May 3rd Kentucky Auto-X

Getting up early IS overrated! Today was nuts... Pombo and I were talking about racing until odd hours into the night, and had an early wake up call from Derek and crew that were waiting in the lobby at 6:40am, -- we were supposed to wake up at 7:45-- that is an hour of sleep for goodness sakes! It was bad enough that we got to the hotel at 12:30am after a grueling 400 mile journey from Autobahn in Juliet, IL. Pombo is a super cool fellow driver and now a genuine friend. His passion for racing is deep, and he devotes his whole life and makes many sacrifices to do what he loves. We all do, but in his case he, his brother and dad have made a great respected name for the "Pombo's" in the racing community. Just google his name to find out a bit more about him and all the cool stuff that has been on Speed lately.

We get to the Auto-x this morning and the track was soaked, it had been raining all morning. Rain or shine the Auto-X must go on. (For those who are not familiar, an Auto-x/Auto-cross is a course set up with cones often times in a large parking lot) My co-driver Andrew Carbonell ran it as I was sooo tired and wasn't up to doing the event. While Carbonell was walking the track I sat in the M5 and got some rest. The Auto-X is the best of 3 runs. Carbonell has only Auto-crossed twice before, although I had faith in his driving abilty, my buddy Ian -the pro Auto-Xer himself- was very doubtful of Carbonell's Auto-crossing skills. The first run was in the wet, the second was still a bit damp and Carbonell picked up a pretty good time with a 45.5 sec lap. That was good for 2nd class or so, but then the 3rd run was in the dry and the two E90 M3's picked up another second and we shaved off .5 for a 45 flat. Results are not up yet, but I think we got 3rd in class.

Next up was the mini-oval. It's been raining like crazy all day so the event at Highland Rim Speedway (TN) was cancelled. I am beat, time for some Zzzzz's. Til' tomorrow..... where we will be at little Talladega, Alabama!