News - Modified Production Number 8
Charlton - Rd 3 Qld Series
34 cars fronted for round 3 of the Qld Series at Charlton. The track was wet and greasy for the first round of heats, but strangely in certain spots there was dust. Unfortunately from those few spots, big holes were formed and a rough track made for an interesting night.
Heat 1 Rodney started out of 2 beside Aidan Raymont. Raymont on the pole line had the better start on the greasy racing surface and Rodney settled into 2nd place and followed Aidan home for the entire race distance.
Heat 2 Rodney started out of 3 beside Shane Macdonald with Brett Baxter and Dale Grotherr off the front row. On the 2nd lap Shaney Mac, Rodney & Grotherr were 3 wide going into turn 2 and the 3 fought for positions till Rodney got through into 2nd with Shaney Mac settling in behind him and Grotherr taking up 4th position. By this stage Baxter had gotten a sizeable lead so Rodney set out to chase him down. A restart, when Nathan Macdonald broke a wheel on the rough track which saw him have heavy contact with the turn 4 fence, allowed Rodney a fighting chance. On the last corner he got up inside Baxter but couldn't quite get in front and was happy to settle for 2nd, but wishing he didn't leave his attack quite so late.
Heat 3 Rodney started out of 9. The car was really starting to struggle with a loss of engine power and Rodney limped home in 7th. Back in the pits, with a roller lifter failing, Rodney removed 2 rockers and lifters so that he could continue to run the feature, although only on 5 cylinders. He needed the points to keep in the series.
Rodney started the feature out of 6 and was suprised at how quick the car was. Expecting to get passed by the majority of the field he kept to his line and waited, but instead found he was able to put up a fight and came home in 7th place.
Luckily Rodney doesn't need much sleep, and as soon as he arrived home from the track, unloaded the car and started pulling the engine down. He found that the cam was damaged and luckily he had minimised any further damage to the engine by finding the problem early. With no time to re-build that engine before the next weekends race meeting, he had to put his original engine back in the car. Although it is down on horsepower, at least Rodney can keep racing the series, and hopefully stay in the points battle. The next round is next weekend at Gympie's Mother Mountain speedway where Rodney will team up with Shane Langton in the 30/30 race.
Thanks to our sponsors The Open Range, NB Refrigeration, S & S Genrich Painting Contractors for all their support.
Cathy