PRESS RELEASE: CRANDON,
WISCONSIN
Green Bay, Wisconsin (June 27, 2005)
With the short two weeks between races, Josh and crew were determined to fix the missing problem that reared its ugly head in Antigo. With that being said, Josh installed a new Ignition system, New alternator, New battery, New filters, and pre-filters, New Steel braided Vent line, 2 new Fuel Pumps, along with that he also found out that from the factory the fitting on the inside of his Fuel Cell was Loose, which would cause it to suck air instead of fuel causing a miss. End result, the miss should be gone right? Well we hope so! The Crew arrived Thursday night into Crandon, “I always love coming to this event, there is so much hype involved here that its great exposure for the racers and sponsors alike, I hope that my luck turns around for this weekend.”
SATURDAY’S
RACE, ROUND #5; HEADER CRACKS,
ENGINE QUITING!
“Practice started out in the morning and by the second lap my engine became really loud and loss a great amount of power!” Josh found out that he blew out his #2 header and with the help of Jeff Kincaid with a slip tube and the expert welding of his brother MJ, the crew got the truck together for the race later that day. With the Header wrap being off of the headers the crew elected to put the ignition coil/box up out of the heat on top of the truck out in the open, where the wires were somewhat stretched, nothing that a little duct tape couldn’t fix. “As I was lining up for the start of the race in the second row, I couldn’t believe my eyes seeing Ken Stout the announcer for SPEED getting into a truck next to me.” The start of the race was exciting as always and josh came through the first turn in about the same position he started. “Right off the start the truck didn’t seem to get the launch like the other guys going into the first turn, I realized I didn’t get a good start so I filed into place and made it through the first corner.” Josh is referring to the land rush start where as many as 15 trucks line up side by side and file into a turn that is approximately 4-5 trucks wide at the apex of the turn. “Its very important to make sure you make it through that first turn, because we are carrying a great deal of speed coming into that corner, there isn’t any room for mistakes.” As the race proceeded Josh started developing an irregular miss, “It seemed like every time I made a right hand turn, my engine would shut off! Then I would wiggle the wheel and it would fire back up again. I couldn’t believe that this was happening to me again! Then on the very last lap literally 16 feet from the finish line the truck just died, and I could re-fire it.” After the race the crew realized that the fan that pulls in fresh air for the intake, burned out which caused the hot wire to melt trough and every time Josh made a right hand turn the wire would spark up against the aluminum fire wall which would create a shorting out of the electronic ignition. Upon further inspection the Ignition switch wire was loose also, which could have been a culprit during the Antigo races.
JNL Photo.com
After borrowing a fan from the Baldwin’s, there couldn’t possible be anything that could go wrong. “Practice went great and from what everybody was telling me that I looked the fastest that I ever have out there. So needless to say I was very excited for the race to begin. I started again next to Ken Stout, I like to call him Stouts. So Stouts and I started next to each other, I believe I was in 16th position and came through the first turn in 15th, I battled my way up to 7th place and along the way Stouts and I seemed to hit against each other, Normally a rookie should know better that these are not oversized Go-Karts, and I would have thought that Stouts would have realized this with all the years of announcing, but low and behold he felt like coming down on me as I passed him. I lost a body panel in the process, which happens. I was getting hot on the heals of Mark Krueger when with about 2 laps to go the engine seemed to lose power again!, I’m like what happened now! The short distance that I was behind Krueger started to become more distant. I Ended up finishing in 7th place, and I was excited about that! Perhaps my bad luck is finally turning around?” After the race and with the congratulatory of many fans, fellow racers, relations and parents, Josh had a moral victory. After further inspection, the #3 cylinder spark plug wire came out off of the spark plug, “I guess the Duct tape wasn’t as strong as it should have been, I’m just glad I didn’t lose any positions when that happened, at least I could maintain my position. We will get this issue resolved for Topeka.”
The 2005 CORR Lucas Oil Series will head to Heartland Park Raceway in Topeka, Kansas on July 8-9 in what will the only night races, rounds 7 and 8 of the 2005 CORR Lucas Oil Pro Series.