L.O.C. Endurance Takes Mediumweight Superstock Victory at Miller Motorsports Park Using a single set of Bridgestone DOT tires, LOC Endurance took the class win and finished 11th overall in the fourth round of the WERA/Bridgestone National Endurance Series this weekend. The grueling 6-hour race was the grand finale to the first major event ever held at the beautiful new Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele, Utah. The race started with lead rider Jimmy Vanderhaar launching the team’s EBC shod Yamaha YZF-R6 from the middle of the 7th row of the grid. When the pack came around after the first lap, LOC sat in 14th place overall, 3rd in class behind Team Velocity Racing II and Dalke Motorsports. On the 11th lap, the team turned its fastest lap of the race at 2:04.34, ironically, just as class leader TVR II pulled in to fix a flat tire. 3 laps later, LOC caught and passed Dalke Motorsports to move into the lead in Mediumweight Superstock. When Vanderhaar pulled in to the pits at the end of the first hour, LOC sat in 9th position overall, 1st in class. The team took on a full tank of fuel and switched riders as Joe Hayes took over for the second hour & then again as Dan Carr rode for the third hour. Running in the 2:08’s and 2:09’s, Hayes and Carr kept the LOC team in the overall top ten for the next two hours. The team’s initial strategy was to run the hard compound Bridgestones until the 4-hour mark if possible and then mount a new set of medium compound tires to complete the final 2 hours. LOC knew that would be a stretch on the abrasive new track, but the tires held up well in practice and a fresh set would be ready to go sooner if necessary. Due to a red flag incident, the race was almost halfway into the fourth hour as Vanderhaar prepared for his second stint on the bike and the team faced its decision on when to do a tire change. With Carr still turning good lap times, the decision was made to keep going without a tire change at this point. The tires continued to hold up amazingly well with Vanderhaar on the bike when a red flag caused another race stoppage shortly after the 4-hour mark. At this point, the team decided to try and finish the race on the first set of tires and to extend the next fuel stop by one lap in order to try to avoid a splash-and-go pit stop in the 6th hour. The green flag dropped again at the 4:40 mark and Vanderhaar finished his stint at 4:54, still in 9th overall position. Hayes then took over to try and finish the race on one tank of fuel and tires that were, by this time, beginning to finally slow the team down a little. With a 2 lap lead in hand, though, the team was confident going into the last hour that the race win was theirs if they didn’t throw it away in the final hour. The fuel light came on with about 3 laps left in the race, but the team finished… exhausted, out of gas, and completely out of tire grip… in first place.