Saturday Night September 17, 2011--Last Race of Season

iThis past Saturday night found the #32 team at Sunny South Raceway for the final time this season. Since it was the last race of the year, a couple of new wrinkles were in store. First they were going to qualify the Legends and Bandoleros, it was also a double points race, which was good for us as we were trying to get into the top 3 in Young Lions points. We were 103 points behind, which would be too many to make up in one race, but because of the double points it was mathematically possible.

There was a very strong field of 15 cars on hand to contest the last race of the 2011 season. In addition to the usual strong contenders; Brian McArdle two time track champion and current track record holder, his son Joseph current points leader in Young Lions, Cody Logan current points leader in the pro division and last year's semi pro champion, the #53 who won the pole in qualifying with a blistering lap in the low 13.1's, Cody Karl currently in second place in points behind Joseph (-30 pionts back). The wild card in this mix was Joey Padget who we were chasing for third place in Young Lions was racing in Kentucky and was not competing. Also racing was the #4,#7,#59, #97, #8, #1 and of course the #32 of Connelly Dubuisson.

When we went on the track for practice, Connelly discovered the toe had been knocked out in our altercation with the #4 in the last race. We lost about 30 min of practice time fixing it. We got on the track and the car felt good to Connelly. He ran some respectable times. We wanted to try a set of tires that we had used earlier in the year as they appeared to have a better stagger than the ones we had been running. We got the tires changed and presented the car to the gate for a test run but the track had just closed to practice. I asked Connelly what he wanted to do about tires for qualifying, he said lets try the ones we had not practiced, bad decision. We had run a number of laps on the old tires in the low to mid 13.20's. In qualifying the car just wouldn't handle and we posted a 13.53 good enough for only 9th place out of 15 cars. You just can't leave .3 of a second on the table in qualifying. We started 5th out of 8 cars in our heat race, made two passes got to third, got passed back by Cody Logan and wound up 4th in the heat. We started in the 7th position out of 15 cars for the feature. Connelly drove a great race and worked his way up to 4th by lap 7, the red flag came out for an accident at that point and it took 15 min to clear the track. During the cleanup, an accidental fire extinguisher discharge by the safety vehicle put a huge amount of dry chemical on the track. They blew it off and ran a few hot laps to finish the job, and got back to racing. Several cars took the "choose" which relegated Connelly to 8th. He worked his way back up to 6th then got into a slow slide and went through the infield at the entrance to turn one and knocked the toe out again and the car quit handling. The slide began right where all of that dry chemical from the fire extinguisher was dropped, could be that contributed to the slide. Before the spin he had run a lap of 13.11 and after the best he could do was a 13.78. We wound up with an official finish of 9th. I did the math and it appears that we might have gotten 3rd place in Young Lions points since Joey Padget was not racing. We picked up 104 which would give us the lead for third by one point. Each driver will have to drop his lowest point race and I don't know what Joey's lowest race was, so the jury is still out.

From my prespective, the 2011 season was a great one for us. We began with a new class of car that I knew little about, and with a driver who was totally new to legend racing. These cars are a complete different animal than the old bandolero. The setup is totally different, but with the help of a lot of people were were able to learn a lot about the car. I brought Connelly along slowly at first, but he grew into the position of driver and by the end of the season was really doing well. We are already looking forward to next season.

Saturday August 27,2011

Saturday night found us at Sunny South Raceway with saddened hearts. My Mother and Connelly's Great Grandmother passed away, and we had just buried her on Thursday. She lived a full and complete life and at 94 1/2 was ready to join her maker. She was active and lucid to the very end but had fallen and fractured her hip the Saturday before and had to have surgury or be confined to a bed for the rest of her life, which she refused. We, in concert with her, chose the surgury and it resulted in her passing. We will all miss her greatly. This puts a lot of things in prospective.

THE RACING:

We had to replace the starter, which we killed when Connlly spun in last weekend's race, turned the engine backwards and that took care of the starter. He reported that the brakes were getting "soft" after last week's feature. Upon inspection I found that the left rear hard brake line had suffered from metal fatigue and fractured. So we replaced both and adjusted the brakes, now we hoped we had a car that would both start and stop.

During practice, the track was slick and everybody was loose, with the track temparature at 118.7 that was to be expected. We did not adjust the car as we felt the track would "come to us" once it cooled down. Which it did.

The field of cars that was on hand was very impressive. Brian McArdle (2 time track champion and track record holder) was there as was his son Joseph (current young lions points leader) with his new super strong '34 coupe. Joey Padgett (# 8 in the US in young lions points) Cody Logan (last year's track champion in young lions and current points leader in the Pro division) as well as the usual SSR participants. We felt like we were probablly a top 5 or 6 car.

In the heat race we faced Cody Logan and Joey Padgett, the #1, #4, and #59 for a first heat consisting of 6 cars. We started outside front row. Connelly got a good start and fell in behind Cody and ran second for about half the race when Joey Padgett got by sending us to 3rd which is where we finished.

In the feature 13 cars answered the starter's call. We started 5th due to the invert and settled in and ran in the top 5 or 6 for most of the race. With 3 laps to go while in 7 th place Connelly spun going into turn 3, his right rear brake locked up and sent him around (he put too much brake in the right rear when he adjusted the brakes) that relegated him to last place. After the re-start he passed one car and in the last turn coming to the checker flag he attempted to pass the # 4, got under him they got together and Connelly spun into the infield and finished last. It was just one of those "racing things" with two agressive drivers going for the same piece of "reale estate" while looking at the finish line. When Tucker Yance (the driver of the #4, and really nice guy)came down to our pits after the race to talk, I jokingly told him I would have to keep him and Connelly separated because they don't play well together. We knocked off the right rear fender so we will have to re attach it before the next race which will be on the 17 of September, it will be the last race of the season. Come on out and watch some really exciting racing.