Friday night started early, as we rented the track for 2 hours prior to the race to try to sort out the #32. We lost the handling on the car in the past 3 races and just didn't have time in the practice sessions allotted prior to the race to sort it out. The track gates open at 5:30 pm and practice starts at 6:00 and is over at 7:15 all classes must practice, so you don't have much time to work out a problem. We were at the track for 3:00 and running test laps by 3:20. We had a list of several things we wanted to try (only got through half). The track was scalding hot when we first got on it 138.9 degrees. We shouldn't have even attempted to sort the car out with the track being that hot, but you can't wait until October--the season will be over. Our first set of 5 laps gave us a "fast"? time of 13.380, we came in adjusted, 13.400 wrong way, adjusted again--13.320, more adjustments-13.290, better but no cigar, adjusted again 13.220. In two hours of work we managed to shave off .160 of a second---huge still not where we need to be but closer. With that run our time had run out. A special thanks to Mr. Wayne (the track owner) who provided us a with transponder and personally read out all of our lap times over the PA system, so we had good feedback. At that point normal track practice started, and the track had cooled down to 106 degrees Connelly managed some times in the high teens--more like it. We qualified 6th not what we wanted, made another adjustment for the heat race, fueled the car and got to the grid for our heat.
Cars that were available to compete tonight were the #32 of Connelly Dubuisson, #44 Joseph McArdle, #53 of Jeremy Lundy, the #7 of Hunter Lewis, the #2 of Billy Elmore, the #2r of Skyler Fleming, the #66 of Andrew Johnson, the #96 of Robby Johnston, the #04 of Dawson Keener, the #33 of Dalton Chipley, a very fast field of cars.
Heat Race: We started 3rd in heat race number two, passed the #44, he took it back, passed the #53 and held onto it for a second place finish behind the #44, followed by the #53 the #04 and #33. Our times had much, improved also the track had cooled to 101 degrees.
Feature Race: The second place finish in our heat had given us the starting position of 4th in the feature, before the invert. Hunter Lewis #7 threw the big dice and threw a 3--inverting 3 cars, which left us still starting in 4th--outside second row. Connelly got a good start and by the end of lap one was in second place. Coming out of turn 4 to complete lap two the #2r pushed up got into our left side, he spun, Connelly was able to save it and restarted in 4th place, while the #2r had to go to the rear as he brought out the caution with his spin. We took the choose and had an opportunity to get in front of the #44 but waited a hundredth of a second too long and Joseph closed the door relegating us to 3rd. after some good close racing the #04 got into the back of the #66 and locked up his brakes causing him to spin. Through all of this Connelly was in third place behind the #7 and #44. Another choose with three cars going up on the outside, but they couldn't hold position on the outside and fell back. It was a close and very competitive race with all cars finishing on the lead lap. Top 5 finishers were #7, #44, #32, #53, #66. It was a very productive race for us as we shaved a quarter of a second off of our lap times--which is huge--got a third place finish, a check for $100 (which almost covers the gas for the truck) and a nice trophy. We have some minor damage to repair from the #53 getting into our rear bumper hard, but nothing that can't be fixed. Looking forward to the next race. Come on out and treat yourself to some very good racing.
Sunday, June 16, 2013
Saturday, June 8, 2013
Memorial Day Classic--Race to Glory
For the past several years Sunny South Raceway has been hosting the Memorial Weekend Classic. It features the normal Friday night race program on Friday and a regional qualifier for the Bandoleros and Legends on Saturday night. This year the Tri-State competition (Alabama, Georgia, and Florida) was added for the Pro Challenge division, it was run on Saturday night as well. This event always provides good competition for the racers, and two races in one weekend. It also provides great spectator appeal as there are usually some out of town cars to challenge the local drivers.
FRIDAY NIGHT MAY 24 2013
The #32 team got to the track late, left home about 30 min. late which put us smack in the middle of the early leavers for the holiday weekend traffic, which cost us another 45 min. We arrived at the track got unloaded, got registered, went through "tech" and only got one practice session. The car was tight and we didn't have time to play with it. We were 2 tenths of a second off of our best time, and qualifying was coming up, oh well -- run whatcha brung!!!
Twelve Legends presented for competition tonight; the #83 of Joey Padgett, the # 54 of Clayton Green, both the #83 and #54 are very fast out of town cars, the #7 of Hunter Lewis, the #32 of Connelly Dubuisson, the #53 of Jeremy Lundy, the #2r of Skyler Fleming, the #44 of Joseph McArdle, the # 66 of Andrew Johnson, the # 99 , the #2 of Billy Elmore, Jr., the # 96 of Robbie Johnston, the # 94 of Bred West.
Qualifying: Connelly qualified fourth behind the #83,#7,#54, with the #53 behind Connelly in 5th.
Heat: That put us outside front row in heat #2 and with a tight racecar we just couldn't hold it down in the center of the corner and we wound up 4th in our heat which put us starting 8th out of 12 cars in the feature.
Feature: Starting that deep in the field with an ill handling racecar I told Connelly to just be careful, not to risk the car as the regionals were the next night, and try to pick up as many places as he could. He was able to pick up a couple of spots and wound up 6th in a fairly uneventful race. The top five were; The #7, the #83, the #44, the #2r with Connelly in 6th. Connelly had a shot at getting by the 2r in the closing laps, but did not force the issue and settled for 6th. The extra 3 points he would have gained were not worth the risk, besides we are not racing the 2r for points anyway. Now we need get ready for tomorrow.
SATURDAY NIGHT MAY 25, 2013
We stayed in Mobile Friday night, saved us a bunch of driving and gas expense as the motel was half the cost of gas for the round trip thanks to Joe McArdle negotiating a group rate at the LaQuinta inn. Plus it gave Connelly an hour and a half of study time--his Spanish exam was Monday and he needed to pass (got an 88 which passed him for the year--hooray). Back to racing, we got to the track early as we pushed checkout time to 1pm., got to the track around 2, which gave us time to nut and bolt the car and we were ready when the track opened for practice, the track temp was 134degrees when we first went out to practice. We adjusted on the car and adjusted on the car even changed a spring, got it a little better, but it still wasn't perfect and with the field of cars we had you better be perfect or close to it if you want to run with them. Cars that presented today were the # 83 of Joey Padgett, the # 54 of Clayton Green, the # 7 of Hunter Lewis, the # 44 of Joseph McArdle, the # 32 of Connelly Dubuisson, the # 66 of Andrew Johnson, the # 94 of Brad West, the # 96 of Robbie Johnston, the
# 33 of Dalton Chipley, the # 2 of Billy Elmore, Jr. that tonight was driven by Tucker Yance.
Since tonight's program is the regional qualifier, it will be run a little differently. There will be qualifying, no heat races will be necessary as there are not more cars than the feature can fit on the track so all qualifiers will transfer to the feature. The regional qualifier guarantees the winner in each class a starting spot in the National Championship race, so if you are planning to go to the nationals it is great to have a guaranteed starting spot when you leave home.
Qualifying: Qualifying order was # 83, # 54, # 7, # 44, #32, #66, # 94, # 96, # 33, # 2
Regional Qualifier Feature: This race is a 35 lap race, compared to Friday night's and the normal Friday night program of 20 laps. So tire management was going to be crucial, if you severely overheat your right rear tire you are done, so you have to run fast enough to be close yet not abuse your right rear tire. After one false start (Joey Padgett took off on the "one to go" flag instead of the green and the field had to be reset). There was some very close racing in the early stages, wasn't much attention being paid to tire management. Joey Padgett lead from the start and really wasn't challenged, the #7, #54 and #44 swapped second/third/fourth a couple of times. Connelly settled in to 5th place and maintained. The # 44 of Joseph McArdle's tires finally "came in" late in the race and he passed the #54 for second, the #7 fell to 4th -- he had apparently got the right rear tire so hot he looked like he had a flat he was so loose. Connelly closed up to within about 3 car lengths--thought we might be able to get by, but with 3 laps to go a caution came out for the spin of # 94 allowing every body's tires to cool off a little and we just couldn't get by. The # 44 laid down some really fast lap times in the closing stages of the race but just couldn't get by Padgett, finally settling for second. The top 5 were #83 Joey Padgett, #44 Joseph McArdle, #54 Clayton Green, #7 Hunter Lewis, and #32 Connelly Dubuisson. Although Connelly finished in fifth position, he was the first car in the Semi Pro division to finish, and if they score his finish the way they have in previous years, he will be the Semi Pro Regional Champion. We will have to wait and see. All in all it was not too bad of a weekend for us, we gained some points, had a fair run against some very strong competition and learned a lot about what changes don't work when dealing with a tight racecar on a hot track. We will go over the car with a fine tooth comb get back to our base setup and stage a comeback
FRIDAY NIGHT MAY 24 2013
The #32 team got to the track late, left home about 30 min. late which put us smack in the middle of the early leavers for the holiday weekend traffic, which cost us another 45 min. We arrived at the track got unloaded, got registered, went through "tech" and only got one practice session. The car was tight and we didn't have time to play with it. We were 2 tenths of a second off of our best time, and qualifying was coming up, oh well -- run whatcha brung!!!
Twelve Legends presented for competition tonight; the #83 of Joey Padgett, the # 54 of Clayton Green, both the #83 and #54 are very fast out of town cars, the #7 of Hunter Lewis, the #32 of Connelly Dubuisson, the #53 of Jeremy Lundy, the #2r of Skyler Fleming, the #44 of Joseph McArdle, the # 66 of Andrew Johnson, the # 99 , the #2 of Billy Elmore, Jr., the # 96 of Robbie Johnston, the # 94 of Bred West.
Qualifying: Connelly qualified fourth behind the #83,#7,#54, with the #53 behind Connelly in 5th.
Heat: That put us outside front row in heat #2 and with a tight racecar we just couldn't hold it down in the center of the corner and we wound up 4th in our heat which put us starting 8th out of 12 cars in the feature.
Feature: Starting that deep in the field with an ill handling racecar I told Connelly to just be careful, not to risk the car as the regionals were the next night, and try to pick up as many places as he could. He was able to pick up a couple of spots and wound up 6th in a fairly uneventful race. The top five were; The #7, the #83, the #44, the #2r with Connelly in 6th. Connelly had a shot at getting by the 2r in the closing laps, but did not force the issue and settled for 6th. The extra 3 points he would have gained were not worth the risk, besides we are not racing the 2r for points anyway. Now we need get ready for tomorrow.
SATURDAY NIGHT MAY 25, 2013
We stayed in Mobile Friday night, saved us a bunch of driving and gas expense as the motel was half the cost of gas for the round trip thanks to Joe McArdle negotiating a group rate at the LaQuinta inn. Plus it gave Connelly an hour and a half of study time--his Spanish exam was Monday and he needed to pass (got an 88 which passed him for the year--hooray). Back to racing, we got to the track early as we pushed checkout time to 1pm., got to the track around 2, which gave us time to nut and bolt the car and we were ready when the track opened for practice, the track temp was 134degrees when we first went out to practice. We adjusted on the car and adjusted on the car even changed a spring, got it a little better, but it still wasn't perfect and with the field of cars we had you better be perfect or close to it if you want to run with them. Cars that presented today were the # 83 of Joey Padgett, the # 54 of Clayton Green, the # 7 of Hunter Lewis, the # 44 of Joseph McArdle, the # 32 of Connelly Dubuisson, the # 66 of Andrew Johnson, the # 94 of Brad West, the # 96 of Robbie Johnston, the
# 33 of Dalton Chipley, the # 2 of Billy Elmore, Jr. that tonight was driven by Tucker Yance.
Since tonight's program is the regional qualifier, it will be run a little differently. There will be qualifying, no heat races will be necessary as there are not more cars than the feature can fit on the track so all qualifiers will transfer to the feature. The regional qualifier guarantees the winner in each class a starting spot in the National Championship race, so if you are planning to go to the nationals it is great to have a guaranteed starting spot when you leave home.
Qualifying: Qualifying order was # 83, # 54, # 7, # 44, #32, #66, # 94, # 96, # 33, # 2
Regional Qualifier Feature: This race is a 35 lap race, compared to Friday night's and the normal Friday night program of 20 laps. So tire management was going to be crucial, if you severely overheat your right rear tire you are done, so you have to run fast enough to be close yet not abuse your right rear tire. After one false start (Joey Padgett took off on the "one to go" flag instead of the green and the field had to be reset). There was some very close racing in the early stages, wasn't much attention being paid to tire management. Joey Padgett lead from the start and really wasn't challenged, the #7, #54 and #44 swapped second/third/fourth a couple of times. Connelly settled in to 5th place and maintained. The # 44 of Joseph McArdle's tires finally "came in" late in the race and he passed the #54 for second, the #7 fell to 4th -- he had apparently got the right rear tire so hot he looked like he had a flat he was so loose. Connelly closed up to within about 3 car lengths--thought we might be able to get by, but with 3 laps to go a caution came out for the spin of # 94 allowing every body's tires to cool off a little and we just couldn't get by. The # 44 laid down some really fast lap times in the closing stages of the race but just couldn't get by Padgett, finally settling for second. The top 5 were #83 Joey Padgett, #44 Joseph McArdle, #54 Clayton Green, #7 Hunter Lewis, and #32 Connelly Dubuisson. Although Connelly finished in fifth position, he was the first car in the Semi Pro division to finish, and if they score his finish the way they have in previous years, he will be the Semi Pro Regional Champion. We will have to wait and see. All in all it was not too bad of a weekend for us, we gained some points, had a fair run against some very strong competition and learned a lot about what changes don't work when dealing with a tight racecar on a hot track. We will go over the car with a fine tooth comb get back to our base setup and stage a comeback
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
