2000
RACE
RESULTS
Heat Race - John started the first heat race in the 8th position and quickly moved up into the fifth position, and swapped that spot with Mike Collins before holding on to finish 5th in a relatively uneventful heat race.
A Feature - Having just missed the inversion by one position in his heat race John started the feature in the 17th position, alongside the #22 of Chuck Clark and just in front of Greg Peck. In turn one of the first lap, John got bumped from below and knocked up into Clark's car, John's right front met Chuck's left rear, and John's right front got pulled up into Clark's body, hooking the two cars together. After a few minutes under caution to unhook the cars (great job by the track crews to not damage the cars further) John would restart in 24th. Matching his masterful performance on May 13, John weaved his way through the field without touching a car! Again the OK 1 Stop car was a ROCKET! When the caution flew on lap 9 John had passed 17 cars and was in the 7th position. After that restart, John picked off a few more cars, battling with Gary March and Jim Thies for position, when the caution again came out with 3 laps remaining John was up to 4th, behind only the #1sr, 4, and 1.98 cars. It appeared that John was going to gain some serious ground in the point standings, after Hesse & Peck were both knocked out of the race, and Clark was struggling. But when the green flag flew, John made a move to the outside of 1.98 that the officials viewed as a jump start. The track definitely needs to work on consistency as to where the green flag is thrown, and when they call a jump start, on the following restart numerous cars gained numerous positions before the start, and the race was allowed to continue. Frankly, we strongly disagree with the call. The yellow came out and John was sent to the back. In the three remaining laps John quickly moved past 7 cars, and in turn 4 of the last lap, something broke in the steering of the car, and the car shot from the bottom to the top, again making hard contact with the #22 of Clark...the last car on the track that John would want to make contact with, if it had been preventable. John was scored with 19th place, after not completing the final lap. Saturday was probably the most disappointing night for John and the team in the 10 seasons of racing at the Park. Keep your head up John, and don't forget what you accomplished in passing the other 20 cars, our night is on the horizon!!
Standings - The modified point standings will bear their biggest shuffling of the season to this point. As John, Peck, Hesse, and Clark all had poor showings, Mark Wenzlaff won the feature, and moves into the point lead, followed by Mike Collins. John is in 3rd position, just 14 points out of the lead.
Heat Race - John started the 2nd heat race in 8th out of 8th cars and moved quickly through the field reaching 3rd place by the 5th lap. But John got bitten by that competive racing bug on the last lap. After taking the white flag in 2nd position he made a move for the lead going into turn one, and the car got away from him and he spun into the infield. Doug Snyder who was following the lead pack made contact with John, bending John's front bumper but not otherwise hurting the car. The caution flew after John's spin and they relegated John to the last finishing position for causing the yellow. Although definitely not the result we wanted, it was definitely a learning experience for the driver and team about the kind of risks a point-leader should take.
B Feature - John would start the 10 lap B feature in the 6th position with just four transfer spots available for the A feature. John was much more patient in this race than the heat race, picking his way through the field and getting in line with #33 Mike Collins at the front of the field. John & Collins pulled away from the field, and as they were coming out of turn four to the checkered flag, John took the high line he had been running the entire race, and Collins took the low line which he had been running, and John was able to edge the #33 at the line. John's third B feature win in 4 weeks of racing, not the preferred route to the A feature, but most importantly he put it in the show again.
A Feature - Starting from the 21st position, John had his work cut out for him on the extremely dry Park Jefferson track. The track was nearly as dry as we've seen it in 10 years of racing at the Park. The track was like glass from top to bottom with the cushion being nearly completely pushed off the top. John ran the bottom of the track and picked up 2 or 3 positions in the first 5 laps, and then moved to the high side as his tires heated up. He made good progress on the top carefully passing cars in a race where there was very little passing. He moved up to 13th position by the finish. A somewhat disappointing finish given our performance so far this season, but a good showing after a 21st starting position on such a difficult track. Suprisingly, the modifieds ran the entire 17 lap race green to checkered without a caution! A tribute to the skill level of the modified drivers at the Park this season.
Standings - This week's racing has definitely tightened up the Modified points race. Greg Peck finished in about 8th and John just holds the point lead by 2 points. Rich Hesse and Charles Clark are six and ten points back, respectively. A strong performance this weekend will be essential! Once again we've proven that getting the car into the A feature and finishing the race without incident is the most essential element to success in the season point standings.
June 3, 2000
Heat Race - Returning to Park Jefferson for the first time in nearly a month to defend his point lead, John started the first Modified heat race in the 8th position of 9 cars starting the race. The track was quite muddy and it was difficult to do much racing. John & Jay Noteboom struggled to get by the #8 of Kenny Cakebread who was struggling even more to hold the 6th postition, until Cakebread spun coming out of turn 4 and John was narrowly able to keep from hitting him by getting hard on the brakes and stopping on the track just short of making contact with the #8 of Cakebread. On the restart John was in 8th, one position in front of the #8 and the last few laps were chaotic as the drivers were anxious to get into the top-5 and gain a transfer spot to the A. In the midst of a few incidents John was able to avoid trouble and come home in 7th, but would not make the A.
Features - Rain came during the late model heat races and the features were rained out again. Racing will resume next weekend. John lucked out with the features being rained out, hopefully next weekend we'll make the A from the heat, and avoid a B feature. The point lead is ours for yet another week!