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Austin Reed and the number 14 Approved Memory/K&N Legends Cars
Back in July of this year Bakersfield native, Austin Reed was California Dreaming about a win in the Legends Big Money 100 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Reed says he plans on spending the rest of 2012 gaining as much Late Model driving experience as possible in preparation for next season.
Surely he had earned that right, Reed started racing when he was 12-years-old and he's winning championships in off-road Trophy Trucks and Legend cars ever since. Now 18, Reed drives for his NASCAR winning car owner father, and successful business entrepreneur Dave Reed. The young up and comer kicked-off his 2012 season in strong fashion, picking up a win in his number 14 Approved Memory/K&N Legends Car at Willow Springs International Raceway in Rosamond, California in the middle of February. He followed that up with a solid showing in Las Vegas during the Sprint Cup weekend.
After graduating Frontier High School in Bakersfield with honors this year, Reed illustrated his determination and comment to racing by moving across the country to Mooresville, North Carolina for the summer to compete in the NOS Energy Legend Car Semi-Pro division of the Jack in the Box Summer Shootout Series.
The K&N sponsored driver started 2012 off strong earning a Legends Car victory at Willow Springs International Raceway.
While the series is a ten race super-series, the highlight of the schedule is the Big Money 100, the largest event in grassroots racing, which plants the nation's best Legend Car racers center stage in the heart of NASCAR country. However, even though he was one of the fastest drivers each week leading up to the marquee event at Charlotte Motor Speedway, things didn't pan out as planned for Reed.
"In the Big Money 100 unfortunately we were unable to compete in the A-main," Reed remarked. "I caught some bad luck racing in a transfer position and lost the spots during the heat races. Although we stayed for the night and helped the team cars fight their way to top-5 finish."
Overall Reed says "2012 has been a great year of racing we've had 28 top-10's, 17 top-5 finishes, and one win in the Legend Car. I have also been testing a Late Model to race in the Pro All Stars Series (PASS) on the east coast." Reed recently competed in Late Model Super Limited series at Hickory Motor Speedway finishing 5th.
"I think my main goal for the remainder of the season is just to gain experience in a Late Model in preparation to go racing next year," Reed adds. "We are racing the Legends Oval Asphalt Nationals in Atlanta October 24th-27th, along with the Legends Road Course World Nationals in Las Vegas December 5th-8th. We are going to be racing a hand full of Spears SRL Southwest Tour races next year too, along with the PASS Series here in the South east. We will of course be racing Legends all over the country next year but primarily in the Southeast. I am also attending my first year of College here in North Carolina."
NHRA Pro Stock racer Erica Enders blasted her way to the early number one spot by posting a 6.624.
As the chase to be one of the top seeds for the 2013 K&N Horsepower Challenge season rolls heats up, NHRA Pro Stock competitors are really mixing things up, as of late, compared to the first half of the season when there were just two or three drivers taking turns at the top of the qualifying field for each event. Erica Enders managed to carry her qualifying momentum from Brainerd to take the top spot in Pro Stock again during the most prestigious NHRA event of each season, the 58th annual Mac Tools U.S. Nationals, just outside of Indianapolis, Indiana.
Preparing for and competing at the biggest race of the season can always add some additional pressure for any professional team, but for this year's running of the U.S. Nationals and the persistent rainy weather that pounded the event, it was even more daunting than usual. Qualifying for Pro Stock got underway as scheduled, with their first hit of five sessions taking place on Friday afternoon, but with the remnants of Hurricane Isaac drenching the area over the next few days to come, that was the only part of the schedule that went as planned.
Erica Enders NHRA Pro Stock GK Motorsports/KLR Group Chevy Cobalt
During the first session, Erica Enders blasted her way to the early number one spot by posting a 6.624, edging out 2012 K&N Horsepower Challenge champion, Vincent Nobile, who made a nice 6.631 pass and Allen Johnson's 6.634 that was good enough to start him out at number three. Teams were scheduled to have two more attempts on Saturday, and while they were nowhere near the original scheduled times thanks to the on and off rain that was quite heavy at times, they almost got them both in.
Session two was interrupted with a quick rain shower right after Dave Connolly made the first lap of the round, forcing the remainder of the contenders to wait it out in the staging lanes while officials dried and reprepped the racing surface and the always stubborn shutdown area. When action returned to the track, Enders once again made the quickest lap of the pack, just shy of her earlier number and held on to the number one spot.
Erica Enders grabs her first U.S. Nationals Pro Stock number one qualifier.
Pro Stock teams rolled to the staging lanes a few hours later to make one more attempt for the day, but after only a handful of cars went down the track, NHRA's Safety Safari shut them down. After a check of the track and a second look at the current weather conditions, the temperature and dew point were both in the low seventy's and conditions had become quite unfavorable to send anyone else down the quarter mile.
Although there were two more days of activities planned for the U.S. Nationals, Mother Nature and the remnants of Isaac had plans of their own that completely washed out the remainder of the event. Officials not only made the decision to bring back all the teams the following weekend, but allow qualifying to remain open for the professional teams. A decision that wasn't unprecedented in the history of the sport, but still one that stirred a vast mix of emotions with all involved.
After the week went by and team's made it back on the track, Enders made a nice run for session number four, but it was Greg Anderson who would bump her and several other down when he made a 6.556 pass, which was a whole tenth of a second quicker than just the week before. K&N's Mike Edwards also improved more than a tenth over his best time the prior week, 6.563 to place him at number two and a testament to the much better and dryer air conditions than the racers faced prior to the rain delay.
But Enders and her GK Motorsports/KLR Group Chevy Cobalt were not done yet and with one more session later that day, she jumped right back up on top with a clean 6.550 to grab her first U.S. Nationals Pro Stock number one qualifier and the $3,000 bonus check from K&N Engineering.
"We were able to hang on to the number spot, even through the second week and that was huge," Enders admitted. "The Summit guys stole it from us, but we were able to go right back up there and steal it back on the last session. Really pretty excited about that because it was Indy, because to be a number one qualifier there is something really good to add to your résumé."
"When you throw in rain delays and days when the track isn't prepped quite right, it just makes for an extremely long weekend," Enders added of the race. "Then since we had to come back the following weekend, well it was definitely long and drawn out."
By adding her accomplishment at Indy, Enders is slowly making her way to the top of the list in the 2013 K&N Horsepower Challenge standings. "I am just really excited to be a part of the K&N Challenge and all that it takes to make it in for the bonus race," she pointed out. "Everyone in Pro Stock is extremely grateful and we all can't thank K&N enough for putting this special program on for us and it certainly keeps exciting for us to have a shootout race to work hard for, like the fuel guys do."
"I'm really stoked about it and we are at a great point to continue to carry the momentum and to keep adding those K&N qualifying points to our total for the big $50,000 shootout in Vegas next spring," she added.
Derek Thorn won second NASCAR K&N Pro Series West race at NAPA Speedway in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Derek Thorn won his second NASCAR K&N Pro Series West race at NAPA Speedway in Albuquerque, N.M., on a night when rookie Dallas Montes made an impressive debut.
Thorn's win was overshadowed by a runner-up finish my Montes, who was making the first K&N Pro Series West start of his career.
Montes was one of three rookies to finish in the top five in the race. Taylor Cuzick was fourth and Austin Dyne was fifth.
Fifteen-year old Hannah Newhouse, who was also making her K&N Pro Series West debut, was sixth.
NASCAR K&N Pro Series West Racer Derek Thorn
Montes and Newhouse will participate in the 2013 NASCAR Drive for Diversity combine. Both drivers turned plenty of heads at the tiny track in New Mexico.
Montes, driving the No. 17 Chevrolet for MMI Services in place of K&N Pro Series West regular David Mayhew, started on the front row with pole winner Dylan Kwasniewski and ran with the leaders the entire race.
"I got a little bit teared up, I have to say," Montes said after the race. "I come from a family with not that much money. Just running good like this is huge for us."
Mayhew was entered in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race in Las Vegas and missed the K&N Pro Series West race in New Mexico.
Thorn, meanwhile, worked his way through the field and overtook Kwasniewski for the lead on lap 87 of the NAPA Auto Parts 150. Thorn started seventh and won the race after a green-white-checkered flag finish.
"It was a weird night all in all," said Thorn, driver of the No. 6 Ford for the Sunrise Ford Racing team. "It was hard in practice never having raced here before. We knew it was going to hard on tires. When the car feels good you have to back it up."
Thorn won his first K&N Pro Series West race of the season at Havasu 95 Speedway in April. He has nine top-five finishes in 13 K&N Pro Series West races and is third in the series standings.
"All in all, it was a good night," Thorn said. "The guys worked their butts off on this car. They've been working on it nonstop in the shop and I'm really happy. I can't complain."
Eric Holmes, a three-time K&N Pro Series West champion, was third. It was his seventh top-five finish of the season.
"It was kind of boring for me the first half, just riding and riding and riding," Holmes said. "Just trying to be patient and nobody knew how long the tires would last, when they would really give up. I was just as patient as I could be. Things started coming my way. I really thought I had the thing going my way. Got the caution I wanted, got to third and something happened to our engine. The motor laid down. In some ways it helped me, but I wasn't fast enough after that, couldn't keep up with these two guys."
Greg Pursley, the leader in the K&N Pro Series West standings after 13 races, was eighth. He has a 13-point lead over Kwasniewski, his teammate at Gene Price Motorsports, with two races to go.
Kwasniewski, who won his fourth pole position of the season, finished a spot behind Pursley, the reigning K&N Pro Series West champion, in ninth.
The next K&N Pro Series West race is the Toyota/NAPA Auto Parts 150 at All American Speedway in Roseville, Calif., on Oct. 13.
The NAPA Auto Parts 150 from Albuquerque will be televised on Speed Channel on Oct. 11 at noon PDT.
NHRA Pro Stock racer Vincent Nobile adds another K&N Low Qualifier plaque to his collection.
The much sought after K&N Horsepower Challenge championship, and its $50,000 payday to the overall winner, all starts with drivers earning as many qualifying points as possible during each event on the NHRA schedule. 2012 K&N Horsepower Challenge champion, Vincent Nobile added his name to the history books earlier this year when he became one of the few to win the crown during his first shootout appearance, doing so by first making the top point earners without making a single career Pro Stock pole start. That all changed for the New York state native during the 5th annual O'Reilly Auto Parts NHRA Nationals held outside of Charlotte, North Carolina as he acquired the first ever NHRA Pro Stock number one qualifier.
When the Pro Stock teams first hit the track to begin qualifying, it was really no surprise for many to see Jason Line's name penciled in at the top. Coming into the most recent zMax race, Line had grabbed the number one spot at this facility for the last four events or dating back to the fall race in 2010. Even with Line's 6.570, Vincent Nobile was right on his tail with a great 6.573 for his qualifying opener and more left in the tank.
Vincent Nobile and the NHRA Pro Stock Mountain View Tire Dodge Avenger
Now that the teams had their first look at the track, they could do a little fine tuning to see if they could squeeze a little more out of both their chassis and their naturally aspirated power plants. For session two on Friday, weather conditions remained relatively the same as they were just a few hours prior during session one, but the track had cooled ever-so-slightly from 114 to 110. That seemed to help many Pro Stock teams kick it up a notch and get more of their power down the quarter-mile.
Again, it was a battle between Line and Nobile. Making their assigned lane swap from the previous session and saving the best lap for the final pair, Line stepped up his number a good distance to post a 6.554, but it was the number blazing on the board in the opposite lane that would be the mark to beat. Vincent Nobile powered his Mountain View Tire Dodge Avenger a full two and a half hundredths quicker to land the provisional number one for the meet and a nice 6.548.
"It felt good," said Nobile shortly following his second run. "I knew when I clutched it, it was a good run. Then my crew came over the radio and told me how fast I had run, and I was shocked. It was a great run. We went back and looked at the computer graph for the run and it looks flawless."
"Depending on the air we get tomorrow and the time we run, I believe it will hold," he continued. "We can even improve with the way the car is running now. It's responding to everything we are telling it to do. We made a few changes after Q-1, and it liked it. There's no reason why we can't do even better."
Nobile also mentioned that he and the team had been chasing an electrical problem for quite a few months and they were happy that they were able to finally pinpoint and correct it.
"We're always striving for number one but we are not like all of these other teams that go testing every week," said Nobile. "We are weekend warriors in the truest sense. We pack the car up after the race and roll it out for the next one. We rarely test, or try to improve ourselves, like that. When we test, it's usually at the event."
Come Saturday, the conditions were not quite as satisfactory as they had been the previous day for the first two sessions. Pro Stock numbers remained good, but could not mirror early event numbers from Friday.
With his 6.548 effort during session two, Vincent Nobile not only nailed his first NHRA Pro Stock number one but the 20 year-old also added his first K&N Low Qualifier plaque to his collection as well as snagging the $3,000 bonus check and the max Horsepower Challenge bonus points to his growing total.
"For my team it meant the world to them, just because they worked so hard on the car and it performed (the way they wanted)," Nobile said of his first Pro Stock pole. "I owe it all to the team. They made the car go fast. I just drove it. But coming into the weekend I did not expect to be number one qualifier."
Following the Concord, North Carolina event, just eight races remain to earn points during qualifying for the 2013 K&N Horsepower Challenge. Only the top seven point earners will get to play their hand for the $50,000 shootout and the eighth once again being selected by fan vote. The Pro Stock shootout venue and date have been changed for the upcoming season and will take place much earlier in the year as well as the opposite side of the country from years past. Las Vegas will play host to the K&N HPC during the 14th annual SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals at "The Strip" at LVMS, April 5-7, 2013.
Details are coming soon on how fans can not only vote to help make sure their favorite NHRA Pro Stock driver gets into the show, but also full information on the next edition of the K&N Horsepower Challenge Sweepstakes, where eight lucky fans will be selected at random from all who have entered for a chance of their own to win big.
Adam Bushman has already started pre-season training for the 2013 AMA Flat Track race season.
Listen up, here's a little inside info - Oak Creek, Wisconsin's Adam Bushman is perfectly aligned to carve out a benchmark 2013 season - so get your bids in early. Some outcomes are just crazy-simple to predict. Corner a wild cat and you become confetti. End a talented and determined racer's season prematurely, and sentence him to couch arrest with a kaput component, and you can bet the farm he'll come out firing on hyper-drive once he heals.
Adam Bushman was leading the 2012 AMA All Star National Championship when he was involved in a crash that put him on crutches for the remainder of the season.
"2012 was by far the best season I've had yet," Bushman declared. "I was leading the AMA All Star National Championship and was running 9th in the AMA Pro Flat Track Championship. I was fast qualifier at Hagerstown Speedway and came out with a 2nd place finish. Unfortunately, it all came to an abrupt stop in Peoria at the AMA Pro Flat Track National, after qualifying 2nd our team was confident we could come out of it with a win. However, I was involved in a crash over the jump and came out with a dislocated and broken hip, which put me on crutches for the remainder of the season."
AMA Pro Flat Track Racer Adam Bushman
Before Bushman's injury he sent a clear message of what he's capable of accomplishing with his focus honed to an even finer point. "These wins came right after I graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, so that was a big burden lifted off my shoulders and I was able to focus on racing."
The wins Bushman refers to are back-to-back-to-back AMA All-Star Nationals, starting with Chilton Speedway in Wisconsin. Technically, because of its proximity to his Oak Creek home, Chilton is Bushman's home track, however - "It was actually the first time we had ever raced there," he adds. "The next race I won was Peoria Speedway, and then followed by Peoria TT. Also, our team was able to come together and figure out some of the problems with our setup that we were having earlier in the season."
As a result of the injury Bushman's post and pre-season training has already gotten underway. "I've been busy getting a new website up and running so fans can see all the news, photos, and videos of Bushman Racing, which should be up in a few weeks. Before my injury I had planned on moving to the Expert class in 2013, but I've decided to stay in the Pro Singles for one more year, so I can get experience on a twin. I can't thank K&N and all my 2012 sponsors enough for all the help in my success, and I look forward to building our relationship with them in 2013, and the new sponsors that come onboard."
