I'm back home in LA now after a long road trip, watching dark rain clouds fill the sky. Rain in Southern California? Does such a thing exist?

Anyways, we have a busy week ahead of us as we gear up for the Formula D finale in Irwindale, but before that we have more action from the Monterey Sports Car Championships at Laguna Seca. If you had the chance to watch the ALMS race on SPEED TV, then you know how crazy things got at Laguna Seca over the weekend!

It's been years since I've been to Laguna Seca, and I was itching to get back to this beautiful race track. As I walked into the paddock early on Friday morning, one of the first machines that grabbed my attention wasn't a race car, but this gleaming orange GT2 Porsche street car.

A walk through the ALMS pits revealed all the regular characters ready to put on one last show before the end of the season. There's the Risi F430 undergoing some last minute work before the start of practice.

I also made it a point to check out the qualifying sessions for the Speed World Challenge series. There are few things better than watching touring cars come down the cork screw, scraping body panels and bouncing all over the zeebra strips…

A new addition to the touring car field is this 2010 Mazda3 sedan, which joins the Mazda6's that have been active in the Speed WC for years.

The Speed GT class also offers some great action with cars like the veteran Caddy CTS-V…

…or the dominant Mustang Cobras of the ACS team. Fan-favorite Boris Said was behind the wheel of one of these Mustangs for the Laguna Seca race.

If you are looking for close racing, you can do no better than the GT3 Challenge series, which was running throughout the weekend.

Although Laguna Seca is a beautiful circuit, getting from one side of the track to the other can be a time consuming and sweat-inducing process. I'm hoping some of the calories I burned climbing the hills offset those nutritious meals from the trackside vendors…

As part of the Sports Car Championships weekend, owners clubs are invited to come out and have gatherings at Laguna Seca. I spotted lots full of Corvettes, BMW's, and the Porsches seen here.

A small crowd had assembled to watch this artist create paintings of race cars. Not a bad gift idea with the holidays around the corner, eh?

Just before the start of the ALMS race on Saturday, the grid was flooded with people as it opened to the public for a brief period. How many other race series let their fans partake in such things?

At 2:45pm sharp, the four-hour race got under way. Here we see Gil de Ferran leading the LMP's around the first corner after the green flag drops…

…with the tight traffic of the GT2 cars following close behind.

After just a lap or two, the field was already scrambling as the faster classes began to lap the slower ones.

This was particularly dramatic when the LMP cars had to mix it up with the much slower GT3 Challenge Porsches.

Just a few laps into the race the #90 BMW of Joey Hand and Bill Auberlen suffered a catastrophic engine failure, bringing a very early end to their day.

Luckily the guys in the #92 were a bit more fortunate. Tommy Milner will be doing another guest blog for us covering his experiences at Laguna Seca.

The beautiful profile of the #45 Flying Lizard as it comes down the hill after cresting the Cork Screw.

And speaking of the Cork Screw, here's a preview of the new "Flatbed Wrecker" class that will be part of the 2010 American LeMans Series. OK, maybe not.

Stay tuned for more from Laguna Seca, including Tommy's blog and a look at Team Falken's race weekend.

-Mike Garrett