Talk about pressure! That run had more families watching than any other. Here were the possible outcomes:
Jason wins and wins the division
Stott wins and it's her first ever
Stott wins and kraft wins the division over Jason
Really neat to see a race come down to that. Jason needed to beat kraft first round and win the race to win the division by 1 point. He got kraft first round, made it to the finals, but couldn't quite seal the deal. It's always good to see a first time winner though. It is true, that watching your kid (my nephews in my case) win, is way cooler than winning yourself. It was really cool seeing Jonathon, jason's older brother, win his first ironman in the masters division.
The one thing I hope IHRA does next year is to give the Jr's a break. That round robin stuff is murder. We had two people helping us, runnings carts back and forth just to keep up. My brother never left the starting line area once they got their final time run. It's sad when you have to bring a generator to the lanes to cool down the car. With rockingham having a long shutdown/turn off, it's 3/4 of a mile from the starting line to shut down, to starting line. That doesn't take in the fact these tiny kids are in fire suits, in 100 degree temps and in their car almost the entire time if they go to the finals. Jr kids are strapped in sooner than any other racer. All we need is one kid getting dehydrated and we have a mess on our hands.
Sorry for the rant
. Congrats again Stott!