Thoughts from Knoxville…
I had so much fun this weekend watching Chase and CJ race!
Chase found the tree with his first test pass with a -.051 and then drilled it the rest of the weekend with:
.028
.073
.037
His last pass was against Rodney Hargis in the third round of the Knoxville race Friday night. He cut a better light than Rodney and beat him to the finish, breaking out by .085 running 8.995 on a 9.08 dial in.
I set CJ up for failure on his very first pass in the Duster. He had only made 2-3 passes in Angie’s CRV the Wednesday before at Ohio Valley.
Since we had already run one race, we didn’t get a time trial for the make-up Motor Mile race.
Me: “Okay CJ, remember what we talked about. Good luck & Go Git ‘Em!”
CJ: “Umm,… Okay Dad. I’ll do my best…”
It wasn’t the greatest pass, but he made it down the track okay. That got the jitters out of the way so he could focus on day two of racing.
Day two was better with two time trials. Each burnout and launch got better as he figured out the brakes. His first elimination run was against Brett Padgett in The White Rat.
We had dialed a 9.30, unsure if CJ would get the launch dialed in and if the heat would slow the Duster. Brett dialed a 9.21.
Well, he nailed the launch and the heat didn’t effect the Duster. He broke out with a 9.00! I’ve never seen someone so happy to lose a race before!
Me: “Remember to go congratulate Brett on the win.”
CJ: “I need to let my voice recover first. I was screaming the whole way down the track and back to the pits!”
Chase: “Yeah. Well,… I ran 8.99 last night. Just sayin’…”
That set the scene for the “Battle of the Kias” a little while later…
Gary and Courtney Bruner had talked the track owner, Tommy, into letting us run some more test passes during the diesel truck race. We had already loaded up the Duster, so Courtney and Barbara tossed the keys to their 2016 and 2019 Kia Sorrentos to Chase and CJ and said, “Have fun!”
They battled back and forth with plenty of trash talk in between and even switched vehicles so one couldn’t say to the other that the car was faster… LOL
CJ: “If you beat me on this next pass I’ll eat my sock I’ve been wearing all day.”
Chase: “I’ll hold you to that.”
Luckily, CJ won the next pass and I didn’t have to moderate that one! 
Speaking of trash talk…
The little heads up grudge match between me and Isaiah Bruner ended up with me drilling him on the tree with my best reaction time of the year with a .005 to his -.054 red light. 
The Duster was running .20 faster than the Funny Truck, so a heads up race wouldn’t be fair…
I told Isaiah that our Coke bet could be decided if he and Chase got paired up during the race…
That happened in Round 2 with Chase winning. He cut a .073 light to Isaiah’s -.050 red light and ran 9.090 on a 9.04 dial to Isaiah’s 9.224 breakout on a 9.23 dial.
Isaiah paid up like a gentleman and went on the next day to put Rodney Hargis on the trailer!
We had 5 Rookies making passes this weekend!
Brad and Brett Padgett in The White Rat
Isaiah Bruner in The Funny Truck
Mistie Bruner in another Slanted Dakota
CJ Simmons in GodsRods Duster II
I’m figuring up all the points now. Jack Jr. and Jack III have taken over the points lead!
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