After months of hard work over the summer, William has purchased a legends car and begun racing at Texas Motor Speedway! Look for William in the, currently, #23t '34 Ford Sedan at TMS! Over the weekend he ran over 150 laps on the 'Lil TMS and had a very impressive first outing in a legends car. The car was built by Cherokee Racing two and a half years ago for a driver to rent but was never ran. It had sat at the teams shop until this weekend when I told them I was interested in the car and wanted to take a look at it. Buddy, the owner of Cherokee Racing, called the driver of their second trailer and told them to turn around and pick up the 23t car. After an inspection of the car they loaded it up and brought it to the track. Upon first glance the car looked rough and I wasn't to sure of what to think about it. I asked Buddy if I could take it out on the track and to my liking, the car handled phenomenally and had TONS of power! I pulled it in and tried to keep my grin to a minimum as to try to show as little emotion as I could even though at that moment I knew the car was mine!
On Tuesday, July 24, William, Bobby and Richard went over to a buddies house. We met at the Lonestar Grand Prix and have now begun a project race car that we are building basically from the ground up. We are building a 1986 Nissan Pulsar that has a 1.5L engine that boasts an extremely underwhelming 59hp! Why would anyone in their right mind use this car to race? Well, us apparently. And we arent the only people building a crazy car!
On Tuesday, July 24, William, Bobby and Richard went over to a buddies house. We met at the Lonestar Grand Prix and have now begun a project race car that we are building basically from the ground up. We are building a 1986 Nissan Pulsar that has a 1.5L engine that boasts an extremely underwhelming 59hp! Why would anyone in their right mind use this car to race? Well, us apparently. And we arent the only people building a crazy car!
Racing Legend Cars has been a long time dream for myself. I had not gotten the chance to race until the middle of my freshman year of college but once I got that spark there was no stopping me. In one year I ran 14 races, receiving two wins and nine podiums, and winning one championship. And I did all this on a microscopic budget. Wanting to be even more competitive, I have put my main racing aside for the summer to give myself a larger budget to work with in the 2013 season, so long as the world does not end before then!! However, with the larger budget I will be making a switch to cars with suspension, street tires, more power, less grip, and the biggest thing of all, more styles of racing with one vehicle. I can take the car to Texas Motor Speedway and racing asphalt circle track racing. Remove the fenders and I can take the car to Kennendale and race in the dirt. Road race at Eagles Canyon. Drag race at North Star Dragway. Auto cross whenever I am not doing anything else. Or travel to Colorado and race Pikes Peak. Any type of racing you can imagine, this little car can handle (except for off road racing and Global Rallycross). I am really hoping to gain valuable experience in as many different disciplines of racing as I can so I can hopefully become a professional drive either on a racing circuit or as a test driver or driving instructor.
William is currently 20 points ahead of Phylicia and 32 ahead of Jarret.
No matter what, William will finish ahead of Jarret. If Jarret gets work points he will have 974 points before the drop, 795 after dropping his lowest finishing position if William finished tenth of ten, he would have 951 points but with the drop he would have 796 placing him one point ahead of Jarret. Spring 4 was probably one of the most enjoyable races I have raced in in my short year of racing. Although the engine is still not even close to being a front runner, the handling was dead on where I wanted. Steering the kart was the most enjoyable part while on the track. During qualifying I went out and just wanted to learn the new track surface after NTK was resealed last week. I went out near the back of the group just to make sure if I made a mistake I did not take anybody out. Quickly I realized this track was going to be fun and fast! Through the turns the kart would stick like I had just put brand new tires on. In qualifying I ran a 45.9 while the pole sitter ran a 45.2. I was not upset though because I ended up getting the outside pole!
Today ended up being a little different than scheduled. I only ran 26 laps because the endurance race was cancelled due to the lack of teams to make it worth while. Although I did not have the amount of seat time I wanted I still had a blast and made the most of the time I did have. We showed up just in time for the drivers meeting but got lucky when they announced the line up and the chonda class was scheduled to go out sixth of the seven classes. This added time allowed us to really get the kart ready for qualifying.
Today is Spring 2 as well as the entire teams first endurance race. I will not be racing in Spring 2 because of things not working out as planned but we will be racing the endurance race. The lineup will include William, Bobby, and Richard. We have no game plan as far as who is going to go out when but we do have one item figured out, each driver is going to push it as hard as they can each lap because, although an endurance race, this race is not very long. At only 75 laps, the race will be over in about an hour. Each driver will drive 25 laps at around 44 to 54 seconds depending on skill, determination, guts, and how strong the motor feels like pulling. We are having to run the older motor this weekend because the new motor had many parts damaged during the Texas Lonestar Grand Prix. We do not have the power we want but will make the most of what we have and place as high as we can. The team to watch today will be the Gaddy Race team with Yaani-Mai, Ansel, and Austin Gaddy. Each driver is a proven winner. Austin and Ansel are not only proven winners at the local level, but at the national level in highly competitive classes. Look for fast times by each of the Gaddy drivers. Another driver to watch is Kevin. If Kevin is able to find a ride before the race he should be running pretty quick lap times even though he has a bow fracture in his arm.
We are looking forward to our second new kind of event just this month! We hope to see you at the track soon! I had the opportunity to go race at Pole Position Raceway against the Owner of the Frisco facility as well as his brother, a 3-time national sprint kart champion. The first session was a refresher run to re-learn the EK-20 karts and how they handle on the polished concrete. Lap times were varied more than I would like but I think being able to go out and run consistent lap times on the first run is just something that will take time and a lot of practice. The second session had a few backmarkers that really threw my lap time off but I was still having fun. Which, by the way, is the point of racing. The third session had five drivers, all of which race karts which made it really fun, and fast. I was able to run every lap in the 26.x bracket.
Here are all of my lap times: This past weekend I ran the inaugural Texas Lonestar Grand Prix. It was my first street race, first national race, first race somewhere other than North Texas Kartway, and only my ninth race ever. My dad and I put a lot of effort into this race beginning in January all the way up until two in the morning the day we left to go to the race. We got my kart together and loaded the truck up at two o'clock in the morning Friday and left at eight to get to the track and set up. Once at the track we had a lot of time to unload the kart and just focus on getting our minds ready for Saturdays first practice session. At five on Friday afternoon we were able to finally walk around the track and figure out our plan and decide what final changes we needed to make to the kart. Upon walking the track we got to see just how rough the track was. We knew right away that this race was going to be fast, difficult, and dangerous.
|