Mashing the Gas at Michigan...

Start - 18th | Competitors - 18| High - 1st | Low - 18th | Finish - 4th

The NASS Lightning group returned to the Irish hills of Michigan this past week for another thrilling, side-by-side slugfest. Fuel milage, tire wear and track position once again set the stage as many of the top drivers in the division experienced early race troubles which changed the complexity of the race as the event unfolded.

Missing the drivers meeting, the AMSOIL Pontiac team was forced to start shotgun on the field. Early race mishaps allowed the ECI Enterprises driver to steadily climb through the field and break into the top five only fifteen laps into the run. Several drivers suffered damage, one of which was fellow MINT motorsports driver Dan Bailey. Check out the image of the week feature and you'll see that the AMSOIL Pontiac narrowly avoided the CyberZine Pontiac as it sailed through the air off of turn two.

After a couple of cautions slowed the pace early on, green flag racing was in the cards for the late stage of the race. Several drivers ducked in once the fuel window was there to make a run to the finish. The team decided to cruise the final fifty laps and save tires for a run to the finish. Several of the front runners at the time gambled on a late race caution but it didn't materialize. The resulting long green flag run to the checkers required some of the front runners to stop late in the go for a splash of fue. The AMSOIL team was counting on some of the teams not making it and slowly but quietly charged back for another top five finish for the year.

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Michigan continued.

Kevin Inglin - "You know, first off I gotta thank the guy upstairs for safe race. It's great that he's looking over us week in and week out. Whew, wasn't that fun! You know, we didn't get any practice this week and got into the hosting server moments before qualifying. With only three laps under our belt, and having missed the drivers meeting, we opted to take a provisional. I felt our best shot was to stay out of trouble early, get comfortable in the car, and let the race develop.

It was a pretty close call there early on as I remember at one point seeing our MINT Motorsports teammate Dan Bailey airborne there on the backstretch. It sure was a shame for Dan as he had been riding a streak of no DNF's that went back to some time in 2001! That's a pretty impressive feat for sure.

We decided ahead of time that we would keep fresh tires on the car and load it up with fuel each whenever the opportunity presented in case of long green flag run. It turns out that, just like Indy, the one time we stayed out and picked up five bonus points coincided with the last caution. This meant that we had to pit behind everyone else and race our way back through the field. We still figured we'd get a top five out of it if we played our cards right and it turned out well for us. Perhaps we left a bit too much on the table at the end but we were hoping on a late race caution that would have allowed us to pounce on the front runners who charged off and used up there equipment. Turns out they were on the money once again. Hat's off to Dean Moll on his 'millionth' win of the season. You gotta hand it to that bunch as they sure got there program going on over there.

Next week we head off to one of the most exciting tracks on the curcuit - Bristol. We're certainly looking forward to going back and doing combat with our fellow Lightning contingent".

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