Part II of PJ's Project; "Biggie G" Injured in Highway Accident

In last week's column, we wrote about Mike Pjatikin's friendship with the late Pete Frazier, and how that bond led to a Pjatikin-produced Memorial Race to honor his friend's memory at the Airport Speedway.

We also mentioned that Pjatikin designed and built a new 600cc Micro-Sprint that made its debut just a few weeks ago, and that we'd have more details (some of them controversial in nature) regarding this new creation in this week's effort. And we will, but first...

Lately, too many of these columns have contained news about serious injuries to members of the Micro-Sprint community. Unfortunately, so does this one...

Take a walk through any Micro-Sprint pit area in the northeast, and ask drivers and crew members if they know Glenn Lewis. I'm willing to bet that 95%, and maybe more, of the folks questioned will respond, "yep, sure do. He's a great guy."

Lewis, known to many as "Biggie G", is the father of 600cc campaigner Shane Lewis. When Shane is on the track, and especially when he's doing well, his proud poppa can be heard saying, "that's my baby boy!"

When Shane was younger and the two were heavily involved with Quarter-Midget racing, Glenn was one of the top Tech Inspectors for the Quarter Midgets of America (QMA). Now that they've been running 600's for quite a while, "Biggie G" is one of the tech experts for the U6SA, and he's on the Rule Clarification Committee of that organization (more on his committee when we get to PJ's Project - Part II).

What has always struck me about Glenn is his friendly nature...he loves talking to people and kidding around with just about everybody at the race track. He and Shane will go virtually anywhere to race, and they race as often as possible. Glenn Lewis loves racing, and he loves the people who are involved in racing.

Last Friday (July 30), Glenn hopped into his truck and, with the racecar trailer attached, he headed for work. It was a normal routine on a Friday...he would take the rig to work, then head directly to Bridgeport - he'd meet Shane at a designated point on the way to the track - where they would race on the quarter-mile that night.

But Glenn never made it to work last Friday. On route 322, not far from the Honeybrook Quarter-Midget track, a car coming toward him suddenly crossed over the center line and ran head-on into Lewis. Glenn had no time to react, and the impact, combined with the trailer's momentum behind him, destroyed his truck.

More importantly, Lewis suffered a serious injury to his right leg - it was basically shattered above the knee. He also broke a rib and had bad cuts on his head and thumb. He was taken to the Trauma Unit of the Reading Hospital. Reportedly, the driver who hit him fell asleep at the wheel, causing his vehicle to cross the center line. He suffered a broken leg as well.

While his injuries are serious enough, Lewis is lucky that they weren't more severe...or even worse. He's still in the Reading Hospital, and as of Sunday, the doctors are waiting for the swelling to subside in his leg so they can begin a series of surgeries to repair the damage. It will be quite a while before he's walking again, meaning the pain in his leg is probably nothing compared to the pain of knowing that he can't go racing with Shane in the forseeable future.

Shane Lewis was a spectator at Lanco's Clyde Martin Memorial Speedway last Saturday, and he spent the evening fielding questions about his dad. Shane said he would have been racing that night, but he's not allowed to open the trailer until the insurance adjusters examine everything.

Please keep "Biggie G" in your thoughts and prayers; he will be okay, thankfully, but he's facing a long road to complete recovery. He'll get there, though...we're certain of that...because he loves racing and "his baby boy" too much to stay away for long.

*****

Over the years, Mike Pjatikin made many trips to the midwest to race one of Pete Frazier's Factor 1 Micro-Sprints. It was the midwesterners who began calling him "PJ" because they couldn't pronounce his last name. By the way, it's "Pee-at-ikin".

After Frazier's tragic death in a racing crash, Pjatikin ventured away from the sport for almost ten years. Late in 2009, however, he got the urge to return to 600cc competition.

Working with Dean "Kiwi" Alexander of Visalia, CA, Pjatikin designed an innovative car, and the pair had respected USAC car builder Dan Drinan look at their plans to make sure the geometry was solid. According to Pjatikin, "this car is mathematically correct, unlike a lot of current 600's."

It is based on a Factor 1 chassis, but "the pick up points...rack heights...Jacobs Ladder...and roll centers were changed to my specs," says Pjatikin. The car was constructed by Factor 1 in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. "This design can only be built (for sale to others) if authorized by me, and it will be very limited, kind of like Scott Bloomquist's Late Model stuff," notes Pjatikin, who resides in Sewell, NJ.

When it was time to put the car on the race track, he chose Micro-Sprint veteran Jack Conover to steer the new machine. It was extremely fast right out of the box, and both Pjatikin and Conover are confident they can make it even faster as they fine tune the set-up and gain experience with it.

There is one little problem, though...while the chassis and suspension are well within the rules, the engine - in its current configuration - does not conform to the content of the U6SA rule book. Although Pjatikin thinks otherwise; henceforth, we have this year's controversy with the U6SA rules regarding the engines allowed to be used by 600cc competitors. Remember last season's "flywheel flap"? There is a similar theme to this year's conundrum...it's all about the interpretation of the rules written by the U6SA committee.

Without going into minute detail - because it would take about a zillion bytes of storage capacity - the issue in question revolves around the fuel injection system used on Pjatikin's new car. He worked with Engler to develop a mechanical fuel injection system, rather than go with the EFI used by most of the 600cc teams. Pjatikin had several reasons for utilizing the mechanical system (fewer moving parts, no sensors to go bad, easier to tune, it's cost effective, etc.). But the U6SA rules deal with only EFI systems as supplied by the factory, and/or carbs. There was no mention of mechanical fuel injection in the rule book when Pjatikin was designing his 600, so he figured, "if it's not there, then there's nothing that says you can't use it."

If you'd like to read a multitude of electronic messages about this subject, log on to microracing.com and go to the page devoted to the U6SA, located under the Micro-Sprint Forums link.

We'll try to summarize the situation: Pjatikin raised the question of mechanical fuel injection to Mike Dicely, who (correctly) referred it to Glenn Lewis and his U6SA Rule Clarification Committee. The committee said that mechanical fuel injection is okay, as long as the stock throttle bodies are used. According to Pjatikin and others who want to utilize a mechanical system, it's not possible to use stock throttle bodies. The matter went back to the committee, who stated that a written change to the rules would need to be submitted before the entire U6SA meets this fall. If the organization votes for the rule change, then mechanical fuel injection systems, without the stock throttle bodies, would be allowed.

Pjatikin's question remains: if there's currently no rule against mechanical fuel injection, then why can't he use it?

The U6SA answer: "you can, as long as you also use stock throttle bodies." But Pjatikin (and others) say that's not possible, so in essence, the U6SA is saying that mechanical fuel injection is not legal under the current rules.

And that's where the issue stands right now...Pjatikin has submitted a draft of the proposed rule change, and hopefully, the whole thing will be worked out when the U6SA organization meets in October. For now, the new car is permitted to run at Airport, even though the club-run speedway operates under the U6SA rule book for their 600cc events. Officials at the New Castle, DE facility agree with Pjatikin that the current rules regarding the use of the system are vague, and since he ran a mechanical fuel injection system there before there was a U6SA, then it's okay to run it now.

Pjatikin also plans to enter the car in the I-30 Nationals in Arkansas in September, and he'll wait to see what happens at the October meeting before finalizing plans for 2011.

I hope this explanation does not sound one-sided; I am not for or against either side in this matter. Once again, I think it demonstrates just how tough it is to write a set of rules that have no "gray area". I'm beginning to feel as though we need to copy the way things are done in the midwest...have an "Open" class where competitors can run whatever they want in terms of engine packages, and also have a "Restricted" class for those who don't want to, or can't, spend lots of money on motors.

Bet I get a lot of opinions on the paragraph above. But that's okay; it's a discussion that is warranted right now.

Thanks for reading; hope you enjoyed it.