Update #29 Race #51

KJ Motorsports

Update #29

Race #51

By Kenny Johnson
07 Oct 2008

We went to Eldora this past weekend for the UMP Nationals. They had 122 modifieds and we qualified 9th fastest overall and 2nd fast in our group. They invert the top 4 in each heat, so we started 3rd. The outside pole sitter and the 4th place car took off and were 1st and 2nd, the pole sitter was 3rd and we were 4th. In turn 3 and 4 the pole sitter got a little sideways and I ramped over his right rear and we each lost a position. I finally got past him and chased down the 3rd place car and was about to make a pass on him when the yellow came out. When we went back racing and went down the back chute, the 3rd place car chose the low line, the 1st and 2nd place car chose the high line and I chose an even higher line. I blasted around the 2nd place car only to find the leader blew up and he went high. I had no where to go and blasted him hard. It tore up my left front shock, lower control arm, upper control arm and the tire and wheel was just dangling on the car. I fell back to 8th coming off of turn 4 and stood on the gas drove it down into turn one and hesitated and hit the wall. Drove it down into turn 3 and hesitated and hit the wall. I apparently wasn’t getting the point that the car was broke, cause when I went into turn one I didn’t hesitate and made it thru without hitting the wall and I continued to do this thru the end of the race and made it back to 5th and almost passed for 4th. Once I slowed down it was difficult getting the car back to the pits. Now this driving got us some new fans, but unfortunately none of them had any money. It was said over the weekend that the people with money are probably sitting back saying I’m glad he don’t drive for me cause I couldn’t afford him. LOL! Oh well, we got it fixed and was ready for the consolation race on Saturday in which we were starting 6th and they were taking the top 2. As it turns out the 2 cars in front of me scratched and did not start the race which moved us up to the outside pole. We took the lead and went on to win by 4 car lengths or so. This started us 19th in the feature and I immediately went to the high side and was passing cars left and right and made it up to 7th. I got behind #135 and could not get by him. I tried low, middle and just could not make the pass. After several cars went back by us I decided to go even higher and it bit me. I got tied up in the cushion of turn 4 and several more cars got by us. I went back to passing cars and made it back up to the #135 and was finally able to pass him on the last lap. They wound up scoring us in 15th place. We thought it should have been 11th or 12th and thought they may have had a few lap cars out of place in the finishing order. But all in all, I love racing at Eldora and am somewhat pleased with our results.

This weekend we go to Midway for $5,000 to win show. This should be a jammed pack field of modifieds also. Hope to see you there!

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Thanks again for your support,

KJ