INDIANAPOLIS — I celebrated Independence Day weekend by racing a midget, a sprint car and two types of supermodifieds.
On June 30 at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park, I ran the midget for Bertrand Motorsports and the sprint car for Davey Hamilton Racing.
The midget felt comfortable, but we had difficulty finding the right setup that would allow fast and competitive times. The car was too tight and then it was a little too loose, and the stagger in general was difficult to predict.
We took a chance on setup for qualifications with a cross-weight adjustment and adjusted the stagger. That was not a good idea because the car was way out of its ideal operating window. We qualified 14th for the feature.
Back in the sprint car, it felt pretty good first few laps on track, but it became tight when we scuffed in new tires for qualifying. The car was too loose in qualifying, but we were just a half-second off the pole in 11th place.
Not bad for my first sprint car qualifying out of a 22-car field.
The sprint car race was first and, although, I qualified 11th, I somehow started the race ninth. The starting lineup was supposed to be an invert for the feature of the top 10. I didn’t even realize this in the moment, but it ultimately ended up not really mattering because the car was really tight throughout the entire race.
The best I could do with the car was an eighth-place finish, losing one spot to my teammate, who I was tracking down pretty much the whole race. There was a crash ahead of me near the middle of the race and I slowed down fast enough to avoid it.
In the midget race, I was supposed to start 14th but somehow started 16th. It ultimately didn’t matter much because the same thing that happened in the sprint car, happened in the midget.
The midget started out feeling very balanced and I was able to roll a lot of speed through the corners with good entries and exits.
Unfortunately, this ideal setup only lasted about three laps, and then as the fuel started to burn off the car went from balanced, to tight, to very, very tight by the end of the race. I hung on and finished 12 th .
The next day, we flew to Syracuse, N.Y., where I made my debut in both small-block and big-block supermodified racing at Oswego Speedway.
In practice for the small block, I wanted to come out swinging, hitting the same pace as I got to in testing earlier in the week. But I spun out a few laps into practice and almost hit the wall. The car was way looser than I had ever felt it and it came around on me pretty easily.
We quickly switched the front springs and adjusted the top wing angle. That gave me additional rear grip. I immediately felt the difference. I got up to speed a little bit slower to allow the tires time to warm up. For qualifying we put on some new tires, and I was able to get within a few tenths of pole position times, but I was still struggling getting the power down on exit.
It was a bit different in the big-block category.
The Oswego officials said I could run some laps by myself to get more acquainted with the car and track. I took the time to just work up my pace and try to get within the same second as the competition in terms of lap times. I didn’t get that many laps in testing the other day, so I was still learning how to get the 900-horsepower beast on the exits.
By session’s end, I ran a couple laps just under the 17-second barrier, which was where all the fast guys were.
Group qualifying was next and I wanted to prove that I could run with the top dogs my first time out. I threw caution to the wind.
This overconfidence gave me a slightly faster lap time than practice, a 16.8 vs. a 16.9. But I also made a mistake that put me against the turn-three wall.
The rear came around on me very unexpectedly and there wasn’t enough time to scrub off the speed to avoid the wall. That mistake took me out of the night’s big race and to say I was bummed was an understatement.
There was solace in the fact that I still had the small block to race but taking myself out of the race in the big block before it even happened was something I never expected that I would do. That’s something that I almost never do.
To finish first, you must first finish, but to do both of those things you need to start the race in the first place.
I jumped into the small block for my heat race, started fifth and finished fourth. I cautiously made my way around a competitor who I was warned doesn’t really like keeping their car in a straight line. I took their advice under careful consideration and was able to cleanly pass them on the restart after a yellow came out halfway through.
After finishing fourth, it set me up for an eighth-place start in the feature.
I grabbed seventh place after a nice battle with the driver in front and me. But I under drove the car the first few laps and that put me back to eighth place for several laps as I tried to find the limit of the car.
I continued the learning process throughout the 30-lap race, making a mistake here and there while experimenting with the limit of the car, tires and setup. When I finished ninth, I concluded that the car’s setup was probably too loose.
In the end, the weekend was a great learning experience and despite the fact I couldn’t make my big-block debut, I had accrued a lot of valuable experience that will only help me going forward.
For that, I am grateful. I can’t wait to race them all again.