Cayuga, ON, Canada September 23, 2012 - The 2012 Canadian Sport Compact Series culminated with the biggest Time Attack and Super Street drag racing fields CSCS has seen all year. Season championships aren’t won in a day though.
Despite this being his first full year of Time Attack competition, Michael Harvey scored 3 event wins and was on the podium at every event with his Innovative Tuning tuned 2005 Subaru STI. Each year the level of competition at CSCS has escalated and this year the Super Street AWD Time Attack class saw many new entries, some with over 100k budgets. As Time Attack transitions from a grassroots motor sport to a high dollar endeavor, Innovative Tuning will be working with Harvey to implement cost effective solutions to continue his winning ways on a budget. The plans have already been laid for modest over winter improvements. With an emphasis on efficiency and Harvey’s continued dedication to improvement, 2013 is looking bright.
On the drag strip Ontario native Jason Velenosi’s Subaru Impreza continued its domination. For years this Innovative Tuning built and tuned base model Impreza has been the fastest Subaru in Canada and still the only one to run a 9 second quarter mile pass. Of course Jason’s Subaru can run nines all day, but when he arrived at the first event of the 2012 season with his car prepped for heads up racing, CSCS officials met drag competitors with a shock. Organizers decided to change the Super Street drag racing format from heads up racing to a 10.0 index class. Cars without full exhaust, without interior trim, and well below minimum weight were allowed to compete against Jason as well due to changes organizers made to attract more competitors. Tuner Mike McGinnis disabled the boost controller, made a few map tweaks and on just 19 psi of boost Jason was able to run low 10 second passes all day. An axle failure at round 2 and a second gear failure at round 4 kept some points out of reach, but Jason persevered at round four and made it to the semi final without second gear by cranking up the boost and using the power normally kept in reserve. This scored him points that proved valuable and the effort throughout the season earned Jason a commanding points lead and well deserved 2012 season championship.
Innovative Tuning is western NY and southern Ontario’s premier automotive performance center located in Buffalo, NY just 5 minutes from Canada. They specialize in total vehicle performance for modified street and race vehicles including in house chassis dyno tuning, bolt on performance to full race builds, maintenance, track support and more.
As mentioned the people running the event run a Subaru/Evo performance shop so they try to help the turbo Hondas beat Jason’s Subaru since it has a massive Innovative Tuning sticker on it.
The point structure is basic for drag racing. 100 for 1st, 80 for 2nd, 60 for 3rd and 4th. They gave Jason 40 points even though there were only 3 cars left by the semi final because the 4th car broke.
They banned my car because they “didn’t like the way my doors looked”. These are the unlimited class time attack rules in their entirety:
“UNLIMITED CLASS
The Unlimited Class is designed for full blown race / Time Attack vehicles and exotics. Modifications are virtually limitless.”
I put stock doors back on and I’m prepared to jump through some hoops next year, but I’m not giving up easy. Jason stuck with it and so can I.
Thanks Mike, I had a great time. I won’t speak for Jay, but I couldn’t have done it without your help. Given my time and financial budgets, reliability was key for me this year.
It was definitely a fun season. For those of you who haven’t been, CSCS has a ‘Show and Shine’, drifting, time attack and the drag racing competition. This combination along with the proximity to Toronto pulls in an impressive number of competitors and spectators. The event is becoming more popular every year. It seems to me that the event staff are not keeping up with the growth. Safety, scheduling and even the event physical layout (pit area, pedestrian walkways, ect…) are lacking organization.
I am happy that a car related event is gaining popularity. I’m not into show cars drifting but it’s still fun to walk around and to see some of the cars people put together.
I’m still having fun, and I know Jay is too. He wouldn’t be coming back next year if he wasn’t.
