Riker Racing #00

Yesterday we went to Greenwood Valley Action Tracks after not racing for 2 weeks because of weather. This weekend was the Blaze Alexander Memorial Race, so there were more cars in the all classes than usually. There were 24 cars signed up for the Rookie 270s. They split our class into 3 heat races each with 8 cars. I started 5th in the 2nd race and finished in 5t place. The car ran good in the heat so we didn't make any big changes in between the heat and feature.

When the feature came I started 17th out of 24. I was doing awesome on the start and in the beginning of the race. The car was probably the fastest it has been all year. I was passing cars every lap and on one lap I passed 3 in one corner! But unfortunate all that great racing started going downhill fast. I was going to pass a car going into the first corner and he got loose and turned down the track which left me with nowhere to go. I hit the side of the car and then I also got hit from the back from another car. Somehow I managed to keep going so I didn't loose any place from stopping on the track. That crash ended up being bigger than I thought. There were so many cars that were involved in it that we couldn't go around the first and second corner so we had to drive around the inside of the track. After that crash my steering was not right. I had to hold the steering wheel right just to make it go left. I was pretty sure I could still drive it like that so I kept going. Surprisingly I was still just as fast or even faster than other cars even with my steering not right! I continued to pass cars here and there.

When we were coming up on lap traffic, a car was almost at a complete stop in turns three and four. So the car in front of me was still going full throttle through the dusty marbles on the top of the corner, which was not a good idea, and started to slide and flip end over end. Of course I just happened to be there. The flipping car hit me while he was still going end over end. That scared me so much. That was the third time this season a car flipped right in front of me, but that was the first time one actually hit me. This made the damage to the car even worse. Now my steering was even worse and the wing it all smashed on the right side. My dad made it my choice if I wanted to finish the race or not. I wanted to still race but I knew it was going to be hard. Now it was even harder to keep the car going straight; it just wanted to go left! When the race restarted I was in seventh or eighth place running still pretty good. On the long green flag runs the car was okay but sometimes it would just push straight up into the wall. I dropped back 2 places. Another caution came out and I didn't feel comfortable driving the car this way anymore. From lap to lap the car was unpredictable on which way it was going to go or how it was going to steer. So I pulled off into the hot chute not realizing that there were only 2 laps left and they didn't even go green again. So I didn't finish the race.

After the race I was extremely upset because I know I should have stayed out and that it was my fault that I didn't finish. Sometimes I don't look at the good that I have done; I only look at the bad. Everyone was telling me how amazing I did because the car couldn't even be steered straight and parts of it were just in pieces. I can only hope that in two weeks when we go back the car will be just as fast as yesterday and that we will have better luck!