Ward, RHR Teammates ‘Make Lemonade’ At South Boston Speedway

April 21^st, 2008

For Release:  Immediately

7^th Place Finish Achieved With Borrowed Powerplant

Fate handed 2007 USAR Rookie of the Year Brandon Ward and his RHR race team a couple of lemons at South Boston Speedway this past Saturday.  But rather than let it sour their party, the ‘Claremont Posse’ made the best of the situation and whipped up some lemonade.  Despite losing two engines early in Saturday afternoon’s practice session, the Rob Huffman-led team managed to salvage a 7^th place finish in the 2008 Northern Division season opening Miller Lite 250 using a “shot in the dark” chassis setup and a powerplant borrowed from fellow competitor and 2007 Series champ Bobby Gill.

Like the 32 other teams who unloaded their immaculately prepared cars and equipment at South Boston, every member of the Randy Humphrey Racing team knew they were as ready as they could possibly be.  And riding the momentum from an outstanding 2007 rookie campaign, Ward had every reason to believe he’d have one of the cars to beat.

“We struggled a little bit at both South Boston races last year.  But after building one new car, making changes to the others, and doing some off season testing, we felt like we had hit on a few things that were really going to help us,” said Ward.  “We definitely did have a better handling race car.  But we sure couldn’t have predicted the engine issues.”

The first motor evidenced a cracked cylinder head less than five minutes into Saturday practice.  And on the first ‘hot’ lap in the hastily unloaded backup car, the powerplant in it also erupted in billows of smoke.  Lifting the hood, crew chief Rob Huffman discovered that the oil pump belt was broken, the pump itself seized, and a connecting rod was protruding from the bottom of the oil pan.  “We’re not really sure what the actual cause of either issue was,” said a perplexed Rob Huffman, Ward’s crew chief.  “We just knew we needed to find a Good Samaritan somewhere.”  And that they did, in the form of Bobby Gill, whose USG Sheetrock Ford team utilizes the same engine builder.

“In addition to putting the borrowed engine in the primary car, we also had to replace the shocks that we had put on the back-up car; and we made some other chassis changes,” said Ward.  “Having only gotten a handful of practice laps, we knew our race setup was pretty much going to be a shot in the dark.”  In fact, it turned out to be a pretty good shot indeed.

Brandon qualified his RHR Fusion 14^th, but immediately began passing cars as the green flag fell.  “I think we’ve got something we can race with here, guys,” he said encouragingly over the radio.  When the first caution flew at lap 19, he brought the #93 Ford down pit road for the first of two mandatory stops, changing right side tires.  He returned to the track in 17^th spot.

By the time the second yellow was displayed at lap 32, Brandon had raced his way up to 13^th.  Again he hustled down pit road, for fuel.  It was his final planned stop.

“Our pit strategy was perfect,” said a slightly disappointed Ward after the race.  “And with all of the problems we had, I think we still had at least a 3^rd or 4^th place car.  With the rain, we just didn’t get all the laps we needed to prove it.”  Brandon had charged into contention, running a solid 8^th when rain began to fall just past the 100 lap mark, precipitating an extended red flag. 

Though the race would eventually resume a little after 10:30 PM, precipitation would soon begin to fall in earnest once again.  Despite the SoBo track crew’s best efforts to dry the racing surface, Mother Nature would ultimately be the winner, bringing the race to an unceremonious close with nearly 90 laps of the scheduled distance remaining.

“Our car wasn’t perfect tonight, but with all the trouble we had and with almost no practice today, it was definitely better than what we came to South Boston with last year,” said a reasonably pleased Huffman.  “The #66 (Benny Gordon) and #4 (Jay Fogleman) were really strong tonight, but I believe that we were as good as anybody else, if we could have gone the full distance.  We’re going to have a great year.”

 For more information:

Rob Albright

(704) 895-1384

competitive@msn.com