Kevin Hutchens races the #4 SRX7 which RP prepared for his first MARRS season in 2009.

After a dominating season, RP Performance and partners Performance Auto Works have locked up 4 championships in the Mid-Atlantic Road Racing Series for 2009. We conquered in SM, SSM, ITA and SRX7, bringing RP’s total up to 26 championships in 15 years of competition.

The Zalner brothers, Ken and Brian, finished in 1st and 2nd place respectively in SM giving Ken his 9th championship in 10 years. Scott Brunk claimed the championship in SSM and captured a new track record at Summit Point Raceway this weekend at the season finale with a blistering time of 1:28.052.

Phenom sophomore season driver Brian Price won the ITA championship in his SM Miata and capped off his season with a pair of wins on the weekend. As if the ITA championship was not enough, Brian also managed to bring it home in 4th place in the SM standings as well.

SRX-7 had a hotly contested battle between RP drivers “F1″ Al Gervais and Dave Ade. In the end, it was Dave Ade emerging victoriously as SRX-7’s newest champion. Al brought it home in 2nd place and rookie sensation Kevin Hutchens rounded out the top 3 for a total RP Performance podium sweep in the highly competitive SRX-7 class.

RP Performance would like to send out a special thank you to all of its drivers and fans for the continued support that our race team has received and continues to receive on an ongoing basis throughout the years.

Thank You!!!

It was quite a hot weekend at Summit Point but the RP team pulled through for a few wins and Bret even got the chance to get out there and race in an ITA Miata. Bret locked in the pole position and won the race on Saturday and finished 2nd on Sunday’s race. Ken and Brian had a 2-3 and 1-2 finish in their SM races while Scott Brunk missed out on Saturday’s SSM race after his transmission got stuck in 3rd gear on the 2nd lap. Drop in a new transmission and fast-forward to Sunday… Scott fought hard for the entire race making his way up to 1st place for the SSM win. Kevin Hutchens decided to try his hand at rally-cross in his qualifying session on Saturday and luckily suffered only sheet metal damage that the RP team quickly hammered back into place.

It is always exciting to visit a new track and the RP team showed everyone how to learn and race fast. After a busy day of testing, the Zs hit the track running on Saturday giving Ken a 1st place finish and the pole for Sunday’s race with Brian fighting it out to the last second for a photo finish at the line to take 3rd place.

The NJ region rules dictate that your finishing position in Saturday’s race define your starting position for the Sunday race. With Ken on pole and Brian right behind him they pushed the entire race. Ken had 1st place locked down while Brian was racing hard all the way to the checkered flag to take 2nd in another photo finish.

Meanwhile, Scott Brunk raced hard in SSM on both Saturday and Sunday for a double win. After finally resolving his car’s ECU issues, he is able to remain strong throughout the race and take home the wins that he much deserves.

Finally in the SRX7 race, Kevin Hutchens battled Alexander Schafer all weekend with both races coming down to a photo finish. Kevin was able to grab 2nd on Saturday while dropping back to 3rd on Sunday (by only 0.032 seconds). You can watch the HD video here:

MARRS6 NJMP Lightning Group 7 Sunday Race July 19th, 2009 from SRX Kevin on Vimeo.

The Spec Miata race on Saturday yielded a 2nd and 3rd place finish (results) for Ken and Brian respectively. Ken’s performance during the weekend gave him both the pole and the win (results) in the Sunday race while Brian finished 4th on Sunday.

The SSM race on Sunday (results) gave Scott Brunk a 3rd place podium finish to continue his steady collection of points for the season.

Kevin Hutchens fought his way up to 4th place in the SRX7 race (results) after the RP guys cleaned out his carb yielding an extra 3 seconds of lap time to bring him up to competition speed. You can watch the whole Group 4 race in HD on viemo.

We had great weather for the SARRC/MARRS double header at VIR over Mother’s day weekend. The RP team continued their performance from MARRS1 and took 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, in MARRS points in the SM race on Saturday. Brian qualified 4th after realizing a problem with his car and switched to the backup car to finish 4th overall and 3rd in MARRS. Tom Bourne started 2nd and got hit on the start going through turn 1 but kept it together to ran a few laps with Ken and the rest of the leaders and lay down a personal best time of 2:20.8. Ken put the car on poll with his best lap to date: 2:20.3 and stayed out in front to finish in 1st. In SSM, Steve Hunt was off to a great first time race at VIR until another car spun in front of him going into Rollercoaster leaving him nowhere to go and ended his race weekend. Kevin Hutchens was also a first timer at VIR in his SRX7 and finished his 2nd race on his novice permit to get signed off on his license. The Sunday race had a crazy start, some of which has been captured on this video.
Saturday Race Results: SM Race SSM/SRX7 Race 
Sunday Race Results: SM Race SSM/SRX7 Race 

I recently purchased a Spec RX7 from a friend of mine and had no idea what I was getting myself into. I was referred to Bret at RP Performance by the Spec RX7 community while trying to figure out my new toy. Bret was very patient with me and my lack of general car knowledge. His team got my car prepped for each event while helping me understand everything I needed to have fun, fast and safe track days. After all his help, I am ready to start my first race season in the MARRS SRX7 and look forward to being part of such an outstanding team. Although he specializes in Spec Miatas, he has not forgotten his roots in RX7s and neither have the rest of the SRX7 guys who always pointed me in his direction when they were not able to answer the questions themselves.