~Charlotte Journal~

Hi Y’all! Hey, I guess sometimes you have to take the good with the bad and for me that has definitely been the case with racing at Charlotte. It’s still one of my favorite places to run especially after winning my first ARCA race there. It was awesome to be back in the car especially after what happened at Dover. My body feels completely healed after the accident. This weekend I really thought there was nowhere to go except to the front after finishing 43rd in the spring race but that’s just not the way it worked out. We had a brand new car for this race and it just didn’t feel comfortable to me on the track during first practice, so we spent most of the practice just trying to get the car set up so it would feel comfortable for me to drive. Our first session practice times were pretty disappointing and I knew that afternoon practice would be important for us to get our qualifying setup locked down. With over sixty cars trying to make the race it just puts more pressure on you, as a driver and a team, to get your car working just like it needs to be. With that many cars fighting it out for so few spaces, there’s absolutely no room for error on our part. Afternoon practice was much better. The crew worked really hard on the car all day to get it ready for qualifying. We must have made every change possible to the car to find the right combination to run for qualifying. Every time I would go back out on the track to run more practice laps, it seemed like we were getting closer to finding the right setup. Everyone on the team just kept hammering away all day and by the end of afternoon practice we had an awesome car. For qualifying we were the fourth car to take the track. We had a great run but unfortunately the guys who ran after we did had the benefit of the clouds coming out over the track and that really helped them with their times. There is nothing you can do about what spot you qualify in so we just started focusing on second-round qualifying the next day and what we could do to make sure we had a starting spot in Saturday’s race. On Friday I was really focused. I knew that we would have to move up from the 39th spot to make sure we would be in the starting grid for the race. We made a couple more changes to the car in morning practice and they really seemed to help. We were the next to last car to take the track and this time the clouds were working in our favor. We ended turning an awesome lap that made us the second round fastest qualifier. If we would have run the same time on Thursday it would have put us in the eighth. Honestly, I was jut happy to be in the race. Everyone was real excited about how the car was running because it was the best lap we had run all week so far. We didn’t find out until about 30 minutes after qualifying that NASCAR wouldn’t allow our carburetor and that we were disqualified. It was really tough to hear that we were going home because I thought that we were capable of running up front in the race. If you can imagine being on top of the world at one minute and then all of a sudden just being knocked down, well that’s really how it felt to us this week at Charlotte. I am really sorry that Charlotte didn’t turn out like everyone wanted it to. I was really looking forward to racing there because like I said the car was absolutely awesome and definitely capable of running up front. The only thing for us to do is to pick up and start concentrating on the rest of the season and next year. We are going to test out at Rockingham on Wednesday to get ready for that track because it is the next one we are heading to in the Busch car. I know we have had some bad luck this year, especially this past weekend at Charlotte and at Dover, but I know that this team will turn it around and really be able to build on everything that we have learned. The good thing is that I don’t have to wait until Rockingham to go racing again because we are heading to Texas to run in the Craftsman Truck Series. In our first run in the CTS, we had an awesome finish at Richmond coming in tenth and we definitely hope to better that in Texas. I really love this racetrack and it should be a great track to run the trucks on. We qualified third there in our Busch car this year so hopefully we have a good shot of starting up front there in the truck also. Again, I am going to be running the No. 34 Dodge. The guys from my granddad’s truck shop built me a great truck to run at Richmond and I know that they will put another great truck under me for this weekend’s race. Charlotte definitely wasn’t all bad. A bunch of people from NIKE were there for the whole week and they showed me a lot drawings of the cool things they are working on for me and my team. I can’t wait until next year when all of this stuff is ready. Right now we are making changes and getting approvals from my sponsors so that everything will be ready by Daytona. Y’all are going to be so amazed by the merchandise the designers have been working on. Everyone that has seen it so far is asking when they will be able to get their hands on it. NIKE also took some footage of the team, car, and me to use in their Video News Release. For the interview they did with me I got to wear some new sunglasses that they will customize for my team. If you want to check out them out look at the Charlotte photo album and there is a picture of me wearing them. This is just one of the many things that NIKE has been working on. I just want to say thanks to them for everything they have done for us. I can say confidently that the No. 45 Team along with the other NIKE teams will be looking good in the 2000 season. Once again thanks for all of your support and just know that we are working hard to get to Victory Lane before the season is over. Who knows maybe running the trucks will shake things up enough and get rid of this bad luck we’ve been having. Whatever it will take just know that I appreciate everyone standing behind us. I’ll see you after Texas. God Bless, Adam

Email: lilsqeek14@hotmail.com