Weekend Brings Mixed Results at Merrittville and Humberstone

By Dave Sully - The Williamson Racing Team has been chasing the setup, so to speak, for much of the year and the weekend events on Saturday, August 4th , and Sunday, 5th , were no different, as a ninth place finish at Merrittville and getting caught up in a jingle at Humberstone would attest. The difference lies in the realization that scoreboard watching and point races were becoming a major distraction, which was taking a lot of the fun out of going racing. Since the team is not racing for a living, the satisfaction comes out of enjoying the moment, no matter what the result. They’ll work just as hard as they have all along, but the sense of urgency to win the championship will be tempered.

Mat offered, “I’ve changed my attitude a little bit. Hopefully, that will help. Last night I wasn’t as tired when I got in the race car. I was relaxed and calmed down. We seemed to be going forward, so hopefully we’re on the right track (no pun intended). Before, we’d be running in ninth or tenth and Pete’s up in second and that gets me more frustrated. We’ll try not to look at points. We’ll look at the big picture and get some feature wins before the end of the year.”

He also talked about the weekend, declaring, “We just missed the setup a little bit at Merrittville. The track has been weird lately, in that everybody’s fast at the top. It’s hard to race, really. It’s hard to come from the back. We didn’t qualify in the heat. We weren’t very good, but we weren’t terrible. We started thirteenth and ended up ninth. It’s just tough to pass lately. The tops been so fast, and the racing hasn’t been as much fun as it used to be.”

As for Sunday at Humberstone, where a wreck at the front of the field between Chad Brachmann and Fred Carleton caused a major pile-up. Mat opined, “We got caught up in everybody else’s mess. I don’t blame Chad Brachmann at all. He was leading and Freddie took him out. It was payback for what had happened before (the last mod race at Humberstone where Carleton blamed Brachmann for putting him off turn three), but it was the wrong time and the wrong place to do it. That’s for sure. There’s no lights at Humberstone. Everybody who races there knows that. They were sitting there in front of the whole field. Humberstone never threw the yellow as soon as they should have. I ran into the wreck, and drove away from the wreck. When we got to the front straightaway, the yellow came out.”

He added, “We were good though. The new car was really fast. It was about as good as I’ve felt in the last month in any car I’ve been in.”

With the Bob St. Amand Big Block DirtCar Series 100 lapper coming on Monday, and with clearer heads, there appears to be reason for optimism for that race and down the road.