So-so Night Keeps Team in the Hunt

By Dave Sully - Thorold, Ontario- On a chilly night at Merrittville on Saturday, May 25th, following a Friday night rainout at Lernerville, the team searched for answers on setup and came up a little bit short, while salvaging a seventh place finish in the Modified Feature. With only fifteen cars on hand for the feature and point leader Pete Bicknell getting wrecked in the heat, it looked like a good night to pick up some points, but, as so often happens, that wasn’t the way it worked out.

After being involved in a jingle in the heat, where he made hard contact with a spinning Mark D’Ilario, but was able to continue, Mat started eleventh after Bicknell had to go to his backup car following his mishap in the heat. On a normal night that might have been a serious disadvantage, but, with the small field, he lined up only four spots behind Mat in the car that won at Ransomville the night before.

The feature saw Chris Steele run away and hide, while Mat tried to keep Bicknell, fast as always and on the charge from the get-go, in sight. He was able to stay just behind him for most of the way, but Bicknell was able to grab two spots in the closing laps to finish in the top five, while Mat had to settle for seventh.

Mat explained, “We missed the setup a little bit. We thought the track would have a lot more bite in it than it did. It was a lot slipperier than I thought. Just made the wrong calls before the race, and it hurt us in the end. We were all right. We passed some good cars to get where we ended up, Woodsie (Scott Wood)), (Mike) Bowman, Tyler (McPherson). Pete gets lucky at the end of the race and gets a bunch of spots. One minute I’m on his bumper and the next minute, he’s two cars in front of me. It’s tough when that happens, but you have to look forward.”

Of the damage done in the heat, Mat explained, “It bent two shock towers and a right front shock. The axle is a little bent and the front bumper is trash. We had our work cut out for us after the heat to get ready for the feature, but we were fortunate it didn’t bend anything else.”

There was no time to get discouraged, as the team readied the Big Block for its debut at Humberstone on Sunday, hoping for greener pastures.