In the Pits: Strom-Lack 2.4 Hour Victory 2022

Wednesday, November 3, 2021

Strom-Lack 2.4 Hour Victory 2022

The 2022 ISF season started with the most grueling event, the Great American 2.4 Hour All Star Endurance Classic Race on the streets of Rapids International Raceway. Dean Strom and Mike Lack were randomly paired for the second time in the history of the race, were the winners by 10 laps over the team of Matt Hayek, Joe Heitz, and Steve Rist.

The race features four teams of drivers racing for 36 minutes in each of the four lanes. The drivers are placed in a team by a die roll. The two-time defending winners of the race; John Wiedemann, Bill Black, and Mike Kristof, had the previous years champion option of remaining together as a team to try for their third win in a row in one of the International Sportscar Federation’s flagship events.

The start saw Strom-Lack locked in a tight battle with the team of Pete Dorn, Everet Kamikawa, and rookie Brad Core. Dorn kept the gap at a couple of laps as he raced Lack, however at the end of the first 18 minute segment the gap was 13 laps. Kamikawa started against Lack for segment two hoping to narrow the gap, however he had more to worry about as Hayek took over and blitzed the field turning 11 more laps than any team in the segment as he passed Kamikawa for second place overall and cut the lead to Strom and Lack by six laps and led the third place team by three at the end of the second segment.

The third segment Hayek started and eventually his team took the lead as Strom took over for Lack and had problems in the second team car. Core struggled mightily in what he thought was his best lane, however it was the first time he raced for that long in GTP cars and the pace of the event can wreak havoc on a rookies race craft. The team of Dorn-Kamikawa-Core fell to fourth place and were out of the running for overall victory by the end of the fourth segment. Meanwhile the defending champions were having problems of their own as they had an engine let go and the back up car threw a shoe causing Kristof to change cars twice in the segment. By the end of the fourth segment they were firmly in third place.

The fifth segment started with Strom-Lack having a two lap lead over Hayek-Rist-Heitz. It was not a strong segment for the second place team as they fell further behind. It was the strongest segment for Wiedemann-Kristof-Black as they kept pace with the leaders and made a serious dent into the gap to the second place team.

That set up the sixth segment which saw all the teams struggle as several cars lost at least one shoe. That brought Hayek-Rist-Heitz back into contention and at the end of the sixth segment and throughout the seventh they fought to within five laps of the lead until the end of the penultimate segment when they were 10 laps off the lead.

The final segment saw Heitz start against Strom and initially Heitz gained two laps until his tires went off and Strom found his speed comfort zone and picked up the pace. Heitz changed with Hayek and Strom changed with Lack but Hayek couldn’t catch him and Strom-Lack took a well earned win (1,321 laps). Hayek-Rist-Heitz finished second (1,310 laps) eleven laps down. Wiedemann-Kristof-Black finished third (1,226 laps) and Dorn-Kamikawa-Core fourth (1,196 laps).