It’s 7 a.m. The 30 minute drive from my home in Western Springs to Alexian Field via 294, 290, and Elgin O’Hare expressway was chilly and overcast and I wished I had gloves and a coffee. Uneventful drive. By 0800 hrs., a small handful of early-bird Miata faithful were starting the registration. Within an hour, almost the full complement of 75 registrants were there, along with CMGC mem-bers David Novak (74 “B”) Seth Jones (71 Midget) Raj Sandhu (Midget) and yours truly in my 77”B”. Dino also showed up to say hi and take a few photos. Lots of conversation and visiting and checking out cars. Some of them pretty serious…

I’ll tell you folks, the Windy City Miata Club was really well organized for this event. Tip o’ the Hat to WCMC…the entire elected WCMC officers were there to kick off their season, along with Events Coordinators Pat Marcus and Autocross Coordinator Frank Rogers who were working registration (they don’t take debit or credit cards for the $35 registration fee as Seth Jones discovered).

Driver’s meeting was held for all entrants…rules and regulations. This is how they work it: cars are assigned to one of three groups. One group drives 5 races, one group mans the stations around the course, and one group is on rest time. This is repeated in the afternoon. Each driver has 10 runs during the day’s event, and your best time is the one that counts. Awards are held at the end of the afternoon. Most cars were Miata’s/MX-5s, but there was a SAAB 9.3, a Mustang, a New Mini, a couple of Subaru’s, Hondas and a very entertaining older Hyundai which spent most of his runs with either one or the other of his rear wheels in the air. If I ever see him again, I’ll buy him a beer. A few entertaining spinouts and lots of screaming engines and squealing tires.

I had to bug out early before the afternoon runs, so I don’t know how our CMGC members scored, but we sure had a blast and met lots of new people. One nice touch for novices (like me), is that experienced autocrossers from the Miata Club will ride along for a run or so with you to familiarize you with the track and help keep you on course (literally). You can also ride along as passenger with the more experienced. I took advantage of both offers, and it was much appreciated. I’ll certainly be doing more of these with WCMC, and encourage more CMGC members to join us.