Some of our racing adventures will be posted here.

We tackled our first ASA Late Model event last year (2006)on the 4th of July weekend. The race was to take place at South Georgia Motorsports Park in Cecil, GA. We also decided we wanted to run another car (that we had never raced before) the following day at Tri-County Speedway with the PASS South series. Sounded like a good idea at the time!

We rushed to get the ASA car finished in time to race at SGMP. We didn't allow much time to prepare Kent Bissell's #97 super late model. We were also a little short on help for the trip. Wes, Jack, and myself (Tim) loaded up our little box trailer with toolboxes and car. We didn't have a spare of anything. We pulled the trailer with Jack's 2 door F-250 standard cab pickup truck. Sitting 3 wide across the bench seat wasn't so bad except his truck didn't have A/C. We definitely could have used that A/C as we traveled across Georgia in July!

We arrived to Cecil, GA around 7AM. This allowed about 3 hours of sleep in a hotel with twin beds (Jack and Wes really got to know each other). We showed up to the track and had the smallest trailer. We were at the back of the line waiting to get into the pits. Since we had no A/C, we found a shady spot leaning up against John Townley's huge trailer. We finally got to go into the track, and they parked us right in front of a giant water drain. We had to fight a non-flat surface all day!

When we finally got the car unloaded and ready for tech, we were at the back of the tech line. Because the line was so long and slow, we didn't get through tech until the first practice session was completely over. Once we were ready, Jack realized he was in for an exceptionally difficult day. ASA requires somebody in the spotter's stand for practice, so I went and did that. It's also though to race without a driver, so Wes stayed in the car. This meant Jack was in charge of everything else on the car. Since this was only our 2nd time out with the car, there was plenty to be done!! Needless to say, Jack was wore out at the end of practice. I also took on the responsibility of tires. We had no experience with Hoosier tires, so it was sort of "pot luck" as far as trying to get the correct staggers.

When qualifying came around, the tires that I picked out were mismatched. The car was nearly undrivable. Wes kept it out of the wall and qualified next to last.

On the pace lap, the transmission linkage bound up. We had to pit on the pace lap to fix the linkage. By the time it was fixed, we had already lost 2 laps. While there, we made a few adjustments to account for the bad staggers in the tires. Wes rejoined the field and was actually pretty quick. He tried moving up through some of the back markers, but was caught up in a crash in turn 3 in the first quarter of the race. We tucked our tails, loaded the car, and raced back to Kannapolis, NC.

At this point, most people would say they had enough punishment for the weekend. However, we were too young and dumb to know any better. When we got back from the 8 hour drive, we unloaded the ASA car and started preparing the PASS South car. None of us got much sleep on the way home, and we were all extremely tired. We kept digging and put the setup under the PASS car and made it legal. We worked until the last minute, and then pushed the car in the trailer. Then we drove another 2-1/2 hours to Tri-County Speedway in Hudson, NC.

We didn't have enough time to prepare the car properly, and it showed in practice. We struggled to find the handle. Also, we didn't have the money for good practice tires, so we practiced on old wore out tires. The car wasn't responsive and we found ourselves in the dark with changes to the car.

We qualified next to last for the 2nd time in 2 days. The race began and the car was bad loose on new tires. Wes tried hanging on, and then the engine blew on lap 26 of the scheduled 150 laps.

We slept all day the next day!

Lessons were learned on this trip. We learned that preparation is the key to success. Enthusiasm, drive, and determination will only get us so far! Preparation is key!

Since then, we show up to the racetrack ready to compete. We unload in race trim and stay ahead of the competition in changes. Sometimes you have to make bad decisions to understand how to make the best decisions!