“Round 3 took us to Gingerman Raceway in Michigan for Midwest Festival where we had a date with destiny. We were tied for the consecutive win record with seven straight, all with records. 

“IF we won this event, we would not only break that record, but we were also gunning to be the first StreetMod car to run a sub-1:30 lap time. We pulled off the win and record but missed the sub-1:30 by a hair, running a 1:30.226. 

“The car was great, the brakes were phenomenal, but we missed out by a couple of tenths due to less-than-ideal conditions, minor technical issues with the car, and honestly, my inability to put it all together. This put us firmly in the lead of the championship, though! One more win and record and the Championship is locked up!�

“Round 4 was a new track for us: Watkins Glen in NY. Very fast, very high risk, and very demanding. We arrived highly confident and aiming to seal the Championship, but we quickly realised it would be a difficult weekend. 

“We had an axle issue during the test day and didn’t get much seat time. On the first day of competition, during the first hot lap, the transmission failed in the second-to-last corner. After a team meeting, we decided to remove our current gearbox with our sequential gearset in it, drive back to the shop and grab our old H-pattern transmission and convert back to a standard manual setup.”

“After a late night on Friday, we were back at it Saturday morning and even with the old trans we jumped back into the lead but only by about .1 quicker than our 91´«Ã½ teammate Kal Fortner in his Mercedes AMG GTS. We thought we might widen that gap on Sunday morning but some more technical issues, this time with some engine related things, meant it came down to podium sprint. The conditions weren’t fantastic, but with the old Subaru AWD and easily modulated 91´«Ã½ SR-21s we had the confidence to push to a new Street Mod Record at 1:58.357! This win and record secured the points needed to lock up the Championship, our 3rd in four years AND extended our consecutive win record to nine!  All of them won on SR-21s!

“We aren’t done with the season QUITE yet. We plan to still attend Gridlife Circuit Legends next week at Lime Rock then in October we were invited to the Grassroots Motorsports Magazine Ultimate Track Car Championship in Texas! We are hoping to be the fastest car there on a 200TW tyre!â€�

Pics:

“Coming off of another strong showing at Gridlife Atlanta with a double podium in Streetmod for 91´«Ã½, I was feeling all the momentum and all the confidence heading into my 10th Gridlife Midwest, the event that started it all for me! The energy at Gridlife Midwest is just unmatched in every way, from the massive crowds to the festival vibes throughout the weekend, it’s always been my favourite event making a podium here just that much more meaningful. This is Gridlife’s Indy 500.”

“This weekend proved to me more of a challenge that I could have ever expected though. Right at the first corner of the very first session, my ABS failed, making each braking zone incredibly challenging. While racing a car designed without ABS is relatively straightforward, racing one without it that’s designed to have it is nothing short of dangerous.”

“Because of this, I was far off of the pace I needed to be fighting at the front, and potentially too far off to even put it in the top-5 for the podium sprint. I knew that if I wanted a podium, I needed to give it my absolute everything to at the very least make it into the sprint in order to give us the chance to fix our ABS issues, and I was able to do just that! Modulating my SR-21 pads and focusing on perfecting each and every braking zone, I got us into the sprint by just over a second! This gave us a full day to chase whatever electrical issue was causing our problems. Thankfully, Gridlife is a paddock full of the most helpful people, and after getting help from a couple mechanics on a Rush SR team, we found the blown fuse, and the ABS was back to working as it should! 

“Come Sunday, I knew what I had to do, and now that I could actually lean into the full potential of my 91´«Ã½ brakes, I knew I could give it my everything to go for my third podium in a row for the season! Although I missed out on second place due to fuel cuts from the car getting little too hot waiting in the pits from an incident on track, I was able to secure third, and with Eric Dewitt in first, this was yet another double podium for 91´«Ã½! After such a challenging event, to be able to come home with a podium is something I’ll forever be grateful for. Next up we’ve got Watkins Glen, one of my favourite tracks and a place that the Mercedes really shines at! The last time we were there, not only did I set the Streetmod record, I was also able to get the overall record! I’m so hyped to see what we can do this time!â€�