Lucky 7 Sportsman Race
New Smyrna Speedway
05-02-09 - VIDEO

When we named this car Lucky 7 it was sort of wishful thinking but this car doesn't have a lick of luck in it! If it ever did we have just about replaced everything from bumper to bumper so the luck must be in the heap of worn out parts sitting on the side of my shop.

I'm not kidding! Except for the frame, which I cut apart and welded back together again last winter, we have the left rear spring, about half of the engine, the transmission and the rear end and that all that is left of the original car and by the next race we will be down to just the rear end. (more...)

Funny thing is, even though we are still a ways off from a win, I have had more fun and have learned more things about building a race car with this car that I could have imagined when I first brought it home. Since building race cars is what I really want to do after I graduate from college this fall, this is good experience to prepare for getting a job.

The main reason I wanted to get this car was, because Sportsman cars don't have a lot of horsepower, it takes a lot of corner speed to run fast laps. You have to drive them into the corners harder that the late model and you have to try to stay off the brakes as much as possible. My crew chief told me that he thought this is where I gave up a lot of speed in the late model so we figured a season in the Sportsman would teach me how to get a way from that habit. I think its working because I drive the car into the corner so fast and I think, "this shouldn't work" but it does so the next lap I drive it in even harder and it works again.

I haven't had any horsepower since last fall so what lap speed I have is all in the corners. If you watch my video you'll see I gain on the cars in the corners and then they just drive off and leave me on the straights. We have been trying to figure out where we messed up and we have finally come the the conclusion that the motor just needs to be freshened up.

This morning I went to the shop and pulled it out so I can drop it off at the engine builder tomorrow. I also pulled out the transmission and will be sending it out to get it looked at too because it has a leak that we haven't been able to fix no mater what we do. While we are waiting for those to come back I am going to change out the left rear spring because every time I go out for a few laps the left rear drops down about a 1/4 inch. My car has leif springs and they tell me that they tend to wear out all at once.

I guess I should be telling you about the race since this is supposed to be a race report but there is nothing really to tell. I drew the pole and almost everybody drove by me on the start. I ran around as long as it made sense but at lap 20 my motor was going slower and slower and my oil pressure light was coming on. I was in 5th place with 5 cars on the track so I had nothing to loose by parking the car early.

Maybe the Luck will start to come our way next race and I'll be running with the leader again.