RECAP: Victoria Day Speedfest 2018

It was quite the eventful weekend at Mosport: Locals coming out of hibernation while Canada celebrates the Victoria Day long weekend (yay Royals) with the smell of race fuel and burnt rubber!

This weekend typically serves as the official kickoff to the Canadian Motorsports season, with all of the major local series starting their summer long journey at the famed Canadian circuit.

Pirelli World Challenge being the only US championship to join in during this weekend, brought GT, and GTS. They usually bring TC, although this year was not the case.

I was at the track on Sunday only, as the weather was crummy on Saturday and I didn’t want to subject myself to that brisk Canadian wet spring weather. I did that once when I was on a CTCC team, and I seriously get chills just thinking about it!

So let’s dive in to the weekend recap!

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Radical Cup is a series that usually comes on it’s own weekend later in the year, but instead decided to race in the May bonanza this year. I love watching these things rip down turn 2 nearly flat out with the massive amounts of downforce they produce.

Next up was PWC GTS. What a field this was! A definite attraction to behold, much better than the GT race later in the day, which I almost slept through (seriously). What a battle between Aschenbach and James for the victory; those cars were bumper to bumper nearly all race long. It’s a shame James got DQ’d post race for a technical infraction (it wasn’t me, I promise). THIS is what PWC needs to recreate with GT, but more on that later.

Next up was IMSA Porsche Cup Canada. The race had some excitement of it’s own, with close racing all around, except at the front haha. Robichon absolutely gave a masterclass the whole weekend, winning both races. His teammate even finished pretty high up as well. A good job for them!

After a nice little lunch break, the good ‘ol boys were up next. By the way, if anybody is going to Mosport and gets trackside food, I DEFO recommend the Chicken Fingers and Fries. $8 CDN gets you enough food to satisfy a small family. Seriously, it was a LOT of food.

The race was a typical Canadian NASCAR race. Basically what NASCAR SHOULD BE. All the close racing without the flying punches, slaps across the face, blatant ramming at Moss Corner, or nearly taking out the marshals stand on the front straight whilst pinning another driver for the win in the dirt against the outside wall. You wonder why I hate NASCAR? That’s a big reason. THESE ALL HAPPENED JUST AT MOSPORT! Every year is something increasingly ludicrous and not once did a penalty happen. It’s one thing to get your drawers in a bunch over a bump, but to attempt vehicular manslaughter is another thing.

Oops, I talked about NASCAR. This is why I don’t talk about NASCAR. Don’t make me talk about NASCAR. Please.

Next up was my favourite series of the weekend, Nissan Micra Cup. The $20,000 race cars that provide so much action, you can’t possibly keep tabs on all the battles. It’s even better at Mosport because this track is akin to Talladega or Daytona in NASCAR [resist….] because they brake hard maybe twice on a fast lap. The back straight might as well be a air strip, because you spend 30s of the lap climbing Andretti Straight (which admittedly isn’t actually straight). This brings packs of cars door to door bobbing and weaving to try to get ahead for turn 8. For the SECOND straight year, a car flipped over in Turn 8 after two cars got together and one car over corrected and flipped off of the tire barrier (see below).

I was on the opposite end of turn 8 and saw the whole thing happen. It smelled like something was going to happen. There was about 10mins left in the race and the tension was heating up in the mid pack. After the flip, I looked at the clock and saw how much time was left and immediately got up and started walking towards the paddock. I knew the race was over at that point. I arrived at the paddock as the car was just being offloaded from the flat bed. It was pretty mangled, but the cage was intact and the driver was ok.

To cap this part off, I’m so happy that the Offical NISMO YouTube channel is now streaming this series live!

The supposed 2nd main attraction for the weekend was up next, PWC GT. I say supposedly, because only 10 cars showed up, a season low. I expected this, because only the teams taking a serious run at the championship make the trek north to Canada. Something about Visas and travel insurance or something (go figure). While the cars were fast, the race its self was very boring. A very fast parade was what the attendees got. Very boring, would not recommend. Thankfully they have at least put a band-aid on a massive cut and announced the next round would be multiclass between GT and GTS. Changes will be fierce this off-season I’m sure…

Last and certainly least was CTCC. The race was so bad, I didn’t bother watching the start, or the end. I only stayed long enough in the middle of the race to take some photos and I left. CTCC is just digging themselves deeper and deeper in the hole. This year’s “amazing” announcement was the addition of GT Cup Class. Yes, a “Touring Car” series now has 2 GT classes. Schweet. Old Porsche Cup cars against TCA class cars. Like THAT’s safe…or exciting? The thing that gets me is that a homemade GT Cup car that started in life as a Super Touring Car and then a GT car, finished below the Super Touring winners (yes, it finished behind TWO ST cars). There are essentially no rules in CTCC, which is why nobody neither cares to watch or race in the events themselves. 4 classes, 15 cars. Do the math: That SUCKS. Some national championship we got.

At least there were some TCR’s in there. Woot.

That about sums up the weekend from my perspective. Thank you everybody who reads this and expect an SRC this week regarding track design. If you liked this post, please feel free to read my other posts, comment, like, subscribe and please do share!