By Dave Sully
The 2013 racing season for the Williamson Racing Team gets off to an early start this year as the crew has made plans to field a big block at Volusia County during Speed Weeks at Daytona, starting on February 18th. Volusia is a big half mile track located twenty miles west of Daytona in Barberville, Florida. It has a lot of room to race and the cream of the crop comes down during Speed Weeks, with the WOO Sprint cars, the WOO Late Models, and the UNOH E-Mods sharing the stage with the Big Blocks. Occasionally some NASCAR drivers participate. Last year Clint Bowyer and Kenny Wallace fielded E-Mods, and Tony Stewart has driven a late model there as well. You never know who might show up.
The team has been busy preparing a new chassis for the Big Block effort, which will continue in the regular season. After a successful venture last season at the Dirtcar race in Michigan, with Mat driving Matt Sheppard's backup car, to an impressive finish, the team acquired a big block motor from the Sheppard team and will campaign that at Volusia and during the regular season. The new car is an experimental design, as BRP continues its unending quest for improvement in its products and cars. There will be four of the newly designed machines at Volusia, with Justin Haers, Stew Friesen, and Matt Sheppard joining Mat in giving the new configurations some serious race testing.
A hardy group will be making the trek to Florida to assist the Williamson Racing Team, with Dipper, dad Randy, and Rob Sawatsky as crew for Mat, with the valued Cliff Warner and Bonnie Robison along as well. Moral support in the form of Grandma and Grandpa will fill out the cast of characters who will be cheering on the No. 6.
The Florida trip is important because, in addition to providing insight into the new big block design, there are features that will be incorporated in the small block car that Mat will campaign at Merrittville and in the 358 Series when the regular season starts. Current plans have the team running the big block on Fridays at Lernerville and the small block on Saturdays at Merrittville. They will start out running the Dirtcar 358 Series, but plan on concentrating on the Super DIRT Series. The determining factor will be how they are faring in the 358 Series. That will dictate how many of each series they run.
As in any endeavor, but especially racing, various factors can affect the way things actually play out, but that's the way things look at this time. Since yours truly winters in Florida and is enjoying the pleasant weather, I will be on hand for Speed Weeks and will be able to supply first hand information right here. Stay tuned.
