9/11/2006 Big Time Fun at Lincoln Speedway and Sprint Racing Lessons and Culture
First things first……
Congratulations go out to Jeff Rohrbaugh winner of the 2006 Trail Way Speedway Championship. Great Job Jeff.
Congratulations go out to Cory Haas winner of the 2006 Lincoln Speedway Championship, winning the title in the last 358 race of the year Saturday night.
Trail Way Speedway way rained out Friday night. So the Trail Way Lincoln Shootout race at Trail Way has been moved to this coming Friday.
Lincoln Speedway 25-lap Championship Event
Saturday Night’s Lincoln Speedway 25-lap Championship Event Recap requires some Sprint Racing background to make sense to the “New to Sprint Racing” fan.
First it was run like one of the big 410 or 360 events with qualifying, B Mains and C Mains. There were 48 cars that showed up to compete. With no other tracks running this weekend, it represented the best of the 358 drivers as well as the well as the regular cast of players.
Qualifying was done one car at a time for two laps. Each started on the asphalt area in the pits and entered the track as the car in front was qualifying. Remember these cars are direct drive so stopping is tough and requires a restart. The track official in the turn 3 entry is doing the aircraft carrier thing with hand signals to slow or speed up the car coming down the pit road so as not to run into the car on the track qualifying.
The Qualifying order is set by a Pill Draw. A Pill Draw is where each driver reaches into a bucket for a number. That number yields the order. This is important from a track condition standpoint, how much cushion, what lines are fast for previous cars, how dry the track is etc.
Jessie drew the 22nd qualifying spot.
Heat Race Order and 24 Car Inversion.
The order of fastest to slowest set the Heat Race order. The fastest 24 were inverted in each of four heats. First heat contained the fastest car in the 6th starting position and the second heat had the second fastest car in the 5th position. Then you have the next four etc, etc. So the 5th fastest is in the 5th starting position. Remember the top 24 are inverted.
Jessie qualified 25th with a 15.03 lap time, 3 one hundreds off of the 24th position. That was the difference between starting on the pole in the fourth heat and starting 7th in the fastest 1st heat. In front of her starting 5th was #2J-Billy Johns the 5th fastest in qualifying and on his right in the 6th position was the fast qualifier #39-Cory Haas. Jessie finished a strong 6th behind Billy Johns in the first heat, missing the transfer by one to the feature. Five in each heat made it directly for a total of 20. Four more positions left.
Now for the C-Main, there were 10 cars competing for the two chances to start at the back of the B-Main. Yes instead of two Consi’s they run a C-Main for the right
Now the B-Main has the remaining 18 cars including two from the C-Main competing for the four transfer spots to the Feature to fill out the 24 car total. Jessie started 6th of 18 and was in 3rd by the second lap having a great run. The car looked strong. A yellow brought out a restart on lap three. On the restart it appeared that the second place car touched the cone and Jessie knocked it over. Well a caution in the same lap as the cone is knocked over put her at the back for the next restart in 18th. The cone is set out near the start finish line to force a single file restart without cars jumping the start.
Now to see what she had left for the next 10 laps. Jessie came on strong and was in 8th by lap 8 with four to go but her tires went away as the track dried up and she couldn’t make up anymore ground. Still a great run from last to 8th.
Gregg Obst took a great shot of Jessie Saturday night and posted it on the Williams Grove Forum Site. Scroll down to Open Wheel Picture and check out the string Jessie Morrison 9/9/2006.
Williams Grove Forum with pictures site
http://www.williamsgrove.com/phpBB/index.php
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