What a great race. Had a blast! Thanks to PeterKay11 for putting on such a great race and doing all the foot work, you ran a tight ship and it showed!
So here was my experience. Friday, PPP flew in to town, I went and picked him up, we stopped at the grocery store to get supplies (food, beer...mostly beer! LOL) got back to my place, hopped in the truck with toy hauler and headed to the track. SlickRick beat us there by a few hours. We arrive, get all set up, Shoubadaba arrived, we hung out, did some last minute maintainance and what not, and we then were able to hang out, visit, and drink beer until around 1:30am. Slick and PPP crashed with me in my trailer, Shoubadaba and his family in his trailer. The next morning I wake up to hear PeterKay11 outside, shouting something dirty. People then started to wake up, we visit and hang out a bit, as the time went by we eventually had a total of 10 cars to race. 2 briggs cars, 1 revolt, and a mixture of pilots and odysseys. I got to meet a few more board members and I have to say, I have had a real positive experience with meeting people from this website. We spent the morning practicing and getting things adjusted and dialed in. Halorising had some bad luck and burned up his piston in his pilot, so he ran his fl350 instead. Flip had some jetting to do, but eventually he got it dialed in. So it was time to call the practice over and get the racing started. Right before the first qualifier, the water truck soaked the track down, which made it nice and muddy! I lined up i the 5th position right behind Shoubadaba for the 1st qualifier. Peter waved the green flag, tires were spinning, and I got a face full of mud! And I had no tear offs on my goggles! I had to pull off the track and wipe my lenses off by hand and by that time I dropped down to last place. I was able to drive past quite a few people, ran a good race, and finished 4th. The second qualifier was fun as well, I accidently bumped Doug Goodnuff's son on the side nerf bar in a turn and sent him on his lid, so we did a re-start, but from then on there were no real battles for me, I was about 5 seconds behind the top 3 drivers and about 10 seconds above the rest of the pack, so I basically just ran my lines the best I could and had a blast! Now the 3rd qualifier was a ton of fun! I started out right in the middle, they put the fl350s up front, and the stadium lites in the back. I was ready and waiting for Peter to wave the green flag and once he did I nailed the gas and took a fast inside line and jumped out into the lead and held it for about 3 or 4 laps! I eventually got caught by Slickrick and Wheels (he had a really fast pilot) and they worked their way around me. Jeff52 was coming up fast in his revolt and I fought him off until the FREAKIN LAST TURN OF THE LAST LAP!!!!!! He took an inside line on me and hammered it and we crossed the finishline side by side in the air over a table top!!! From what I was told he had about 3 tire lengths on me! Man it was fun! So freakin close! As for the main, I hopped up into second place for quite a bit of the race following Wheels in his pilot. Slickrick wanted to start in the back of the pack and work his way to the front (kudos to him!) which he did quite quickly, his Gen4 Briggs car is freakin amazing! I tried to fight him off and made his ass work for it until finally he got past me and was gone! The only person I had left to hold off was Jeff52 in his revolt. After running a few laps, I looked over to see Slickrick out of his car with it broke down. I guess a bolt fell out of his suspension and he was unable to continue. So I was able to reel in Wheels a little, I counted I was trailing him by 2 to 3 seconds. My attention was more focused on Jeff52 this time and trying to not let him get an inside line on me. There were quite a few times when he almost touched in on me, but I was able to gas it and keep ahead of him. My mind was going back to the previous qualifier when he passed me on the last turn. In the end, I was able to hold him off and close the door on him and I took 2nd place! Trailing not far behind the winner Wheels. I was pretty excited and had a blast with the battles we had. The weather held for us just long enough, when we were done and getting loaded to go it started sprinkling and by the time I hit the freeway it was raining pretty good. Slickrick's wife took PPP to the airport for his flight home and Slickrick and his wife and 2 kids crashed at my place and drove home to AZ this morning.
Had an awesome time, Also want to thank all the guys who were mindful and courtious (spelling?) enough to move aside when we would lap them, it made the racing experience safer for everyone. I have some pics and video to sift through, will be posting soon.
|