Good news from the Livingood Motorsports team! I think I finally have a race car that can win races!

After the motor blew up last month we bought a spec motor from Jimmy Cope Racing. After we put it in we went to the track for a few hours of testing. At first I really didn't like the way the motor felt. Compared to my 2 bbl motor, it seemed sluggish off the corner but it was a lot faster down the straightaways. We spent the day working on the springs and finally found what the car wanted.

I have to tell you I have never had an engine builder take so much time with me. Jimmy not only told us what to do to pep the motor up coming off the corners but he came to the track and helped me with my driving line as well. You know, when you are just starting out like we are, and you have to learn everything from the ground up, it's really helpful when someone gives you a straight answer and takes the time to explain why and that's exactly how Jimmy is... (more)

When we got to the track the first thing we had to do was take the car over the scales and check the body and the car to make sure it meet the rules. When we took the hood off and they saw the Jimmy Cope motor in there, the head tech man said, "A Jimmy Cope Motor! Get the gauges!". I like that! Of, course they were kidding, well at least they didn't really check anything that they normally wouldn't, but its good to know that my motor builder has a reputation for staying on top of things.

I had a set of tires for practice that I thought were pretty good. They only had about 35 laps on them but I guess they had gotten a little hard. The other cars were having problems sliding the nose too but after the first practice my front tires were ruined. I was tempted to make a bunch of changes but my crew chief said he thought the car would be good when we put on new tires. Everything else seemed to be working fine so we went out one more time for just a few slow laps to scuff the new tires and get them ready for qualifying.

I was the 4th car out to qualify and when I came off the 4th turn to take the green flag for my first lap I felt a terrible vibration. It went away when I lifted to go through turns one and two but as soon as I was back on the gas full throttle it came back again. I finished the lap but pulled it down to the apron and didn't take the second laps because I wasn't sure what was wrong and I didn't want a tire to come off or something like that and hit the wall.

When I got back to the trailer I told my crew chief about what I felt and we checked the throw out bearing on the clutch. It was tight as a drum but it was suppose to have about an eighth of an inch of play in it. To fix it right we really should have pulled the transmission out but we worked on it a little and thought we might have fixed it.

There were 22 cars at the track and one of them actually qualified slower than me and one other never qualified at all so I had the 20th starting position for the race. The good thing about that is, if your car is really a lot faster than where you qualified, you can look pretty good coming up through the pack at least until you get up to where the cars are as fast as you are. That's pretty much what happened for me in the race.

You can always count on a wreck in the first couple laps that takes out a few of the fast cars up front and ours came in about lap 6. Like they say, cautions breed cautions, and on the restart the leaders got into each other and everybody checked up causing a few cars to spin out. On the next restart I was up to 11th place!

The adjustment we made on the clutch helped but the clutch was still slipping a little. We figured it would probably give out before the end of the race. I was up to 9th place on about lap 20 when smoke started billowing out of the back of my car. My crew chief radioed me to come in because he figured the clutch had gone. The car was actually still working fine. Still, that was an awful lot of smoke. It filled up the inside of the car too so I knew I had a pretty big problem.

I pulled down to the pits and drove to the trailer and there stood Jimmy Cope waiting for me. He took off the hood as I jumped out of the car and after about 2 minutes he found that an oil line had come loose and blew oil out on the headers causing all the smoke. We could have fixed it so I could go back out on the track but we didn't know how much oil had come out and if the motor was hurt. So, we decided to park the car for the rest of the night.

There were so many fans there with my shirts on and I also had about 10 people from my sponsors come out to see me too. I'm sorry I couldn't have given you more of a show for your trouble. You all made me feel really good when you cheered for me at the driver's introduction. Thank you very much!

For those of you who have been getting my race reports for a while, you know how good this is. Not finishing the race is bad but getting the car to work so good is real progress. After we talked about the oil leak, my crew chief said, "Hey, before you forget, how was the car handling?" I told him I couldn't have asked for a better car. A friend of mine was timing me and he said I was getting faster and faster with every lap. Another friend said that he though I was actually gaining on the leaders. After looking at the finishing order, I'm pretty sure I would have finished 5th or 6th if I'd have been able to stay out there. Considering that I have never finished in the top 10 in a Goodyear Challenge race before, that would have been quite an improvement.

This was also probably one of the busiest weeks of my life. At school we had the FCAT testing and then I had to go to the Metal Matters Conference for my sponsor, the Fabricators and Manufacturers Association. At the conference they had a press conference to announce some grants and my GO Brennan Scholarships so I had to prepare to speak for about 5 minutes in that. I was on the same podium with John Ratzenburger of Made in America so that was pretty cool. All the while I was trying to get caught back up on the home work I had from missing a few days of school. It's not easy being me! (just kidding!)

Well, right now it looks like my next race will be at Desoto Super Speedway on April 16th so you won't be hearing from me again for about a month. Please don't forget to tell your friends about my $500 scholarships on YouTube.com.