It was time for another fall festival in West Central Ohio, this one being the annual Minster, Ohio Oktoberfest which brings somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000 people to the small town of 2000. There is always a very nice car show that goes along with the festivities and this year there was a record number of cars overflowing into the neighboring vacant lot. We loaded up the D C Racing Penske Aluma ARCA Dodge Charger (the former #12 Altel Dodge Charger of Ryan Newman) in our beautiful Aluma trailer and headed out first thing in the morning. The day looked as though it may be rainy one but things cleared off and we had a great time. The D C Racing Aluma Dodge Charger was a hit of the car show as there was always a crowd around the car. Drew worked the crowd handing out autographed pictures of his Aluma Amzoil Dodge Charger Outlaw Late Model and letting kids and adults alike take their turn having a chance to sit in a real Sprint Cup Race Car once driven by Ryan Newman. Although we didn’t win a trophy, we had a great time meeting lots of people.

Main Event Series Finale at Columbus Motor Speedway – 10/10 – 11/09

After being rained out two weeks before, the day finally came for the Grand Finale of the Main Event Outlaw Late Model Series. This race annually draws 40 to 50 of the finest Outlaw Late Models in the Midwest vying for the $6000 top prize and $1000 to start the race. Friday’s test was rained out but we had at least got a good feel for the track as we completed the Friday test two weeks before the rains came. We scramble a ton to get speed but it is difficult at this 1/3 mile nearly circular oval. The top ten qualifiers were locked into the show, with the rest having to vie for one of the twenty qualifying positions through heat and last chance races. Four Main Event Series Regulars would make it in on points provisionals. Drew got all he could out of the car qualifying 15th, which would put him in the outside front row of the second heat. Mike Stacy who recently won four out of four races would be on the pole for the same heat. At the drop of the green flag of the heat Drew and Mike Stacy would run side by side for a lap or two then Drew would fall into second place and the two would put a half lap on the field at the drop of the checkers with Drew close behind the #6 Stacy car.

The 100 lap feature would find Drew starting right where he qualified, 15th. Patience would not be a virtue for many as there were several wrecks during the race, all of which Drew found his way around. The most scary one (for the crew chief anyway) was when the 2nd fastest qualifier got real loose and started falling back. Drew got inside him to pass and just then he started to spin, he bumped Drew putting him sideways. Drew saved it, but that poor guy slammed the wall big time. Drew worked his way up to 8th place with about 25 laps to go, but a couple of the really fast guys that went to the tail got buy him and he finished in tenth place. We were very satisfied with that given that the car had gone quite loose on us and Drew brought it home once again with only a minor tire rub on the right front corner. Every one of the finishers ahead of Drew were veteran drivers with multiple wins and championships. Drew would be named rookie of the race! This finish moved us up one notch in the point standings to 9th place.

Winchester 400 Weekend Outlaw Late Model Race – 10/17/09

Brrrrrr what a cold weekend for racing, specially on the fastest track we go to and having never been there before. This was the weekend of the CRA Winchester 400 with Kyle Bush attending on Sunday and our Outlaw Super Late Models running a lead in feature on Saturday. We arrived at the Track about 11 am Friday morning and unloaded the car and all of our gear on pit road. We got two sessions of hot laps today and by the seventh lap Drew was running the same times that would later be the pole speed on Saturday. We did very little adjusting on the car for the second set of hot laps letting Drew get familiar with the high speeds which were averaging 120 mph laps and top speeds in the area of 140 mph. The setup we got from Port City seemed to be right on as the day went very well and we finished on top of the speed charts. We packed everything up, covered the car and went home for the night at 7 pm.

Saturday brought on a different story as during the first of our two hot lap session the car was wicked loose. We chased the setup doing a few adjustments to tighten things up. We found out that the spoiler height rule was 42″ so we opted to lay the spoiler down a bunch to gain 1 1/2″ of spoiler height. We hit the track again and Drew said there was no forward bite coming off the corners. We went to adjust the front rebound on the shocks a couple ticks so we would get more forward bite and found the left front shock was at the lightest possible setting which would make the car very loose off and lack forward bite. The car was perfect the night before and there was no way that adjustment can change. Someone must have crawled under the car and changed it as we left it in the pits covered up but on jack stands all night. We changed that and gave it a little more rebound up front and went out to qualify and turned in a time in the 17s, two seconds off the pace. Drew described it as zero forward bite. We checked for a broken axle, NOT. Checked the clutch and the flywheel was blue, the clutch was shot! Jason and Aaron Timmerman happened to be there, and one of Al Reeve’s guys from Mike Stacy’s team all jumped in and we tore it apart. Thanks a bunch guys!! One of the vendors had new discs, we overhauled the clutch in record time, about 45 minutes. To top it off Drew’s radio button on the steering wheel quit working and he could only hear me, I could not hear him. We knew it before we went out so we made up some hand signals in case.

We were slowest qualifiers so Drew had to start at the tail. There was an invert of 8. We got to take a slow lap to test the clutch but not the setup, all was ok so we were ready for the feature. Drew was going to follow Mike Stacy up through the pack but he didn’t know how the setup would be as we made lots of changes to compensate for the spoiler, the loose, etc., then found the bad clutch. They gave the field a few hot laps to test things and warm up tires, the car seemed good although not fully up to speed as they were under yellow and I could not hear anything from Drew. Drew could not keep up with Stacy at the start as planned as a few slow cars got in front of him. There were two running side by side that held Drew up for about ten laps that allowed the top three cars to get away 1/2 lap. Drew passed them, then passed the fifth place car, caught the fourth place car in about 5 laps and took about 10 laps to get by him, when he got by he left him in the dust but the top three were too far ahead to catch. He was running the same times as Mike Stacy who won! We finished 4th.

What a day, ups and downs but a good end and not a scratch on the car and lots of good comments on Drew and how fast and good he was with traffic. When asked how Drew liked Winchester he said “It’s awewome, I love it! It’s my new favorite track!”

The season is over, now it’s time to figure out how to make the car go faster for next year. Thanks a bunch to Aluma Trailers for the fantastic trailer, Elmer Schaeffer Amsoil Dealer for those super lubricants, and Impact Racing for their fine safety equipment.

We will keep everyone informed on our progress through the off season. We plan to run the Main Event Series again next year with a hand full of ARCA races, hopefully both Toledos, Mansfield, Iowa, and Rockingham. We are now seeking marketing partners and sponsors who we can help to market their products and allow us income enough to run these races. Anyone interested please contact Andy Charlson toll free at 877-272-8179 or on his cell phone 419-305-3772.

Thanks to everyone for your interest and help!!

Come race time we still could not get stagger, these tires would not stretch, so we took out some cross and raised the track bar one turn to free up the car center out. Drew went out for the feature not knowing what he was going to get under him for a setup for sure. The car was very loose!! Drew did a heck of a job avoiding wrecks and moving up to the front. He even put a Midvale stripe down the front stretch wall, his very first brush with the wall with this kind of race car. No damage was visible and he said the car was actually better. The car was over heating some at this point, a problem we have had and tried to remedy every time we had a chance to put enough laps on the car to get it to do it. He continued his move to the front but after several yellows and 27 green laps into the race the car was over heating too much and he was forced to pull in. At this point Drew was in 8th place and still on the move, considerably faster than several of the cars in front of him.

The next few days we took the motor to Rhyne Competition Engines for a check up only to find that there was no heating problem there and the engine was in as good a condition as it was in at the start of the season. We deemed the overheating problem to not enough radiator capacity. We had put the radiator/oil cooler in the car that Port City recommended but most racers are running motors in the 600 hp range, not ARCA engines with 770 hp. So, this week we are putting an ARCA radiator in the car with a separate oil cooler. We also found something on the setup that we had overlooked which should get the car to work better in the corners. We will also cut about 100 hp from the engine this week by switching to a 390 carb.

Wish us luck as we head to the very small challenging Kil-Kare Speedway this Friday June 5th and then on to the special $10,000 to win race at Angola Speedway on Thursday June 11th. We are very excited about this race as Drew was on the pole and ran right up front the last and only time we had been there.

A special thanks to Aluma Trailers for the great trailer that gets us to and from the track, Elmer Schaeffer & Amsoil for the super lubricants, Impact Safety Equipment for great safety equipment, and Scott Baker at Baker Performance for getting us up and running again Saturday morning.

The Aluma Trailers, Amsoil, Impact Racing, Dodge Charger #21 Outlaw Late Model Team

P.S. Drew got his first fan mail from a young race fan in New Jersey requesting an autographed picture. Thanks to all you race fans out there!!