Sat. night and Jim has removed about 250lbs of mud, give or take a few hundred, after feeling like he took half the track with him last night. He has gone over the car fairly well and checked it all and feels pretty good about tonight. Also last night after all the heats and National Late Models were done practicing, Jim was able to get some good hard practice laps on a track that should be much like we should race on tonight. He said he learned a bunch after trying out several different things out there. Race comes up fairly quick and after hot laps he and Pokey(Richard Crook, part time pit crewman) bounch some stuff around about tire pressures and Jim told Pokey to set the tires up and not tell him what they were ( I know, sounds crazy but Pokey is really good at his stuff [he's not a bad driver either]). Well we line up 6th and at the green we get held up with a car in front and the 111 gets by. Jim realizes the car is really handling good and in a few laps he catches and passes the 111. But on exiting turn 4 on this lap, the car gets really loose. Jim collects it up without losing a bunch of spots or getting the wall and aims for the 1st turn. Now here is where he knows why the car got wide back at turn 4. Rut-row, flat right rear. We go around and very narowlly are missed(I closed my eyes). We get into the pits and Pokey and John Whisnant (BTW Congrats to John and his wife on thier new baby boy, spencer) get us a spare (and I reopen my eyes) and we rejoin the pack, last. At the green, Jim starts plugging away at regaining all the spots we can, since the car is a little loose with the spare. With a couple of cautions thrown in we end up 7th for the night. Not what it appeared we were going to get, but hey we did finish and respecfully and drove it on the trailer. So know we have 3 weeks off. Time for some TLC for the tow truck, and a little tweeking on the car. Our next race back at the Park' will be July 13th and 14th, yep another 2 day show which we will share with Carolina Clash Super Late Models. So see you then and how bout' some Scooby Snacks??????
July 14: Well while we were off, the Carolina Clash changed their schedule up some and we ended up running a regular Saturday show instead of the original 2 day show that was planned. But that's life so you just roll with the changes.
Now since we where off the past 3 weeks, Jim has had a lot of time to go over the car and also had Henry Satterfield from Satterfield's Machine Shop double check our timing and carburator settings. He found a little problem with the carburator and quickly straightened it out and said "call me when you win!". I love confidence, woof, woof. Well Saturday looked iffy with the weather but when we got to the track if was clearing some and proved to be a perfect race night. Jim got the car unloaded and Pokey showed up and did his magic with the tires. Jim came back from hot laps all fired up. He said the car was perfect and he had drawn a #4 pill that put us on the outside front row for the heat. At the green and with 2 of the fastest cars in our class on our tail, Jim set sail. After fighting to keep the lead and driving with his head(oh dangerous thought), Jim gets his First heat win. Man didi that feel good.
Ok feature time and Jim has the Pole and at the green he said the carburator bobbled a little and going in the first turn there are 4 cars in about 2 1/2 spaces and it gets a little physical. Going into the third turn Jim says the car picked a real push problem. Within the next couple of laps that push problem turns into a flat right front tire(imagine that). Well Jim gets into turn 2 and the next thing you know we're looking at the inside wall(Rut row). Well no contact and Jim gets it into the pit for Pokey to get it changed under yellow, we also get some help from Jay McKenny, a Crate Late Model owner, and they get Jim back out with out losing a lap. Jim gets back one position before the checker falls.
This flat tire deal is starting to get on our nerves, but this one takes the cake. There are two huge holes on the INSIDE of the tire. You would figured with the contact on the first lap it would have been on the outside, but noooo, we had to be different. Well at least the car is in one peice, now all we have to do is get some tires this week since we are now down tthree good ones. Well untill next week, don't forget, eat some scooby snacks for me. See ya at the 'Park!
July 21: Well here we are in the second half of the season already. As of Friday the 27 we don't kow what's going on with points. They have been updated but the numbers are all wrong so I guess we'll have to wait. Saturday though was a little different. Mr Hobbs didn't get quit enough water down and the track went from real slick, hard, no bite, bite (???) to worse in the heat and we came in 4th. In the feature it got excitng real quick. On the green flag a couple cars got to gether and spun in front of us in turn 2. On the restart the was another altercation somewhere. When we go again the top 6 or 7 cars are all bunched up including us in 5th when another cars spins in turn 2, and again we miss him. Going into turn 4 we get turned around by a visiting car under yellow! That's different! Well we get relined up in 4th under caution, the same before mentioned out of town car thinks he belongs in front of us and after a couple of laps the officials put him there, (I love it). On the restart all is well until the fourth turn again and we again are punted around by who we think is the sibling to the before mentioned out of town car(ya'll see a little pattern here?). Well we get t o see the rea of the field and on the restart and after one more caution we end up 8th (woof). Well as Jim goes up the scale house to congradulate Adam Nations on another win, there seems to be quit a bit of controversy and when all is said and done the top 3 cars are DQ's and we end up 5th. Not bad, could be better, but could have been a lot worse. So until next week, save me some Scooby snacks!