While he didn't win one of five karting scholarships awarded at the Skip Barber Karting Scholarship Shoot-out, Alexander Rossi came out of the competition with more experience and even more recognition as one the most talented up and coming formula one drivers in the country.

Rossi, a 13-year-old from Nevada City, was one of 47 drivers invited to participate in the competition at Laguna Seca Jan. 7-9. The majority of the other drivers ranged from age 17 to 20.

The weekend started out with a bang for Rossi as he won the shoot-out's first event on Friday, which was a timed autocross on a wet skid pad while driving a Dodge Neon R/T 2000 with a five speed manual transmission. Drivers had to navigate through a coned course in the fastest time and were penalized for hitting a cone. Rossi finished in 27.65 seconds.

What was even more impressive about his success in the autocross session was the fact that the drivers competed in the pouring rain.

The first event was not the only event conducted in the rain as, unfortunately, the rain continued to pound the track for the entire weekend.

"It took awhile to get used to the rain," Rossi said. "I didn't have much experience in rain before the shoot-out and I was kind of sloppy at first."

Driving in the rain is no picnic in any situation, but it added even more pressure to Rossi as some of the other drivers had more experience handling formula one cars and doing so in the rain.

"In the rain you have to drive on the absolute perimeter of the track, not on the inside," Rossi said. "That's something I wasn't trained to do and it's not really in your normal instincts as a driver."

Despite his experience disadvantage, combined with the poor conditions, Rossi consistently finished with the top 15 drivers in each session and finished in the top 10 at the event end. After the autocross event, the driver competed in Dodge race cars on the track for the remainder of the weekend.

The scholarships were awarded to drivers ranging in age from 16 to 23, with 23-year-old Jordy Vorrath from British Columbia, Canada winning the shoot-out.

"I am extremely happy that I did the shoot-out," Rossi said. "My dad and I have said that we couldn't have bought a more experienced group of kids to race against or the conditions that the rain created."

County Champs

Seven Hills takes 8th grade volleyball title

Whoever said "Lightning never strikes in the same place twice," was obviously not acquainted with the Seven Hills eighth-grade boys volleyball team.

For the second straight season, the Raiders defeated Union Hill in an exciting three-game match for the County Championship at Nevada Union High School last month.

The third and final game ended with a 19-17 verdict, after several lead changes between the two teams. Seven Hills coach Tim Floyd credited the Raiders' hard work and winning attitude as keys to the championship.

Union Hill also had a championship season, winning the Lyman Gilmore Tournament title earlier in the season, after defeating Seven Hills in the teams' only other head-to-head matchup.

- The Union staff