There’s a scene in the movie, Days of Thunder, where crew chief Harry Hyde (played by Robert Duvall) gets on the radio and sarcastically tells his driver, Cole Trickle (played by Tom Cruise) to hit the pace car because it’s the only thing he hasn’t hit all day. I think my virtual crew chief was probably telling me the same thing today. In addition to hitting several other cars, I also hit the armco in turn three at least twice. If you’re a fan of car-to-car contact, then this race was for you.
I qualified 14th on the grid and gained a couple of positions in turn one when the other cars stacked up. I won’t do a post-mortem on each lap, other than to say there was a lot of bad driving on my part, including being overly aggressive, even when I didn’t need to. Because my Honda is underpowered compared to the cars I’m racing against, I sometimes have to push the issue and pass another car when I have the chance, even when the opportunity is optimal. Because of that, I sometimes find myself in a bad situation, resulting in an off-track excursion or car-to-car contact. It drives me nuts, but I guess it’s necessary, at least sometimes.
I finished 5th, which was probably better than I deserved. For race two, I really am going to try to keep the contact to a minimum. We’ll see if I am successful.
After 19 rounds, the top five in points are:
- Lou Mindar (255 pts)
- Don McGowan (123 pts)
- Peter Ward Jr (115 pts)
- Josh Pettibone (110 pts)
- Hugh Navarro (101 pts)
Next Race: Watkins Glen Race #2