The 2015 Bumper to Bumper IRA Sprint Car Series opened up at LaSalle Speedway in LaSalle, Illinois this past Saturday night. Scotty and the entire Scott Thiel Motorsports crew headed south to make their first ever appearance at the speedway. After having a decent hot lap session to learn the track, the team discovered a brake issue which caused them to have to go to work and caused an early night struggle but they overcame adversity and made it into the A-main event and drove up to the 12th position on a rubber down race track after starting out in 21st.
Scotty and the crew prepared the car for their hot lap session and the car felt pretty good overall for Thiel after he came into the pits after but when the crew went to double check stagger, they discovered an inboard brake issue that needed to get fixed immediately. Qualifying for the IRA 410 sprints was up next in the order and the crew scrambled to get a new brake system changed out on the car. A few other issues came in the factor while working on the brakes and they missed their spot in the qualifying order. The IRA allows the driver one lap for qualifying if you fail to make your spot in the lineup. The crew tightened everything up and pushed Scotty to the grid for his one lap. After laying down a 12.556 lap time that would be good enough for 29th quick out of the 40 cars in attendance.
With a struggling qualifying effort, it placed Thiel to start eighth in the first heat race event. Ten laps was the distance and only the top five cars would transfer into the nights 30 lap A-main event. The field stormed out of turn four to take the green flag. Scotty charged to the high side of the track and was gaining momentum to pass a few cars but had check up on the throttle going into turn three as a few cars made contact and slid up in front of Scotty. He regained his ground and made a couple passes and was in the sixth position with five laps to go. After working the high side for the next couple laps Thiel slid into the fifth and final transfer spot with two laps to go and charged his way forward but came up short at the line for the fourth spot. Fifth place was still good enough to transfer into the nights 30 lap A-main event.
After the winners of each B-main event received their qualifying time back to move them up in the running order, Scotty would start out the A-main event in the 21st position. The crew went to work to prepare the car as everyone knew it would be difficult to move forward on the extremely slick track conditions and the possibility of rubber getting put down on the racing surface. The field pushed off and began to line up for the first A-main event of the 2015 IRA season. The green flag few as the field charged out of turn four. Scotty worked the bottom sided of the track for the first few laps then moved to the middle and started to make his way forward. A caution came out on lap four and bunched the field back up. The green flag came back out and Scotty worked the top side in turn one where he moved forward a couple spots yet again. The halfway signal flew and the track started to take rubber and Scotty knew that things would get a little more difficult in regards to passing. He moved down on the track and found the rubber early on and used it to his advantage to move forward several more spots. Coming off of turn four with only ten laps to go, Thiel smacked the wall pretty hard with the right rear of the car. The car felt okay for a few laps but Scotty noticed something happened as the car leaned on the right rear pretty hard as the race continued on. He held his ground in the 14th position as a caution came out with only two laps to go. A green, white, checkered finish would be next as the field got lined back up and took the green on the restart. Scotty worked the middle groove in turn one and went side by side with a couple of cars. He gained ground off of turn four as the white flag flew and slid into the 13th spot going down the backstretch. Coming into turn four he made the move into 12th and held on to it as he crossed the finish line. The crew looked over the car after the main event and discovered that when Scotty hit the wall down the front stretch it broke the Jacobs Ladder on the rear end. “We had a decent run after starting out bad early on tonight. The car was working really well in the main. I could go wherever I wanted to on the track and the car stuck. I got into the wall a little bit there on the front stretch and I didn’t know if I had a flat or broke something but I just kept digging and we ended up 12th. Can’t really complain about that since the track took rubber pretty good towards the end. We’ll get things figured out and hopefully be better for Beaver Dam” expressed Thiel after the main.
Next week the crew will head to Beaver Dam Raceway in Beaver Dam, WI for the second round of IRA Sprint Car action on Saturday April 25. Keep up to date with Scott Thiel Motorsports all season long on Facebook and get updates on each event.
Scott Thiel Motorsports would like to thank all of their great marketing partners for the 2015 racing season.
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- Scotty Thiel on Apr 20, 2015
- Article Date: 4/20/2015 by SixFour Promotions