The 2008 Season Begins
This is how the #8 started the day at Madera But by the end of the day…….
The actual first race of the season was held at Shasta Speedway and unfortunately none of the Clement/Ball racin’ bunch made that trip. So the beginning of our 2008 season came at the Madera Speedway. I had spiffed up the #8 with new “Aluminum” painted bumpers, fore and aft along with the latest “hot setup”, and Keith had punched up the engine with an upper-end rebuild. We even had 4 brand new tires mounted up, although I had already decided we would run our older tires at Madera. They run the SuperModified division on the same nights that we race and they use really soft tires that leave big gumballs all over the track. Our little tires just love to pick up all that stuff and pretty soon you are slidin’ all over the place. Plus you get to scrape that stuff off those nice hot tires between each race. Not fun!!! The gate guard at the speedway became a big fan as soon as he saw our gleamin’ green mo-tatin’ machine. He wished us luck and said that it would be a shame to race such a pretty little car. We shoulda’ known somethin’ was up.
The first practice session belonged to the Legend cars so I left the new tires on so we could get a heat cycle on them at least. Those new tires in combination with my new “hot setup” left poor Keith barely able to keep the thing on the track. It was “squirrely loose” off the turns and so we decided to soften the rear springs a bunch and also switch to old tires. Hey, what do you need new tires for when you bring a crappy “hot setup” to the track? Luckily for us this approach actually resulted in a decent handling car. In fact, even on old tires Keith was able to squeak out a time just slightly faster than Fred or Dave in qualifying.
Combined with our ninth fastest time (out of 15 I think) and Fred with the tenth spot, an eight car invert, a couple of fast rookies who are forced to start at the rear of the pack their first couple of races, an interesting thing happens. Lo and behold Fred ends up on the pole of the Main with Keith right along side. Dave will end up with the 12th fastest time and falls in behind the fastest qualifiers. (Keith can identify with that spot!!! Been there, done that…) But wait, first we have to run a heat race.
Dave ends up on the pole of the first heat with Freddy starting in the second row right behind him and Keith just to Fred’s outside. You never really want to be on the outside at Madera. It is a very “one groove” track unless you bring a lot more car than the guy next to you. We came up a bit short on that score. But Keith is a gamer and shot the little #8 into the turns about as hard as he could. The #90 (driven that night by many time Main Event winner, Steve Fensler) that started just ahead of Keith grabbed the lead and pulled away for a pretty easy win. Keith stayed with Freddy for a couple of laps but kept locking up the left front brake. Dave and Fred dueled with one another until Kelly Martin in the #38 finally got by Keith and joined the fight. Kelly eventually moved into the second spot and Fred grabbed third from Dave and Keith ended up fifth. Later when I got to talk to Keith he said that he had forgotten to readjust the brake bias from when we ran the last race last year at Shasta. But he couldn’t remember which way to turn the adjusting knob to fix the problem. Oh well, a little rust on the driver’s part is to be expected. Besides, it was just a heat race, and we had a good startin’ spot in the MAIN EVENT!!! Right?
Fearless Fred grabbed the lead fairly quickly using that inside starting spot to his best advantage. Keith got freight trained a bit and fell into the 5th spot as he finally got a chance to get to the bottom. Dave meanwhile was having his own troubles with one of those rookie drivers that started at the rear of the field. About to complete lap 4 Keith broke loose his rear tires coming off the 4th turn and got her sideways “big time”, finally looping the car at about the start finish line. As the rest of field streamed by he got the #8 pointed in the right direction and it looked like he wouldn’t benefit from a yellow flag. Fortunately for Keith, as the cars rounded turns one and two Dave tangled with the rookie in the #53 who ended up spinning in turn 2. That brought out the yellow flag Keith needed to be able to restart at the rear of the field and not potentially lose a lap.
As the race got back underway things looked pretty decent for Keith as he jumped back by several cars and was moving forward quite well with Dave just up ahead. Dave was also moving along well and was trying to chase down Fred about five cars ahead of him. As the field was trying to complete lap 5 the driver of the #56 car decided going through Fred was easy than going around. He dumped Fred between turns 3 and 4 and in the process collected up the #63 of Cody Berger and sent him sliding backwards into the turn 4 wall. Now Fred has to restart at the rear of the pack and try and regroup. Our officials apparently decided all was fair on this night because the #56 cars driver wasn’t through just yet. The race got underway once again with Dave in 7th and Keith in the 8th slot and having a nice duel between them. Dave prevailed and Keith slid back two spots behind the #05 and the #53 cars. Fred was quickly closing ground behind Keith as the cars ran the 7th lap. As the lead cars rounded turns 3 and 4 the numbnut kid in the #56 decided going through the #21 was easier than passing her also. He dumped her in turn 4 and left her spinning into the path of Dave in the #3, the #53 and Keith in the #8. Dave hit her first and then the #53 got airborne over the top of Dave’s right rear tire. While the #53 was still in the air Keith rear-ended him with the hood and grill of the #8. Still able to steer the car and with the engine still running Keith headed back to get the yellow flag at the start/finish line. He made it but was dumping oil out of our broken oil cooler like mad and erupting flame from the engine. He shut the engine off just as he passed the start/finish line when he noticed there was fire licking at his left foot. Good Call!!
Dave’s car was done for the night with major left front damage to his suspension. The #21 car was eliminated, Keith was done and the #53 and #90 (not sure why his rear suspension broke) were also through for the night. Freddy managed to sneak through the hole that Keith had punched and was our sole survivor at this point in the race. Only 7 laps down and a third of the Main Event cars have been eliminated by the idiot in the #56. Still no call from our new head official.
About all I can tell you after this point is that Fred moves his way back up into the top 5 and is having a spirited duel with Kelly Martin in the #38 for the 4th position. This continued on for several laps until they encountered the lapped #65 and #20 cars. These two were also having a spirited battle that resulted in the #65 slipping up in turns one and two and forcing Fred way to the outside. Not sure what happened after that but Fred ended up breaking a trailing arm mount on lap 24 and his evening ended out in the infield with the rest of Clement/Ball racing. As Homer Simpson would say, DOH!!!
The final finish had Fred in the 9th position, Dave in 13th and Keith in 15th. So a promising starting position only yielded a dead last finish in the end. Ya just gotta love this racin’ stuff!!!! The good news is that all three cars have been repaired and will live to race another day. Keith and I plan to attend the race at Ukiah Speedway on the 19th of April. Another place where we have had a promising start only to have the rug pulled out from under us. I personally am looking forward to seeing Keith get the finish he deserves from a Main Event there. He did get a heat race win last year at Ukiah in which he totally dominated. That’s what I’m talkin’ about!!!
(Please be aware that the above race report was prepared by a “racin’ Dad” who sees things with the jaundiced eye of a proud Papa!!!)