Saanich’s Gavin Aitken won first overall in the feature race of the Ronald McDonald House Formula ‘C’ Continental championship race at Mission’s Rivers Edge Raceway on Sunday.
The open wheel event, known as Racing for the House, is part of the North West Formula Continental series, which the 34-year-old Aitken started in last year.
“It was awesome,” Aitken said. “It’s a great win for our team after we almost didn’t race.”
The “team” consists of crew chief Jennifer Le, Aitken’s wife, and his engineer Blaine Alexander, who is his brother-in-law.
They nearly pulled out of the race, facing cooling problems for their Formula C car.
“It was overheating all day Sunday. We were going to go home and then decided right before the race to chance it and it was more of a test to see if it would last the whole race,” Aitken said.
“Luckily, it ran really well, enough to win the race.”
Two other Saanich drivers earned success at Mission over the weekend as Mike Hawthorne drove his Porche 996 to first- and second-place finishes in a pair of Vintage Class races. Bill Okell raced his Honda CRX to second place in three Improved Production races, once on Saturday and twice on Sunday.
Okell rarely uses the CRX, as he “parachuted” into the Improved Productions series.
Okell and Aitken are both focused on racing at The Ridge Motorsports Park in Shelton, Wash. in September, Okell in the Nasport Lite series and Aitken in the NWFC.