Martinsville Survival

DJ survived yesterday at Martinsville Speedway. There is not much more to say about his day but I will give you an idea of everything that the UPS team had to endure on the weekend.

Friday was the most uneventful day: Practice for 90 minutes and qualify. Well the practice did not go bad but the speed just was not there. The car was not far off but it only takes being off about a tenth of a second at Martinsville to drop you about 10 spots. That is not exact but it is close, just to give you an idea of how close and competitive it is. They drew an early number for qualifying and that probably hurt as they qualified in the back of the pack. Once qualifying was over the weekend got interesting.

In Saturday’s practice sessions the emotions tipped both ends of the scales. During the first one hour session, the UPS Ford Fusion posted a speed in the top 5. I felt good about the car at that point, but I am just the spotter. What do I know? The second and final practice was not near as kind. The car did not seem to run as well from the beginning of the final session. The racing business has a way of slowing you down just when you think things are going your way. About halfway through this final practice the car’s brakes started fading and in turn one caused DJ to loose control going into turn three and just brushed the wall with the left front corner. The damage was minimal but it takes a time and effort that you would spend on getting the set up better to fix the cosmetic damage. The team had to immediately work on fixing the damage. Practice was over.

I don’t know where to begin for the race but Sunday was probably the busiest day I have had as a spotter. This is the condensed version. The car was making good progress and staying on the lead lap when an accident occurred going into turn 3. The UPS car was caught up in what appeared to be a famous Martinsville chain reaction wreck. He was about the fifth or sixth car in line and probably got the worst of it. Heck, I might not have caught it in time for him to get stopped. That is what he thought. He asked me to pay attention on the restarts and he would take care of the cars around him. I thought I was watching ahead but I will say things seemed to work better after making the adjustment he wanted made. The car was damaged enough that they lost one lap while making repairs. The crew did a great job of keep their composure and getting the car back in competitive form. He was involved in another accident a short time later that I know Ken Schrader got the worst end of. The 06 car just made a bad choice and got into him damaging the 21, 88, and 06. This accident took some timely cautions and organized pit work to keep from going more laps down, but they stayed on top of it and actually got the lap back. The end result was a hard fought 16th place finish.

It was a rough day for DJ and many others but it is Martinsville. A tight little half mile that has had the same things going on for many years: torn up cars, hurt feelings, and survival.

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