Chaotic Success

This weekend was a three race weekend for the Brachmann Racing Team as they included a trip to the Humberstone Speedway on Sunday night to their schedule for the time being.

Friday nights racing began with a bang when one of the lead cars spun out, leading another to T-bone him and turn sideways. This left Chad with nowhere to go and caught him on the right side of his own car tearing the headers off and the right side body. The team then put their night into hustle mode and hurried back to the race shop to pick up their back up car. 

Just as the back up car arrived back at Ransomville, the feature was lining up, so Chad strapped in and had car running while rolling it out of the trailer. Chad would start the feature 27th and continually made gains throughout the night, bringing his second car home in the top ten and eventually finishing 7th.  

Saturday nights venture to the Thorold bullring would prove to be very tough as a field of great drivers showed that a fast track favours everyone. Chad started his heat in the 5th position and would fight with a tight race car for all eight laps just to qualify. He would eventually finish 2nd, and start the feature in the 12th position. When the green flag flew for the thirty five lap feature event, Chad found himself in four wide battles with Fred Carleton, Scott Wood and Chad Chevalier and while the track was wide, it would seem to be unforgiving at times, and eventually this battle left Chad in the 14th position and Wood 19th in the field. Chad would take full advantage of both lanes on the race track to manoeuvre his Mighty Taco Modified, attempting to make progress in any way he could with a tight car. On lap 15, Mr Small Block Pete Bicknell entered the fray, and he and Chad would battle for a series of laps before eventually getting by on lap 24. The two veterans would hold their positions for the rest of this one, as the finish saw Bicknell 10th, Chad 12th and Wood 13th. Rick Richner would find victory lane with a second to last lap pass of Mike Bowman on the outside for the win. Steve Schumacher a rookie, held on for the best drive of his year so far and a 3rd place finish.  

Sunday night, Chad took his Mighty Taco modified to the Humberstone Speedway in hopes of finding victory lane after a rough and chaotic start to the weekend. He would start from the scratch position in his heat race and would use the wide line around the speedway to make his way to the front one lap at a time. Chad found himself short on time though and would eventually run out of laps just as he caught the leaders and settled for a third place finish, and a qualifying position. After qualifying concluded, He found himself in the 16th starting position for the nights feature on a dry, slick track. When the green flag flew for the nights main event, Chad was engulfed in a big four wide battle down the back stretch, but shot through a seam to be the first to the third turn and out of danger. This was the beginning of a five lap battle with Thorolds’ own Scott Wood that saw the two veterans exchanging playbook moves to jockey ahead of each other. Wood and Chad worked through traffic as they caught mid pack cars while the leaders checked out for the evening. With just a single caution in the nights feature, Chad wheeled his car around the outside and managed a top ten finish despite a half lap differential from the leaders, and would come home 9th.  

This coming weekend the Brachmann Racing Team will agian compete at Ransomville in a regular Friday night event, and will be in action again Monday at the Merrittville Speedway for the 358 Modified Super Dirtcar Series opener. Competition from Quebec, New York State and New Jersey are expected for this 100 lap shootout featuring some of the best racecar pilots in the Northeast . If you want excitement, you need to get dirty.

Photo courtesy of Alex and Helen Bruce Racing Photos