For those of you that read these stories know that Lakeport although one of my favorite tracks that has not been all that good to me. So for the race on Aug. 22 my dad (who generally doesn't travel) though he would go with my mother and me and see if he could change our luck.
We left home early and went by the Applebys, to see if they were going to make it to the race with their new car. They were just finishing up and said they would be right behind us so after dropping off some rims we got back on the road.
We arrived at the track about noon and pitted next to Jake Jackson #7 car from Kelseyville. They were all ready unloaded and were siting around shooting the bull. That's my dads best thing so he grabbed a chair and sat down with them, while mom and I set up our pits.
Before the first set of hot laps dad had walked up and looked at the track we deside we should take two full turns out of the right front. After the change we hit the track for our first set of practice laps. The adjustment was right on the money and the car felt great. We took the rest of the hot lap sessions just for the practice and managed to qualify third, this got us in the dash, and our day was going well.
We rolled out for dash and I lined up outside David Winchel #0 with Richard Appelbey (in his new #83 car) and Ryan Mosher #52 (fast time) behind us. On the start I got snookered by David and then I misted a shifted. I'm glad I had a driver with Moshers talent behind me, he jumped on the brakes and dropped under me to avoid contact. After I recovered and got it in gear I managed to stay with them and the car still felt great.
In the heat race we started forth and finished third, the car still felt good and believe it or not Smokin Joe wasn't even smoking. We had to put him back in late Thursday night after our new motor from Blue Print Precision Engines did not arrive from Henderson Nevada in time.
At the start of the main event we were caught in the low grove and lost a few positions before I got to the out side and got moving. Every thing was going along fine I had just passed the #13 car of David Fisher and was on the outside of Rick Andrews #58 when down the backstretch I saw the #0 car of David Winchel lose a motor and catch fire. This was pretty scary, as I have never seen one of these cars blow a motor that bad. When I got stopped on the front stretch I could see in the mirror that David had already got out of his car and seemed to be OK. On the restart I was racing Rick hard on the outside, Rick had put lights on his valve stems that flash as the wheels turn this made for some very interesting racing as we ran side by side for several laps before I got by him putting us 4th. I tried my best to pass the #38 car of Kelley Martin on the out side but had no luck and Rick got back by me while I was up there this put us back to 5th. With the #52 car of Mosher in the lead and Humphreys running second and the three of us having a great race among ourselves things were going along fine. Then Jack Humphreys in the #49 car had a set of tires go away under him and got very loose. We all got by him with about eight or nine laps left, this is when my neck begin to bother me as I had forgot to put my neck strap on, maybe because in the last 3 main events at this track I had only finished total of 9 laps. By lap 27 my head was about to fall off my shoulders. I could not hold my concentration any longer, I knew I had to break off the race with Kelly and Rick or take a chance on crashing them. In the end we finished forth and I will never never forget my neck strap again.
After the race we lined up to get our cars checked everybody was so happy with there finish Rick just ran us through the box and let us go. We put the cars away and stood around congratulating each other on how well we had done, but by far the happiest among us was Kelly as the picture shows those are checkerflag panties on his head.
Sorry this story is so late but we have been working on the modified, getting it ready for the big three-day open show in the dirt at Chow Chilla. Last year we ran well but crashed late in our race, they had one hundred and ninety-two cars and a great show.
Fred #55 Legend