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California Crusin' ... | More >> | Recap Archives: 2005 | 2004 | 2003

Start - 14th | Competitors - 31| High - 1st | Low - 18th | Finish - 11th | analyzer report
Race Report - March 1st, 2005

The crew packed up the hauler as the snow fell in New Jersey and headed for the California Sun. Arriving at the track, the AMSOIL team made a plan for battle, ran a conservative practice and waited for the call to fire the engines. Starting 14th on the grid, mayhem ensued on the green flag as several drivers made contact in the front of the pack as the cars crossed the start finish line. Following the initial incident, there would be a few more and through attrition the AMSOIL Chevy was in up to seventh place early on and never passed a car in competition.

After the second caution, the crew held Kevin out and gained five championship points for leading a lap. Gaining the bonus points, Kevin dropped off the surface to the attention of the AMSOIL crew. Returning to the speedway in seventeenth, Kevin cautiously proceed as there was still a high risk of an incident and several damaged cars were now in front. Caution waived for the third and final time on lap eighteen and Kevin was still near the back of the pack. The crew conceived a plan to top off late hoping that it would somehow add an advantage should a full fuel run ensue. Ensue it did as the rest of the race ran green. Kevin held his pace and ascended through the field to lead by lap seventy-eight. Some drivers short pitted in order to more evenly distribute the tire wear as the AMSOIL crew was hoping for a late race caution. As noted the caution never came and Kevin once again went to the attention of the crew as the final pitstop was made on lap eighty.

Upon exiting the pits, Kevin ran as hard as he could but without the aid of the draft, the front runners caught and lapped him with only seven laps to go. Kevin was up on the wheel however and drove as hard as he could over the last segment and made his way from eighteenth to eleventh at the finish.

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Kevin Inglin, the pilot of the AMSOIL Chevy had this to say after the run:

"We had a decent run. I was fast enough to compete but the complexion of the race kinda took us out of contention. We debated if we should stay out or short pit on that long green flag segment and I made the call to stay out and hope for a caution. It really was the only way that we could have had a shot at getting back up there with the leaders.

Sometimes the cards fall in your favor and sometimes they don't. While I'm not thrilled about finishing outside the top ten, I can take solace in knowing that we brought it home in one piece. I gotta give a tip of the hat to the crew this week. The AMSOIL ACES were awesome as we didn't have a single miscue in the pits.

We get a week off and then we head to Las Vegas. We'll go back and see what we can do to improve the qualifying for Vegas and we have a test coming up so we're looking forward to a good run.

Until next week... "