WKA
FDDS Race #5
Crossroads Motorplex
Jasper, FL
June 28th, 2003
Race Report
No pictures again this week. The
Data Acquisition Specialist was called out of town on official Grandma business! Don't understand it but I guess a Grandma's got to do what a Grandma's got to do...
The crew chief and I got to the track early on Friday so we could try a few things out on the champ. I've been a little slow there and we were looking for about 6 to 8 tenths of a second to get me up front for the race. That's a lot, 8 tenth! So, we went to an extreme on the set up to see if we could get better. Well, it didn't work. By the end of the evening we decided to go back to what we had been doing in the past.
On Saturday morning we knew that we would get rained out but didn't know when. Then the sun came out and it looked like maybe we were going to get lucky. With the old set up and a few tweaks to the cross weight we looked pretty good in practice. The kart felt like it used to to me and I thought I was pretty fast. Then, just before qualifying, it started to rain. It didn't rain real hard or very long and soon the sun came back out. We had put on some pretty hard tires and were just about to change to some some sticky ones when it looked like the track was going to get even faster than it was in practice so we left the kart alone. The rain may have actually helped the track!
I went out to qualify in Sportsman II lite and I was really fast. When I got to the scales I could see my crew chief with a big smile and a thumbs up so I knew I was starting somewhere up front. When I got out of the kart he told me we had the pole! Then, we went out in the Champ and, although I was still 3 tenths off the fastest time, I sat the outside pole. Finally, we went out to qualify in heavy and I sat the outside pole in that too! Boy what a difference from the last couple of races here. Still, when we looked at the qualifying times from the earlier races we found that the track was about a half a second slower. We actually qualified slower than before but guessed the tires a little better than everybody else. My crew chief told me than he was going to work on learning about the tires this year. I guess he's starting to figure it out a little bit!
Once it started to sink in how well we qualified we then realized that if we got rained out now we would get finishing results and points based on our qualifying position. Well, I like to race as much as the next guy but I started praying for rain! Sure enough, just before they started the races it started to rain again. The crew chief and I were jumping around and high fiving each other but we weren't going to jinx ourselves by packing up too early so we just sat in the trailer and waited. Wouldn't you know it, the sun came back out and they got the track back and were able to start the races anyway.
In the first race I knew just what to do. I lead them around real slow so that everybody behind me could fall in line and not get bunched up. Then, what the green flag flew, I got a nice start and lead the field into turn one. On lap 2 I got a little excited and didn't hit my marks so I came off turn 2 a little high and let a few karts go by me. That got me upset and I guess I lost my concentration a bit. I just wasn't driving smoothly so I was slower than the top 4 or 5 karts and a few laps later another kart got under me on the back stretch. I did something I have done before and it didn't work just like it didn't before. I tried to race the kart through the corner on the outside. Once I was out of the groove it was all over and I dropped back to 9th. Then, I got it together and got smoother and faster and I passed 3 karts to finish in 6th. I guess I finally learned my lesson about patience, I think I had a kart that could have won the race or at least finished 2nd or 3rd so I'm not going to do that again!
Next, they called us up for the Champ race and as soon as we got through the pump around it started to drizzle again. They red flagged the race that was going on and then a few minutes later they called the rest of the races because the sun had set and the radar showed that there were some pretty big storms in the area. We pushed the champ back to the trailer and started to load up realizing that we might get a pretty good jump in the points. There is just one more race in this series so, if I can do as well then as I did this weekend, I should wind up a with a a top 5 finished or maybe even a little better!
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