Spotter Bytes
SPOTTER BYTES
By Wayne “Muffy” Wildermuth
We rolled into Stafford on Friday night for some weekly racing series action. The Tyler Hines #94 Branford River Marine sponsored SK was prepared for battle. Still not being in the handicapping system forced us to start in the rear of the field. It’s not always safe back there, even if you’re laying back on purpose. On the start everyone got stacked up and Woody Pitkat made contact with the front stretch wall and ended up sitting in our lane disabled. We had nowhere to go and slammed into him petty hard. It’s a good thing Tyler hit him straight on, or our car would have been torn up pretty bad. We were able to continue with minor damage and came to the finish line with another 15th place finish. Only one more week of being out of the handicap system and then we will need to race hard for a top spot in the heat races so we can try to finish up front in the feature.
The #32 LifeCare Family Chiropractic, LLC Late Model was also ready for battle. Kevin Gambacorta showed some tenacity behind the wheel again for the 2nd week in a row. Good hard racing and not giving in earned him a 4th place finish. We are now only 6 points out of 1st place in the point standings. Yeah, I know it’s a long season, but nothing wrong with tracking points all season long, right?
Saturday was a road trip to the track they call Maddog, Monadnock Speedway in New Hampshire for the Valenti Modified Racing Series 100 lap season opening race. We started outside row 1 in the heat race and were immediately run into the outside wall by the pole sitter. We fell back to last in the heat and had to run the consi to try and get into the race. We failed to qualify in the consi and had to take a provisional to get into the feature. We started 23rd out of 24 cars, and we had our work cut out for us. We ended up with a really good car and we drove our way to 7th place with about 10 to go. Then, while racing hard to a good finish, we spun out. We were only able to get back up to 12th with the remaining laps. Dave Schneider did a great job of driving and if not for impatient drivers, he easily could have driven his way to a top 5. I’m looking forward to our next event on May 22nd at Stafford Motor Speedway.
I also spotted for #11 sportmod driver Scott Nordman. He needed to learn the fast way around the track. I think I helped him out a little bit as he came away with a 9th place finish out of a 16 car field. This was his first ever race at Maddog and I think he will only get better with time. I’m also looking forward to returning to the track and working with him some more.
Sunday was another road trip, this time to Chemung Speedrome in Chemung, New York for the 1st race of the 2015 Race of Champions season. I would be spotting for Jimmy Zacharias in the #71 Central States Used Clothing sponsored race car. It was an emotional weekend of racing as we had lost a major part of the racing scene with the passing of Matt Clemens earlier in the week. With heavy hearts, we soldiered on as Matt would have wanted us to do. After first practice, we knew we had a car that was a rocket ship. We finished 2nd in our heat race, settling for that spot without putting too much pressure on the heat race winner, we were saving that for the 75 lap race. Well, after the redraw, we were starting on the pin. We led pretty much most of the race and were just out on a Sunday drive until lady luck stood up and slapped us right in the face. With about 10 to go, the engine decided it didn’t want to play anymore and blew up. We ended up 23rd. It really would have been special to win the race in memory of Matt Clemens.
Next up I will travel back to Stafford Speedway on Friday for more weekly racing and then on Saturday I will cross the pond as they say to visit the Riverhead Raceway for more racing action.