A Reversal of Fortunes Puts Team Back in the Title Hunt

By DAVE SULLY - With the bad taste still in their mouths after the disheartening battery problem produced a poor finish two weeks ago, the stars lined up for the team on Saturday, July 26th, resulting in their regaining the point lead. It took a bad break for Chad Brachmann and a gutty performance by Mat to turn the trick.

After finishing third in the heat, Mat started eleventh in the field, next to Brachmann, and the two were immediately caught up in a battle for positions, as Scott Wood grabbed the lead on lap three and established himself as the one to beat. Mat had moved up a few spots when the caution flew on lap 10 when Tim Jones spun in turn four after contact with Brachmann. Brachmann was sent to the rear for hitting Jones.

When the race restarted, Mat continued to advance, with each spot being surrendered grudgingly by his competitors. By lap 33, Mat had moved past Mike Bowman into third when the caution flew once again, setting up a green/white/checker finish. Wood held on for the win, while Mat kept digging and nipped Chad Chevalier for second at the line. Brachmann, meanwhile wound up finished 15th, which at the end of the day, saw Mat regain the point lead by a single point, with plenty of racing left in the season.

Mat had this to say about the goings on, “I've got a sweet hot rod right now. We worked for it. We got down on ourselves last week and tonight what happened was the perfect situation. It's bad luck for Chad. Whether he got into Jonesie or not, they put him back. I don't know the logistics of it. It was good for us. It just needed to be a deal where he had a bad night and I had a bad night. I had mine two weeks ago, and he had his tonight. We're going to do the last five nights here, I think it is, with some good runs and just hope we're ahead at the end.”

“Like I said at the beginning of the year, the ultimate goal is the point championship, and tonight couldn't have gone any better. It's like a win, coming from eleventh on a track like that, which is really tough to pass on. We've got a good hot rod and it showed. We just have to keep trucking.”

On the last second pass for second, which turned out to be huge, Mat added, “You have to look at it as it's four points. Third is two points, but if you get to second it's four more points, so you look at it like that when you're behind. Now that we're close, you can just go back to racing again. I had to get that distance that we lost. I had to get it down to where we don't have to worry about it any more. Now, we're back in the picture.”

Nothing regarding the championship is assured, as the team is readily aware, but it's a nice feeling to know that they're in the hunt. They'll carry that euphoria to the next race.