After working all week long on final preparations, the STM crew headed out Friday morning on the nine hour haul to Park Jefferson Speedway in Jefferson, South Dakota. Excitment kicked in when the team pulled into the pits and prepared the car for racing. The track was a larger size and the horsepower difference between the MSA 360 and the ASCS 360 showed. Scotty started out the night starting 5th in the heat race and ended up 6th. With that heat race finish, it would place him starting 17th for the night's A-Main action. After taking the green flag, Scotty got settled in and made his attempt to move forward. He only picked off a few cars because the track was heavy in one and two causing the more horsepowered cars to run that much faster. The STM #64 sprint car rounded out the night finishing in the 15th position. For the first night getting back into the car, Scotty was pretty happy and was excited to see what the next stop would bring, Eagle Raceway.
Driving two hours south of Jefferson, the STM crew arrived at Eagle, Nebraska. After asking a few locals were a nearby car wash was, the guys settle in and began to wash and prepare the car for the night's racing action. In hotlaps, the team and Scotty were blown away at the fact that the car was pretty fast and were running down some ASCS guys. The track began to dry out and become semi slick and Scotty started out in the 6th spot in the heat race. Making a small bobble in turn three, it sent him to finish the heat in 8th place, forcing him to run the B-Main. In the 10 lap, top 5 transfer, B-Main, Scotty started in the 10th position. At this point, the track was very dry slick and when the green flag dropped, Scotty took charge and picked off one car after another. A caution came out with one lap to go and Scotty was sitting in the 6th position, knowing that he needed to get one more spot in order to make it into the night's A-main $1500 to win race. Taking the green again, Scotty dove into turn one and passed the guy to make it into the 5th position and the A-main event. The STM crew finalized the car for the super dry slick race track and the 25 lap A-main. Scotty started out in the 20th position and slowly picked off car after car when the green flag dropped. After having a few cautions, Scotty managed to be sitting in the 11th position. Taking the green again, he flew into 10th and then a red flag flew, stopping the race. The race started again and Scotty was on a mission to get up to the front. With 8 laps remaining in the A-Main, Scotty came out of turn four, passing for 8th position, when the rear of the car suddenly dropped down and spun out down the middle of the front stretch. Scotty knew something broke and found out he snapped the rear axle right in half. The night was over for Thiel which was very upsetting, knowing that he had a solid top 10, possibly top 5 car to work with. The crew got the car fixed enough to roll it into the trailer and packed everything up. The final result was 17th place for the night.
Overall the Scott Thiel Motorsports team was very pleased with the weekends racing action. Making both A-Main events was an accomplishment in itself, running with cars that had 150+ horsepower over their msa 360 motor. The guys will be working hard to get everything ready for next weekend's racing at the Dodge County Fairgrounds in Beaver Dam, WI for the opening night of MSA Sprint car action!
- administrator on Apr 11, 2010
- Article Date: 4/11/2010