The Modesto Grand Prix brought plenty of excitement, talent, and drama for one race weekend. Team PSL Karting’s tent was definitely full of mostly excitement and talent after a slew of top-ten finishes. Superkarts! USA’s (SKUSA) inaugural street course race pushed the limits of what American karting traditionally looks like and brought the development of the drivers involved to a whole new level of course racing. With a never-before-raced track, PSL/CRG drivers could rely on the two fundamentals of the sport: top-notch equipment and barrier-pushing, talented driving.
Jordon Lenox-Lamb certainly brought cause for celebration for Team PSL Karting in S1 Pro Stock Moto, grasping P1 in Saturday’s final. With the championship on his mind, he kept ahead of his peers, stayed out of trouble, and proved why he practically has the P1 championship locked down, finishing P1 again on Sunday. This marks Lennox-Lamb’s fourth win of the season, making it a clean sweep of all the races in the SKUSA Pro Tour.
Team PSL Karting’s momentum continued forward in S1 with Milan Dontje finishing fourth in Sunday’s final. A rookie to S1 this season, Christian Schureman stayed close behind, edging out more seasoned drivers with a P6 finish. This is also Schureman’s best result this season in the SKUSA Pro Tour.
Phillip Orcic, the newest addition to the PSG/CRG family, continued the tent’s positive momentum by placing just under his teammate, Lennox-Lamb, with a second place finish Saturday. Orcic was quick out of the box, and continued to impress throughout the weekend; however a slight wrong move into a barrier ended his race Sunday with a DNF. The Diede brothers, Troy and Cody, were also quick throughout the weekend; however they, too, met a similar race-day-barrier-demise on Saturday. With a further handle on the track they went on to have top-20 finishes on Sunday with Troy P13 and Cody in P16.
Andrew Campbell, Team PSL Karting race team manager, shed some light on how the team felt about the new Modesto circuit. “In all forms of motorsport, a driver assumes risk, which is an integral part of the action and thrill of racing; this event was no different. The street circuit was really well done even with an ambitious schedule designed at offering maximum track time to drivers. SKUSA made a valid effort adjusting the circuit layout throughout the week for safety improvements and amending the schedule on Sunday to ensure a realistic timetable was achieved. It really was quite the event, with tons of positive exposure for our sport. We are looking forward to the next street race that SKUSA has to offer."
Jordan Redlin took to the new street course quickly, proving to be fast in the TaG Senior class throughout the weekend. Constantly improving, he set fastest lap in the final, even after some bad luck in the previous heat races with engine start issues.
Campbell continued, with the successes of the weekend, "We had a great run on Sunday and some really tough battles against the other competitors. It was difficult to outrun anyone as most of the front runners were being very cautious with attacks."
PSL’s S2 Semi-Pro Stock Moto driver, CJ Cramm, also showed big improvements, and is looking forward to taking the learnings from Modesto onto an even stronger finish in Las Vegas for the SKUSA SuperNationals event in November. Another driver to look out for from PSL/CRG under Sin City’s lights will be Orcic, battling for the KZ title.
Reflecting on the inaugural Modesto Grand Prix, Campbell concluded, “At the end, we came out in P1 with Lennox, and Milan Dontje in P4. Milan really is becoming quite comfortable in the gear box category and will be a big threat in Vegas.”
PSL would like to show their appreciation for the tent and hospitality of the all-new PSL West, as the new partnership with the western-based squad proved to be a success. All of the shifters participating in Modesto were powered by Swedetech, and PSL continues to share excitement in their relationship moving forward. Expect to see Swedetech’s fair and strong equipment with each driver under the PSL SuperNationals tent.
Team PSL Karting will be trackside in 2014 at the SKUSA Pro Tour, Eastern Canadian Karting Championship, Coupe de Quebec and the Canadian National Championships. Team PSL Karting is associated with CRG, Maxter Kart Engines, Rotax, Tillett Racing Seats, Sniper, Unipro, Douglas Wheels, Vega, MG Tires, Arai, Freem, Alfano, D.I.D. Racing Chains, Briggs & Stratton, KG and ORG.
To learn more about the World’s #1 CRG distributor, sales & service, arrive & drive opportunities, PSL racing engines or dealer opportunities, please visit www.pslkarting.com or www.pslkartingusa.com.
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