Tyler McQuarrie
With a new team and a newly-built 350Z, the 2009 season is finally beginning to show what Tyler McQuarrie is made of. From Top 32 in the first round to a Great 8 finish in the last, Tyler is slowly fighting his way to the podium.
I love New Jersey. Every time Formula D stops there, I have an awesome event. In 2006, I qualified the RS-R S2K Third and got into the Great 8. In 2007, I qualified the Porsche First and got to the Final 4 before the motor broke, and in '08, we took home a Second. So you can imagine how excited I was to head back to Wall Speedway in my new Falken Tire Nissan 350Z.
We had practice on Thursday and the ASD guys made a few changes to the rear end of the 350Z. After a few practice runs, the changes to the setup proved to be for the better, so we focused on the shocks, to help get over the bumps at Wall Speedway.
I woke up Friday and looked out the window of my hotel room-it was raining hard! When we got to the track, it looked even worse. The track was flooded. Long story short, Formula D decided to cancel the day.
Saturday's weather was much better, but the track was still pretty wet. I decided to wait until the end of practice in hopes of a dry track to simulate the conditions for Qualifying. I ran two laps and was ready. When Qualifying was all said and done, I had a great run and scored a 95.9. I was tied for first with Ken Gushi, but his speed was one mph faster, so I technically placed Second.
Because of the tight schedule, we went straight into Top 32 and my first match-up was Chris Kregorian. Early battles can be very hard because of the difference in vehicle speed. I had a clean first run and pulled a gap on Chris. He broke on the second run, so I moved on to the Top 16. My next battle was against my old teammate, Kenji Yamanaka. I knew this would be a close battle and it was. I lead on the first run and pulled a gap, while Kenji made a few small mistakes. On the second run, the lights went green and Kenji took off, creating a very big gap. I drove into the bank harder than ever to try and catch up, but I brought in so much speed that I grazed the wall, causing me to come off the bank late, which made for a late setup for the infield section. The run looked ugly so the judges called for One More Time. My OMT runs were clean and Kenji made a couple of mistakes, so I advanced on to the Great 8.
My next round was the same as my Top 8 battle in Atlanta: the battle of the convertible 350Zs, against Chris Forsberg. I lead during the first pass and had a clean run. Chris made a minor correction coming off the bank, which caused him to straighten up a bit. On the next run, I followed him and stuck to his bumper with no mistakes. This was an interesting battle, since we went up against him in Atlanta and he beat us no problem, but the roles were reversed at Wall, which is a testament to the work and development that ASD and the team have done to our Z. On to the Final 4!
The next battle against my teammate JR was a Falken win-win with one of us moving on to the Finals. I lead the first run, and was slowly able to pull two to three car lengths by the end of the run. When I followed, I was able to stay within a car length through the infield section, so going into the last corner, I was going to try and suck up on him. But at this point, the smoke was already heavy in my cockpit, and once you added JR's smoke, I couldn't see anything. I was going off muscle memory to get into the last corner, which caused me to go wide and straighten up. My mistake-JR advanced to the "Falken Finals" against Darren McNamara.
By now, Ken Gushi was the last guy standing in the way of a Falken podium sweep. No pressure! On our first run, I stuck to his bumper and started to close in on him going into the last corner, but I made the same small correction from the last battle-only not as bad. On the next run, I pulled away big time and Ken made a few mistakes and they called for a One More Time. I needed to finish this, so I stuck to him like crazy. I pulled up alongside him in the last corner and my right front tire touched his door! On the next run, I pulled away and won! Third Place was mine and the Falken podium sweep was complete!
Getting on the podium in Formula D is hard enough, but sweeping it is amazing! This was so big on so many levels. All three Falken cars on the podium were built by ASD, which says a lot about their work. Falken brought me on this year to help them get results, so to get on the podium in a new car after three events was unreal. I'm so proud to be part of Team Falken and what better way to thank them for bringing me onboard than to help round out the top three!
Tyler McQuarrie
www.tylermcquarrie.com
Falken Tire
www.falkentire.com
Brian Crower
www.runbc.com
By Carter Jung
Enjoyed this Post? Subscribe to our RSS Feed, or use your favorite social media to recommend us to friends and colleagues!