STR Progress and Packwood Championship Tour Recap

(Ron Bauer, pictured above.)

To begin, let's flash back to the 2015 SCCA Solo Nationals last summer in Lincoln, NE. Mazda Motorsports (with its partner Long Road Racing) brought a pair of new 2016 Mazda MX-5 Miatas to this massive event. The goal was to start development of not only parts for the car, but the car itself for Solo competition.

With the help of Ron Bauer, Eric Strelnieks, Tara Johns, Rachel Kerswill, and other top-tier drivers, the STR car was fine-tuned with the available parts at that time. While Bauer and Strelnieks both ran times that would have been in the middle of the trophies, everyone agreed that more development would be needed to make the car competitive at the top of the STR class.