Our evening started off a little rough. We made it all the way down the front straight-away before the car quit. At first I thought that something in the throttle pedal assembly had come loose, however after being pushed back into the pits, we traced the problem down to an electrical gremlin—where or which gremlin we just weren’t sure. Luckily the problem wa spotted—our ECU had come unplugged. I was extremely nervous about going into the race without any laps in our new G2 FOZ Chassis. To make matters even worse I would be starting on the pole in my heat (an honor I owe to Beau Stewart’s dad Dennis). I’ve decided that it is best that I don’t draw my own pill—it is almost a certain guarantee that I will start at the back of my heat. Over the past several races, my daughter has been the designated pill drawer (if that is a word). She’s growing up quicker than I like and this gives me a great excuse to make her come to the races with me. She had a prior commitment for the night, so Dennis Stewart would deliver my luck for the evening in the form of a number 3 pill draw.
Despite starting on the pole, I quickly relinquished the lead to Kevin Roberts Sr. in the 4K. I thought I might catch up and get back around Kevin, but the car was much looser than I like and I struggled through turns 1 & 2. At the end of the race the ECU came unplugged again causing me to loose momentum rather quickly right upon turn entry. With no where to go Rob Winks tagged me in the rear end. Although Rob was gracious enough to come over and apologize afterwards, it certainly was not his fault. The good news was that I coasted to a second place finish in the heat. The bad news was that my new car already had battle scars. The funny thing is that getting that first bruise on a new racing car is almost like initiating it. The first new car I ever had was the first FOZ Race Car that we built. After it was completed I was standing in the garage admiring it when my dad walked in and said “you better get over it”. I did just that. My first event was a national at Lawrenceburg a few years ago. This was also the first time I ever had an adjustable shock. Although we were moving up through the field nicely, I decided I could make things better by cranking the shock down. The next time into the corner the car got a bite and I turned it right into one of the big earth mover tires on the inside of the track. It bent the front end pretty well. I called John Godfrey and told him that I was sick about crashing our brand new race car. He said it would be okay, just put it back together and race it. He claims they are normally faster after you bend them the first time. He was right, we put it back together and ran it the next night and eventually the remainder of the season with no problems. This time we got off a little bit easier with just a few cracks in our tail section. Nothing that a little borrowed white racing tape couldn’t cure.
For the feature I lined up outside the third row in sixth position. I got a pretty average start and didn’t loose any positions in the process. As I started to get more comfortable with the car we were able to pick up a few positions. After a few laps we went to a red condition after Mark Hery and Kevin Roberts Jr. got together, leaving Hery’s car on its side with Roberts car perched high atop. Robert’s car had to be picked off the top of Hery’s car with the boom on the tow truck. Luckily everyone was okay and damage to the cars didn’t appear to be to severe. Several additional cars apparently spun to avoid the incident and were sent to the tail of the field for a restart. Despite turns 1 & 2 being super slick, as the race went on I was getting more and more comfortable with the new car and eventually was running in third place. As luck would have it second place running Nick Daughtery would loop it coming off the very slick turn 2 putting me in second place for the restart. Once we went green I though I might have a chance at the win as we got into lapped traffic, but my biggest obstacle—being old and out of shape would stand in the way. A second place finish our first night out in the new car was definitely better than I had hoped for.
As I stated in a previous blog, one of the things I am hoping to do is pick out a couple of drivers that deserve mention...and make mention. There were two drivers that I thought deserved special mention this week.
I was chased to the checkers by Lee Underwood. Although I've only competed against Lee a few times and no very little about him, he appears to be another one of the talents that is gaining experience in the mini sprints. I could hear his engine close behind me for much of the race. Congrats to Lee and his family on a nice run and thanks for loaning me the tape.
The other driver that deserves mention is Nick Roberts. Nick finished in fourth place driving the FOZ his dad drove last year. A victim of the multi car melee the week before Nick was in the shop the one day I stopped by a lunch. I claimed that his brother was quiet in a previous article, but I think Nick might even say less than his brother. I asked his dad how you get him to talk and had to laugh at his response, "you gotta step on his foot". Great job Saturday evening Nick.
The Midwest Mini Sprint Association also ran two races over the past few days. On Friday evening they were at Salem's Thunder Valley Raceway where they took the wings off. They had a good field of fifteen cars with The Ambrose brothers leading the charge. Colin Ambrose finished first, followed by Lynn Ambrose in second and Lynsey Tilton in third. I have not seen results yet from the groups Monday evening race at the Shelbyville county fair.
One of the more satisfying portions of the evening was getting to use a product that I helped to develop. I’ve spent plenty of time talking about our work to develop Viper Pipes into a provider of economic, quality racing exhaust systems for motorcycle powered racing cars. My new car has a complete Viper system and muffler. Although extremely partial, I think the system looks great and performs very well. It was also very rewarding to see our Viper Pipes systems on some of the other cars at the track.
Unfortunately we’ve had too many opportunities to sell our new wings, and Saturday evening would be no different, with two cars getting upside down. Although I've said it several times Larry Bland always provided us quality wings and finding a replacement was difficult. We have recently partnered with a father and son team that go by Aero Wings. Although I haven't had the chance to meet with them yet, my dad said that they are all around nice guys who seem to have a well established operation for building quality wings. We are offering both front and top wings.
As competitive as racing is, it is also quite a big family. Please keep the following members of our racing community in your prayers as they recover from illness and surgeries. Alan Ruppenthal of ERC Chassis/Midwest Mini Sprint Association. Beau Stewart's mom Bea and Merrill Calvert who are both recovering from surgery.
That's all for now. Hoping for good weather this weekend, so we can go out and try it again.
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