The Luck Bank At ADRL South Georgia

Taking The Race One At A Time In ADRL Extreme Pro Modified

Hagerstown, MD – Our return to the fantastically prepared and well run Hardee’s session at South Georgia Motorsports Park was quite the exercise in futility for our Appalachia on Steroids Pro Extreme Camaro. And that, My Friends is a classic understatement! After what we thought was a very successful test session at Maryland International Raceway the Saturday before the Easter Bunny arrived, we found out was a major misconception.

The ADRL draws the first two pairs out of the hat for each class in the first round of eliminations which eliminates the “I ain’t going up first, are you? NOPE!” syndrome. So as our luck would have it John Stanley was the first car drawn first round. And this as well is not usually good for us! At the hit of the throttle for the first qualifier John’s usually able steed went about 20 feet and blazed the tires. Luck bank draw, NEGATIVE number one. Then on the second qualifier young Cody Barklage came out of the right lane across the center line on two wheels and missed the back and/or the driver’s door of John’s Camaro by a bit. The fact that Cody missed John at all put us even more in the Luck Bank at that point!

So it was on to the third qualifier on Friday night and our time to shine! Not a snowball’s chance in Hades’ on this day! John left with a lazy car under him and no power to do anything except to pedal it and try to get to the other end. And when it was all said and done we were left number 16 on the ladder of sixteen! We called that one a wash at the Luck Bank.

The ADRLSaturday morning dawned and we prepared in anticipation of our fourth and last qualifier and our last attempt to make a stout field. BUT Mother Nature had other ideas. The thunder boomers that were to arrive Saturday evening arrived bright and early in the am, thereby nullifying the last qualifying session with our not on the mark we had hoped for 4.044 @ 189.02. This meant we were seeded in the field and we had “made the show”! Hooray to be us!!! Then we realized we had to run the number ONE qualifier, the very potent Al-Anabi Racing Camaro driven by Sheik Khalid Bin Hamad Al-Thani his own self! During the last qualifier on Saturday they made the quickest and fastest run in 1/8th mile history! with a 3.637 @ 212.49 and he was our first draw. Luck Bank withdrawal number four was most definitely not in our favor at that point!

But as I always tell the drivers I mentor “Races are won on the starting line, not on paper and most definitely not on a message board in cyberspace! You MUST be in the other lane to win! And this was our turn to finally have a positive return from the Luck Bank. Sheik Khalid made a slight error by double bulbing John (VERY, VERY unintentional, I might add but more on that later) allowing John to do his normal deal and not get flustered. You have to imagine how John felt at that time! It was the classic David Rednecks vs. the Goliath team from Fort Knox! At the flash of yellow Sheik Khalid left a -.002 red-light on the tree running 3.760 @ 207.50 handing the win over to John with his 3.971 @ 185.77! John Stanley 4.752 @ 115.13 would fall in the next round of eliminations by way of shutting off early getting loose from traling oil giving the win to Wes Johnson 3.805 @ 194.30.

Now on to the double bulbing scenario…

At the bottom end of the track, John said that Sheik Khalid was one of the most professional racers he has ever met! He was gentleman enough to come over to John and congratulate him on the win and he apologized over and over for double bulbing him! That young man showed an awful lot of class on that day! So if any of you read some of the message board “bs” about him take it with a grain of salt. He is a very sincere young man that can only do good things for our sport.

So with no more to say I will quote what the age old Mr. Paul Harvey said for oh those many years: “And now you know The Rest of the Story!