Struggle at Salem, Still get 12th

Hey everybody. I'm sorry I missed giving you a preview of the Salem Race. I've been awful busy and with it being vacation season at Kidd Tire it doesnt look like I'm going to get a break anytime soon. I'm not here to moan about "work" stuff, but if you dont mind I'll tell you about our race at Salem.

Our day started out easy as we were able to unload and get in line for tech really quick. Our crew, Jason, Josh, Chris, Joe, Mike, and HM really hustled and got everything set up in record time. I baby sat the car in the tech line with Joe. We sailed through tech inspection (first time all year without any major violations!) Our rear spoiler was a bit too high, as I had the rear ride heights up a bit. I had them up so we wouldn't bottom out the exhaust during practice. I ended up being able to bring them down during practice so the officials were happy with us when we went through pre-qualifying tech.

Practice was eh-so so. I know that's real descriptive, but hey what can I say. It was what it was. It took me a good part of practice to get comfortable running 8 inches off the wall. After I got "comfy" we were able to start tuning the car and we went up the practice sheet quickly. The car was a bit on the tight side, and something that was puzzling to me was that I still had a bit of steering input in it on corner exit, but more on that later.

I qualified the car 16th. Now, I know that sounds good, but in reality with only 24 cars taking time, it really sucked. The problem? I just got lazy in qualifying. Plain and Simple, I took turn 1 & 2 off and was concetrating on 3 & 4 too much. Had I put a whole lap together-we would have been a little closer to the front, but as the race would play out for us, it really wouldnt have mattered much.

The race started, and we held our own on the start. I wasn't as conservative on the start as I was at Mansfield and we ran well for the first several laps. Thirty laps or so into the race though, the car picked up a bad push on corner exit. I drove through it for a bit, thinking that a caution would be coming any lap. After a while though I had to change my line and start searching for a better way around the track. I tried diamonding the corner, that is driving in hard and low, letting the car drift in the center and then turning it hard left and coming off low. I tried late apexing with no success. I tried the high line and the low line, nothing worked. The push got worse and worse no matter what I tried. During the middle to late stages of the race, I pitted for adjustments and none really helped.

I just resigned myself to a crappy car and made the best of it. It was my intention to race the track for the race and try to put myself in position to get a good finish at the end. Well, I had to do just that, only for the entire race and not for a good (top 5) finish at the end. I guess what I'm saying is that I had hopes of racing smart and getting a top 5 out of it, instead I had to race smart just to finish the darn thing without tearing the RF corner off of it.

So what was the problem? First of all, I missed the setup badly. I brought a package that was similar to what we ran well with last year. It just didn't work this year. I think we had too much spring split in the front or something mechanically was just bound up. I haven't yet debriefed the car to see what was screwed up but i can promise that I wont take the same setup back to Salem next time.

Thats all for now.....next up MOTOR MILE!!!!

18th at Mansfield-Great Fathers Day Weekend!

Hey everybody, We had a fun time this weekend in Mansfield, Ohio. The car ran well and the team worked really hard. We had a little extra help this weekend as Andy Wizorek from GEM came up to help us out. Andy works with my brother and also helps Michael Ritch out in the Southern Division. He was great help and a lot of fun to be around. Andy knows his stuff and I'm looking forward to working with him again soon.

Our race weekend was filled with a lot of highs, a couple of lows and a lot of work in between. USAR was able to get practice started on time despite the heavy rains the Mansfield area had overnight and early Saturday morning. Our car was pretty good to start with, the bumps in 3 and 4 were very upsetting to the car. We were tight in the center of the corners too. Andy and I put our heads together and made some adjustments that really dialed the car in. We improved our time with each adjustment. By the end of practice, we had the 12th best speed. The coolest thing was that the car was fast and consistent.

Qualifying was fun. Andy told me before we went out to take it easy getting into the corners and not overdrive the entry. I agreed with him and told him that I wouldnt do it, that I would be smooth and let the car roll free. I practically guarenteed him that I would behave and be smooth. Guess what the first thing I did was? Overdrive turn 1 on the first lap. I buried it into the corner, probably 3 car lenghts deeper than I had driven it all day. Spun it out and ruined that first lap. I turned the car around, thoroughly aggrivated with myself and very embarrassed, I layed down a conservative second lap that put us 16th on the grid. When I got out of the car, Andy had this "I told you so" look on his face. All we could do is laugh, because he did tell me and I promised but I guess it went in one ear and out the other. Typical for race car drivers. Honestly-we should have qualified 3rd, 4th, or 5th but I let us down on that one. I was too greedy, too keyed up, and was trying too hard to be a hero. Next time Andy, I promise I'll listen!!

The coolest part of the weekend, was that Lisa and Ryan were the Grand Marshalls for the race. (Thanks Craig!!) They were a part of Driver Intro's and got to say Driver's Start Your Engines! Lisa was trying to coach Ryan into saying GO DADDY!! but he clammed up with the sight of the TV Cameras. Anyway, it was really special for me. I have to admit, I did get a little emotional in the car hearing them give the command. I'll never forget this weekend and their participation in it. It was probably the best racing weekend for me ever.

The race was pretty typical Mansfield. High Attrition, lots of wrecks and a surprise ending. I was pretty conservative to start the race and let a few cars go by. I didnt want to push the issue too much, I just wanted to get some laps in and let some of the knuckleheads take themselves out. The race was pretty much going our way until a flat tire derailed it. We're not sure what caused the flat, but when the tire went down it broke the sway bar arm and drop link that attaches it to the Lower A frame. It took us a few laps to engineer a solution and to determine if would be safe enough to take the car back out. Mike Compton, Andy, Jason Hagerman and the rest of the guys did a great job figuring it out and getting me back out there. The rest of the race for me was spent running hard, respecting the leaders and burning the brakes off of it. Yeah, on top of everything else, I lost brakes with 50 or so to go. I cant tell you for sure how many laps were left because it sure felt like a 100 or so but I know it wasnt. I couldnt quit. My team didnt quit me so I damn sure wasnt going to quit them.

So the highs were Lisa and Ryan, being fast in practice and gutting it out to take the checkerd flag. The lows were the flat tire and the broken sway bar arm and the surprise ending??? Our buddy Agnew ran out of gas on the last lap and Derek Kale won his first race. Congrats to Derek-he deserves a win and my heart goes out to my close friends on the 73 car. Those guys help me out so much, I wished I could have given them a quart of gas so they could have won that race. Oh well...till next time....Michael

Mansfield Preview

Alright-here is the Mansfield Preview.

Mansfield is a neat race track in Northeastern Ohio. It's a true half-mile race track with a traditional oval shape. You make a lot of speed there and it's real difficult to pass. It is a one groove track although it is wide from apron to outside wall. As you pass the start/finish you set up for a low'ish entry to turn one. There's a black strip through the sun bleached asphalt that serves as the "groove". I enter the turn on the lower side of the groove and let the car gradually move up the track as I accelerate. I drive it in pretty deep and use a little brake to keep the car settled. I let the car free roll for a few feet then start back with the gas.

As I do about everywhere else I keep the car tight on the outside wall going down the straight headed for 3. Turn 3 I take a more "late apex" than I do in 1. I enter the turn a little higher and try to cut down the groove in the center so I can maximize speed on exit. Turn 4 exits a little lower than 2 so this seems to work OK for me. There's a nasty bump entering turn 3 so the shock package has to be right.

The keys for this race is to have a good turning race car. You have to be able to turn here-that is the key to going fast. If you can drive into the turns really deep and still get the car to turn then you're going to be the King-Daddy in Qualifying. Another key to this race is pit-strategy. It is so hard to pass cars on the track here, you have to pass as many as possible in the pits. That means pit stops will be critical. Track position will be key so look for the stops to be timed so that you cycle through so that you can get the best possible track position you can get. Finally, we'll be watching for the big one. It seems as if the two races I have been there that sometime there will be a big pile up with 6 or more cars. The good news is that there is room to manuever and miss the big wrecks but the bad news is that because it is so hard to pass, someone will get impatient and lay the bumper to another competitor and cause the aforementioned mess-it's inevitable!

I'm looking forward to Mansfield. I like the track and like the area. I feel like I get around there pretty good and I believe our set-up will be pretty good too. I have a lot of confidence in our team and in myself to get the job done next weekend. My goal is to qualify well (top 20) and get a top 15 finish. Very doable and very realistic I think.

Ready for Mansfield??

Hey everyone! I guess I'm done sulking about South Boston and am ready to face the world now. We have been working really hard at the shop the last several weeks preparing for Mansfield. I have KKM001 ready for action and KKM002 almost ready. (KKM002 is the car I wrecked at South Boston for those who want to know) For the first time we will be taking 2 cars to the track. Our friend and former competitor, Kres Vandyke, is generously loaning us his trailer for the weekend and another great friend, Tim Anders of Circle T Pipeline is loaning us a truck to pull it with. A big thanks to both of them for their generosity.

So why did we skip Milwaukee?? Simply put-Money. No, we're not broke or anything like that, it's just that that race was going to cost us a small fortune to go to. With fuel prices as they are, the fact that the race weekend was extended to 3 days (that equals 5 nights in a hotel for us!) it was just to costly for my team to participate. I could have run that race, but probably would have had to take the month of June off for the checkbook to recover. So I made the decision to skip it in favor of racing at Mansfield and Salem.