>From: Randy House 


BETTER LATE THAN NEVER . . .
     Welcome to another update in the continuing saga of "
As the Thunder Rolls"when we left for Xenia at 5:30am we
had high hopes of getting there in enough time to practice
and maybe finally put the Southtown Motorsports
Thunderbird on the pole, well now...that is a wee bit
optimistic isn't it ? WE made it about twenty miles from
home when we blew a tire on the team hauler, this set us
back about two hours, pole dreams are fading.
       Back underway we were near Indianapolis when as
our luck has it, we blew yet another tire on the hauler, this
is a ringing endorsement for Michelin recaps by the way,
this set us back about an hour, pole is out of the question,
getting there to race is now the focus.
       We arrived at the track and ARCA gave us very little
time to prepare and then said we could have five minutes
practice, not enough time to set anything but enough to
make sure the thing would turn left after the extensive
damage at salem. Eric drove it hard for the few laps we
got and brought it back in for the furious effort to get new
tires and get ready to qualify, we had no way of knowing
what to set  as we only got one set of tire temps with so
little practice.
       The SOUTHTOWN THUNDER got the car ready and
through tech in an amazing amount of time, we were of
course the last ones to qualify.
       As the crowd watched in anticipation  we too
wondered what kind of time Eric could possibly post with
all the problems we had and virtually no track time....
       "There you have it folks, ERIC SMITH is on top of the
heap, fast time of the day !!!"
      We were astonished and dazed, first pole position and
right when we least expect it, THE THUNDER WAS
REALLY BEGINNING TO ROLL NOW BABY !
       With no tire temps to speak of we were still unsure of
setup, we then won our heat race and went to work on race
setup using what little we learned from that.
       After the dust had settled we ended up seventh, not bad
considering what our right front tire looked like when we
got back to the garage area.... Ten more laps and we
would have been repairing the car again. Oh well off to
Flat Rock.


OH HOW WE LOVE FLATROCK . . . NOT

We arrived at Flat Rock with plenty of time to actually get
the car set up fairly decent this time.
Our crew chief  Randy House and car owner Cleve
Smith,along with Eric and the Thunder got the car
prepared for qualifying, we nabbed the ninth spot, Eric
later says he was a little anxious to repeat the pole effort
from the night before and may have over done it a little.
      As the race got under way we were staying with the
leaders and seeming to have no problems,
OH YES... we didn't have any radio contact with our driver
not good ,not at all. Around lap 40 we were told by ARCA
that we had a little smoke exiting the rear of the car but
they could live with it if we could. Well we certainly could
live with it but Eric would later have an entirely different
view.....As it turned out the power steering pump had gone
to hell and as a result we, I should say , Eric had no power
steering..hmmmm.
       To make a long story short, we finished eighth, this
was after much discussion with ARCA as they had us at
tenth three laps down !!!! Thanks again for checking the
update and we hope to see some of you soon.....until then.
listen for distant thunder, it may just be heading your way.

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*<<<<<<<< GO ARCA # 9>>>>>>>>>>  *
*<<<<  SOUTHTOWN THUNDER  >>>>>  *
*<<<<<<<<   RULES    >>>>>>>>>>  *
*      CREW CHIEF ARCA #9        *
*       rhouse@mtco.com          *
*  http://www.mtco.com/~rhouse   *
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* I hope I die in my sleep like my grandfather and *
*   not screaming in terror like his passengers    *
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