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In the end, we could take a hint.
After blowing up four engines in the previous month, we showed in Las Vegas
waiting for another engine to drop in the car and slim hopes of running for the
national championship. The Lawson Bros. had kindly pulled an engine for us
and brought it so Friday night we pulled the engine, put the new one in, and got
down to work. Unfortunately, we had additional problems. When the
Saturday practice rolled around, we were hoping for some sorely needed track
time, but the same bracket that broke last year broke on the pace lap.
Fortunately, Factory Five came to our rescue and we put the new bracket on.
But more suspension problems cut short the Sunday practice. We were
running out of time. Finally, we got a full speed session during
qualifying. But Las Vegas is a very technical track (and we were still
battling some suspension problems) so we ended up qualifying an uncharacteristic
14th. Meanwhile, Bryan Dobyns was tearing it up on the track. It
looked like the race was for second and even that was going to mean a lot of
learning on the fly. Our stated goal of a top 10 finish was going to be
difficult.
With a little help from Harry on the radio, Dan got a nice jump and picked up some positions on the start. Very quickly he moved up to 6th (we think) before a spin gave back all of the positions and more. He began running down cars again, but the season finally caught up with us when it mattered most. After just four laps, a small hose on the water pump came off and the car shut down completely. It was one of those things that would have been found if we had more testing time, but also represented all of the problems that have dogged us for the second half of this year. With the car completely dead and just coasting on the track, we finally decided that it was time to give up. A disappointing finish.
Meanwhile, as expected, Bryan Dobyns did run extremely well and ended up with the overall win.
Many of these pictures are courtesy of Tatiana Cheney.
