa Ostella. |
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