The post FRN Blog: Introducing Rathyna Gomer – Drifting appeared first on Female Racing News | News about Women in Motorsports.
]]>Hi Folks,
I was given the wonderful opportunity to share with the world my experiences as a female within the racing community. I would like to take this time to formally introduce myself—I am Rathyna Gomer, a pure car and drifting enthusiast. My love for cars started off as an innocent adolescent playing Gran Turismo 3 on Playstation 2 and eventually grew into an obsession. At the age of 16, I attended my first professional drift event (DIGP at Irwindale in 2006) and immediately caught the “drift bug”. As I was sitting in the stands devouring a strawberry covered funnel cake and breathing in clouds of tire smoke, I realized I was meant to be on the other side of the spectator barrier. From that moment forward, I made it my ultimate goal to become a professional drifter. Although I have not yet achieved my goal, I am progressing and learning more than I could have ever imagined when I first made that promise to myself years ago.
In 2010 I made the first giant leap—I went to a professional race track, Willow Springs International Raceway, for the first time. For several months, I went to the track as a solo driver and learned how to drift. By the end of 2011 I had attended about a dozen events and even earned my first award—“Best Drifter of the Day” at a competition. In 2012 I made it a point to take my driving to a professional level and competed in the Pro-Am series in Southern California, Top Drift. Since I had been doing most of my driving in my daily driven 2007 Nismo 350z, I decided to take a break mid-season so that I could build something that was more suitable competition. Currently, I am in the process of building a 2004 Nissan 350z fully equipped with a LS3 engine. The chassis also has a fully welded-in roll cage, and I anticipate that there will be a notable amount of custom fabrication for an increase in safety and performance. As soon as the build is complete, I will be out on the track again, competing in more events such as Top Drift and Vegas Drift for the 2013 season. I expect that since I will now have a track-dedicated vehicle that I will be able to focus more on my driving and hone my competitive abilities.
I hope that the readers of Female Racing News will anxiously follow along with my journey as a competitive female drifter. I am so glad that there are so many other women, similar to me, that are striving for the same goal! Thank you for reading about me and I hope that you find my adventures as interesting as I do!
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]]>The post ANDREA PATHIAKIS STARTS UP 2012 LORORS appeared first on Female Racing News | News about Women in Motorsports.
]]>Riverside, Ca. February 16, 2012- The Lucas Oil Regional Off Road Racing Series has announced six races for the 2012 season and Mini Stock champion Andrea Pathiakis will be continuing her drive from last year, to make this season another unforgettable one. With the race season starting this Saturday, February 10th at Glen Helen Raceway, the series will continue through the year with two new venues added to the list; Lake Elsinore Motorsports Park and an end of the year championship shootout at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
The ICON Vehicle Dynamics team is proud to continue sponsoring Pathiakis and will be attending the regional events alongside their sponsored driver for pit support and an overall great day of racing. The #11 Mini Stock had nothing short of an exciting 2011 season with three podiums including two 1st place trophies. During the last October race, Pathiakis was two points shy of being on the top of her class and although it was a small gap, the female driver knew that she needed to just drive her race and persevere for the podium. Pathiakis started in front and stayed in the front during the Mini Stock main. The #11 driver worked hard to make it past three Stock Modified trucks and even stayed up close to one of the fastest trucks in that class as the other Mini Stock field was far behind. The competition yellow flag came and went as Pathiakis quickly gained her lead again while the Mini Stock stayed in the back of the pack. A couple more fast and smooth laps, she then took the checkered flag ending the 2011 season with the overall points lead, taking home the 2011 LORORS Mini Stock Championship; as a rookie. This upcoming weekend’s premiere season race will be nothing short of action packed excitement that comes from short course racing.
As the new 2012 season commences, Pathiakis is proud to announce the signing on of new and old sponsors including Lucas Oil, Off Road Vixens, Method Race Wheels, Nissan Motorsports, MOMO USA, SDHQ, and DMZ Fab & Race Prep. Tim Duncan of DMZ has been a crucial APRacing team member, providing thorough race preparation and oversight of the racing program along with valuable words of racing for the driver. Pathiakis has been busy in the off season as she is a full time college student and continues racing with ICON Vehicle Dynamics motorsports marketing manager, Sean Kepler in various desert races and travels with the ICON team. The off season has also included the presentation of the #11 Mini Stock at the Sand Sports Expo and Off Road Expo to promote the driver and Lucas Oil Regional series.
The Lucas Oil Regional Off Road Series has dramatically grown from its premiere April 2011 race; including all of the attributes that the larger Lucas series has to offer. Pathiakis has become a key competitor in the grassroots racing series and already has plans to continue her success in the 2012 season. The ICON Vehicle Dynamics is proud to continue with the driver and is overly pleased with her presence and victories. The 2012 year will bring many opportunities for the 2011 Mini Stock Champion.
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]]>The post Not IF but WHEN – Miata Crash at Infineon Raceway, Blog from Geri Amani appeared first on Female Racing News | News about Women in Motorsports.
]]>They say it’s not a matter of “if” but “when” a race car driver has a crash. In a game of calculated risk, high speed, and mechanical chunks of metal in a whirl of momentous velocity, one has to expect disarray to occur at some point in time. Being on the edge is certainly an exhilarating experience, but when things go wrong they go wrong very quickly.
I’ve seen a lot of crashes in my relatively short history of driving and working in motorsports. It’s a painful thing to watch, whether it’s a professional race or a club-level event. Crushed cars may draw a spectacle, but it also draws someone’s bank account. The racing community is largely a tightly woven network of people where, if you stay involved long enough, it’s hard for others not to know who you are. Likewise, when things go wrong it doesn’t take long for the news to travel. In a lot of instances, racers come together in support of each other during the challenging times. The story I’m about to share with you is another example of how helpful the racing community can be, and how imperative car preparation is in this sport.
It was the last race of the season, excluding the 25-hour and 6-hour races at Thunderhill in the NASA Northern California region, and was scheduled to take place at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma. I had just moved to the area four months prior and since then had only raced a few events. In comparison to Arizona, my connections in NorCal were merely in their early stages of development. Luckily my professional work in motorsports this past season, including Grand-AM and World Challenge, essentially brought everything full-circle and had allowed me to reconnect with drivers and crew I’ve met a long the way.
Despite being new to the area I was fortunate to have pitted with a great group of Spec Miata drivers, including the NASA NorCal Spec Miata Championship Series Director—Dean Thomas, his wife Laura, as well as Jaime Florence and Aaron Braverman. They were some of the first Spec Miata drivers I had the pleasure of meeting, aside from professional driver Ken Dobson—who not only has extensive experience with Spec Miata, but had become instrumental in my progress this past year.
With the recent rains in Sonoma, first session out was a grab-bag of grip, slip, and eminent slide. Following sessions were qualifying for Spec Miata, then Performance Touring (PT) races. With the Spec races moved to Sunday, I was more or less focused on sorting the car (and the driver) per the track conditions, with plans to run the PT race for extra seat time.
I should have taken a hint from my luck that weekend when my steering wheel came off on the exit of Turn 6 during my PT practice session. Fortunately, my trajectory was more or less straight and I was able to resolve the issue without consequence. Strangely enough, I had briskly tugged the wheel before I had driven away from grid—a habit I’ve long since developed after the first time a wheel came off at Hallett entering the infamous turn called “The Bitch.” Indeed it was. Needless to say I called the session early. It’s amazing how disabled a driver becomes for that split second when all you have to control the car are the gas and brake pedals—directional inputs are rendered null and void!
With my pre-race sessions more or less wasted for the day, all I had left was the race to focus on. There were only a few comparable SM cars running in PT, but I figured it would be a useful warm-up for Sunday. My mother brought me drinks and snacks as always then found a place to observe on the hill at Turn 9 overlooking most of the track. Next to her was Grand-Am driver Andrew Novich, who has been kind enough to join me at the track and spot my sessions via radio.
The race was off to a decent start. I made a few initial passes all while sorting myself in the field. I soon spotted a familiar white Miata and began to slowly close my distance after a few laps. When racing in a mixed class environment I’m often negotiating space with higher powered cars. In my days driving on Arizona tracks I had grown accustom to traffic with high differentials in speed, so interpreting their approach became something more or less commonplace.
On the exit of Turn 6 I had spotted a small cluster of muscle cars, and it was clear that they had their own race in full effect. Referencing their position from the hill I anticipated they would greet me somewhere at Turn 7 or shortly thereafter. My timing was about right and soon enough a yellow Camaro was looming large with his opponent a few car lengths back in my rear-view mirror. A part of my instinct had hinted that something may be coming up, leaving me two choices—do I give up everything exiting Turn 7 because of fast traffic approaching, or hold my line and leave responsibility for the other driver to complete a clean pass? At this rate I had already entered the beginnings of what is known as the “esses”, or Turns 8 and 8a. Anyone familiar with Infineon also knows this is a place where little mistakes can cause big problems. This snake-like section of the track has very unforgiving characteristics. Incorrect driver inputs or unfavorable circumstances that imbalance the car can add up here.
The decision to hold my line was already made as I touched the first curb at Turn 8. I saw the Camaro disappear from view where he clearly went to pass on the outside. Thinking for a moment that he had slowed and fell in-line with me, my car was struck with a sizable force that instantly turned me around 180-degrees. My brakes did nothing to slow my speed and I was simply along for the ride. Sliding along side the tire wall I was thinking that I would eventually slow down and stop in the grass. That wasn’t to be. As my car skimmed the tire wall I began to gain air turning upside down and nearly reaching the other side of the wall. It was at this time that my car was launched into the air backwards, with the tire wall acting more like a trampoline and less like a shock absorber.
Word spread fast across the track. Apparently, you can’t pull a stunt like that and get away with only a few people knowing about it. Turns out quite a few spectators witnessed the crash. Luckily, in this unlucky situation, a local photographer and video-hobbyist happened to be recording the esses during the race and captured the last segment of my crash on video. Watching after the fact definitely brought the realization of how rough the tumble was for good ol “Clifford” the Miata and his driver. Despite the loss of my car, I was in high spirits, and reviewed the crash video right away. “Whoa!!! That is f***ing awesome!! Let me see it again!” Was all I could say. Since I was able to walk away to tell the tale, I think I can safely say that it was indeed a pretty cool crash. 4-thousand views on YouTube in less than a week? Apparently Miata’s are cool cars… but only when they fly.
Once the adrenaline began to wear off, I started experiencing all sorts of emotions at once. Reviewing Clifford’s injuries spelled the level of the impact and made me wonder how I got away so clean. It was almost enough to make me cry, which I never like to do because it’s kind of a girl thing. Girl racers don’t cry, right? Were tough as acrylic nails! Well I did, but only for a second, so that doesn’t count.
It wasn’t long before I saw an unfamiliar man enter our pit area. He stopped next to me and scanned all of our faces, “I’m looking for the number-34 Miata driver. Is he here?”
I looked up at him and replied, “I’m right here.”
If he wasn’t clearly shaken enough, I think my reply just made the situation more complicated—I was the girl who flew, not the guy who flew. It was then he asked if I was okay, and apologized for the situation he had caused. In his explanations he noted that he was racing for a championship, and that his driving record previous to the incident had been clean for 7-years. Of course, when someone tells you this shortly after performing a very specialized FAA airspace violation, it was hard to be convinced. I didn’t have much to say, but I was very much willing to listen. But, each time I looked at the car—the car I spent two years working with—I had even less to say. What I did know was this crash would put me out of the game for quite some time, placing an abrupt halt to my goals and ambitions to progress in my racing. As the driver hunted for words to express his apology, all I could draw upon were the impressions made by my driver coaches, as well as my colleagues at the Jim Russell School—ways of the wise if you will, and a clear realization that I have been a very attentive driver.
In a calm tone of voice, I reminded the driver that racing is clearly a dangerous sport and we come into this game knowing there are inherit risks. “In the future you need to carefully consider how you make decisions, and which decisions you make, because obviously they can have very high prices,” I said. “To be a good race car driver requires a careful blend of aggression and patience, and you lacked one of those today.”
The driver nodded, and proceeded to offer some assistance to correct the damage. Graciously accepting to it, our conversation slowly came to a close. As difficult as the conversation was, it was amenable that the Camaro driver came to my pit area to find me, and even more so with his offer to help resolve what had happened. Turning to a rattled group of drivers, we began to sort out what just took place and what I will have to do next. Clifford was a great learning tool, and he did his job. It was clear that he also protected me from serious injury. He was a great little car indeed. I will never forget the car nor the experiences I’ve had driving it.
While some people would have started a fist fight if they were in the situation like mine, I saw no need to aggravate an already intensified circumstance. I’ve learned very early from some well-known and respected racers that being professional regardless of the level of racing is not only paramount for your reputation but raises the bar in terms of off-track driver etiquette. It’s no secret that I want to race in a professional series in the future, so I find it no less important to be as professional in a club race as I would be driving in Grand-Am.
[Continue Reading Geri's Story on her site]
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]]>The post Beauty’s Got Muscle Trailer #1 appeared first on Female Racing News | News about Women in Motorsports.
]]>If you remember a few weeks ago we posted about the awesome documentary that was being made by our good buddy Katie. Like us, Katie has a tremendous love of cars particularly those of the muscle variety. She is searching the US far and wide in her 1978 Nova, “Ned”, to find other ladies who share their passion their cars. Her first trailer is done after finishing up the first leg of her journey, she traveled from her Native New York to down into the dirty south! She did stop by here and talk to us a bit about the wonderful things that we do here at FRN and a little about what we do behind the wheel as well. You can see our founder in a few shots in the trailer. Enjoy the first trailer you can follow Katie and Ned on their journey on their Twitter BeautyGotMuscle and Facebook Accounts. ENJOY!
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]]>The post FRN Exculsive: Behind the Scenes Look at the Women Involved in Formula Drift. appeared first on Female Racing News | News about Women in Motorsports.
]]>Firstly, I will introduce myself – I am Sarah Burgess of BMI Racing, along with my husband I own the RX8 4 Rotor that competed in the Formula Drift series last year. Female Racing News has given me the opportunity to cover the first round of Formula Drift from a different perspective.
Similar to any other motorsport, it is mainly a male dominated sport, and always there are a few diamonds in the rough. While there are currently no professional female drifters out there competing, there are quite a few women in the background; I had the great opportunity of seeing these great ladies every month last year at each round of Formula Drift. So I thought it would be great to highlight some of these pretty cool, hard working girls.
Casidi Tanaka Fixmer has one of the toughest jobs in Formula Drift; her title is Operations Co-coordinator – what does that mean? She is responsible for ensuring everything happens – and within a timely manner. From dealing with drivers and team owners, organizing logistics, sending out notifications to all the teams and staff (and I have received those emails at 3 o’clock in the morning sometimes), to being in attendance at the Will Call desk all weekend and dealing with everybody’s crisis. Amazingly she stays cool, calm and collected. Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to speak with her this weekend, but I hear she too also drifts (or has drifted in the past).
Next on my list is Stina Hubinette, wife of the crazy Swede Sam Hubinette. Stina takes on the responsibilities of running around and organizing various things, including website design, handling the accounting and logistics, she attends each of the Formula Drift drivers meetings as Stina is also Sam’s spotter when he is competing at these events.
Stina also gets behind the wheel of a car, and has competed in Time Attack events, the Thunder Hill 25hr Endurance Race (with Sam), and she also provides precision driving for television commercials.
Abigail Baker is not only busy keeping the 2010 Formula Drift Champion in check, but she is also the Communication Manager for Vaughn Gitten Jr Motorsports and the Public relations/media management/social media specialist for Team Need For Speed. At each of the Formula Drift events you’ll see Abigail typing furiously away at her laptop, arranging media people for interviews and photographs for the guys at Team Need For Speed, and many other things that keep her on her feet.
While walking through the pit/vendor area of Formula Drift, I had the chance of meeting Kerryann ……. She has a Nissan R32 with a RB26 engine, which is something rare here in the USA, but a common sight in Australia (the car that is) Kerryann grew up around cars, and ten years go decided to take her Honda drag racing – well, the bug had bitten her and from there she has spent her time trying various types of racing, modifying a range of cars, and currently settling on her current Nissan. At the moment Kerryann is running the in Time Attack, and over time she will increase the cars performance in the pursuit of faster times.
This is just a handful of the great women I get to meet every time I go to the track. Even if their not physically working on the car or behind the scenes, they are there giving support any way they can to their husbands and boyfriends. Its one of the small things that keeps this industry going.
On an end note, the first round of Formula Drift 2011 was won by Justin Pawlak in his Falken Tires Ford Mustang. This was Justin’s first win in his career of competing in Formula Drift, followed with the ever popular Matt Powers and his Need For Speed Nissan S14, with Dai Yoshihara in his Discount Tire S13 finishing third.
The next round for Formula Drift heads to the ever popular track in Atlanta, GA, May 6-7 (That’s right Mothers Day!!) For more information on the Formula Drift Championship Series be sure to check out their website http://www.formulad.com/
Big thanks to Amanda at Female Racing News for this great opportunity and everybody for giving me their time for a quick chat. I’m looking forward to writing more for the website in the near future, as my role changes in BMI Racing from working on the car to getting in behind the wheel.
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