03 June 2017 Kent, WA – A night with no weather issues that have plagued previous dates had everyone was eager to race. This was apparent by the nice car count that the series racers were ready run. Following a run order that gets done with no issues will get you finished before curfew.
As a drag crew, you prepare for the worst and hope for the best. Nothing short of weather will stop the racing than race car breakage. If something happens, the three main offenders are the motor, transmission and rear end. When any of these three go bad the liquid and metal that is dropped to the track surface takes time to clean up. Rear end damage is by far the quickest to clean up as it is mostly contained to the starting line. The other two will mostly happen down track where you cannot stop fast enough to keep from spreading liquid for some distance. This cleanup brings “all” hands on deck for the dragstrip crew as it is a process to bring the track back to racing form.
Now three quarters the way thru eliminations and backing into the finish time a little pick up in pace will get her done. But everyone knows “Murphy’s Law”…
Just when things were looking good it reared its ugly head and brought a stop to all racing for another cleanup by the drag crew. This one forcing the crew to walk the track picking up pieces of metal spit out by a transmission. Another herculean effort by the drag crew got racing going though now the reality of time leading to the curfew says finish all you can as quick as possible.
Finishing two of the four classes with just a couple rounds in the other two is a testament to Pacific Raceways drag crew and the adversities that they may face on any given race date.
In the two classes that finished saw Jim Werre best Mark Sires in motorcycle and it was a father/son duel with Wayne and Nick Douglas facing off in Sportsman where son Nick “treed” his dad for the win.
