Updated Sep. 24, 1999

• April 18th, 1998 - The car was a little loose during the heat race but we finished 2nd anyway. The best lap time was a 19.31. Started 3rd in the A feature and the car began missing. Kevin adjusted the tires after the heat race and the car was handling good. I made my way to 4th place after a bad start and had a best lap of 18.94 until the motor popped. Oil came out the left side breather caps and started a little fire on top of the motor. I got stopped fast and was jumping out when the car starting rolling down the banking. I need to remember to add "Put the car in Park" to my "To Do List" when I am hurrying up to get out. The fire was not too bad. After taking the motor apart we found out that the head over the number 3 cylinder had a big hole into the water passage. I guess the old 462 heads we were using decided that they had raced long enough. Damage: 1 Piston, 1 set of Rings, 1 Head, Some crispy wires. Luckily the block was Ok. Watch out for fire extinguisher dust, that stuff got everywhere inside the engine. Dad & Keith cleaned it out soon enough that it did not cause any more damage. I am getting a new set of Dart Sportsman II heads. That should make the motor run better over the old 462s anyway. Just wish it didn't take a fire to convince me.


• May 2nd, 1998 - WIN, WIN, WIN! Wow I hope I got that out of my system. But first, the heat race: 3rd place with a loose car. Now on to the feature race: 1st place. We made a wedge change and a tire pressure change after the heat race and the car worked better in the feature race. From my front row starting position (due to last race DNF) I was able to open up a good lead on several restarts. On the last restart with 5 laps to go the car started pushing in turns 3 and 4. Luckily I held on to 1st place, holding off a hard charging second place car. I was turning 19.20 something lap times in the middle of the race. We were hoping for more speed with the new heads. Maybe it is time for a gear change and some more tuning.


• May 23-24, 1998 - Qualified 6th fastest, but the race got rained out. We will miss the June 6th race because we are going to Texas Motor Speedway to watch the Truck and IRL races. We are planning to angle mill the heads to get the compression back where it was with the old heads.


• June 20th, 1998 - 100 lap make up event. It wasn't pretty, but we got 2nd place. We had too much stagger to start the race and I was just hanging on. Also, the car was running hot - Altus had a high of 113 degrees that day. Another problem was that the brakes began to fade after about 15 laps. On a restart at lap 38 there was a big pile up that I luckily managed to escape. The track decided to take the half way break at this point to clean up the mess. Lucky for us. The right rear tire was punctured from debris. The crew did very well during the mid-race break: they changed the right rear tire to less stagger, filled the car with gas and water, bled the brakes, cleaned the windshield, and gave me some water to drink. After the restart we were in 5th place (due somewhat to the wreck). The car worked good until the brakes faded again, and the right rear tire wore out. After that, I just stayed out of trouble and tried to remain on the lead lap. With other racers having trouble and well placed yellows (for us) we finished 2nd, and remained on the lead lap.


• July 4th, 1998 - Oh boy, did the car get hot! Every warning light on the dash was on except the low oil pressure light. Thankfully, the car kept running and we managed a 4th place finish. The race was very exciting with lots of passing. I had to work harder for this 4th place finish than the earlier win. Dad and Keith are gonna check the head gaskets to see what is causing the car to run so hot.


• July 18th, 1998 - Dad and Keith changed the head gaskets. They were leaking. Dad and Keith also put some new leaf springs on the car (THANKS Dad and Keith). We couldn't even determine what vehicle the old springs came from, they weren't Camaro springs - because they had to fabricate new rear spring mounts to make the new GM style springs fit. The car came out of the corner very well with the new springs. We got the setup a little too loose to start the feature but was still passing people. After spinning in some oil, I went to the pits to crank some more wedge in the car. This helped a lot and I was able to pass on the outside up to third place. Second place spun out on the last corner and I dodged him to end up second. The cars behind me weren't so lucky and a big pile up ensued.


• July 25th, 1998 - WIN! WIN! WIN! See Mitch Tasker's story from RaceWire.


• August 1st, 1998 - Bummer. Got a tire knocked flat in the first corner of the heat race. The car was pushing in the feature and I ended up 6th. The car ran hot just like it did at Red River Speedway. Turns out the radiator was corroded. I bought a Griffin radiator with a built in oil heat exchanger and we will try it for the next race.


• August 15th, 1998 - Bigger bummer. The car just didn't seem like it was running good even though I won the heat race. At least it ran cool with the new radiator. We adjusted the car and got more push in the feature race (oops). I was moving up after getting stuck behind a slower car for a while and then it happened. I started seeing smoke inside the car. I backed off a little for the last few laps and ended up 8th. After tearing down the motor Dad found 3 melted pistons on the driver's side. Not good. We either had bad gas or the last three races with the car running hot hurt the pistons. We are gonna put new pistons, rings and bearings in the motor for the next race. The block and the heads were ok.


• September 5th & 6th, 1998 - Even bigger bummer. We melted 2 more pistons in the first practice on Saturday night. Did not even get to race. Dad and Kevin stayed up all night to rebuild the motor for Sunday (we need to get a spare motor). Keith and I were ordered to sleep by Dad, so we showed up Sunday morning to help. Two pistons were replaced and every other piston got new rings - pretty radical rebuild for over night. We also dumped out the Phillips 66 race gas and filled it back up with VP race gas. Well, I guess we had some lingering problems with the driver's side head because we had a compression leak on that side during practice. Dad put some Bars-Leak in the radiator and it seemed to help. We started on the back of the 100 lap feature and was moving up good until a red flag for oil down on the track. The car failed to restart and I got a push to the pits (can't push start because of the automatic transmission). After a frantic thrash, Dad found out the starter solenoid backing plate was loose. Mike Jackson held it together with his hand and we got the motor refired during the halfway break. After a few more laps the Bars-Leak gave up and the water temp gauge pegged. I figured that was a good time to park the car. Moral of the story: Don't by race gas from the Phillips 66 store on Sheridan next to the Hu-nan's restaurant.