~Phoenix Journal~

Hi Y'all! Well, we just got back from Phoenix. Anytime you have a race out west it makes for a long weekend for the whole team. We didn't have a real good run and ended up 38th but that wasn't to say that we didn't have a good racecar. I had never raced at Phoenix before but I absolutely loved the track. Like I said, we had a good car all weekend. We were 20th in qualifying, making it in on the first day, which always takes a lot of the pressure off because you can start concentrating on the race and how the car should be setup. We went on the track on Friday for practice ready to make some adjustments to figure out the right setup for the car but the car was actually really good. In Happy Hour we were 13th fast but after running about five laps I felt that something was wrong with the motor. We couldn't figure exactly what the problem was but it was pretty flat running down the straight-aways. Chris Hussey and I along with the rest of the team discussed what we should do. The motor was still turning 8100 rpms but I just didn't feel comfortable leaving it in. We made the motor change after Happy Hour. I knew we would have to drop to the back of the field but to me it was worth moving back instead of risking that the motor would give us more problems during the race. At the start of the race, Chris told me just to be patient and that we would move our way to the front of the field by just picking off the cars one by one. It was about lap five when I knew something was wrong with the motor. It was really disappointing because I know how hard we all worked this weekend by changing the first motor so that we would have a good race. These kind of things happen though, its just part of racing. The sparks plug wires came disconnected twice and it put us five laps down before the first twelve laps of the race were even finished. That made for a pretty long day finishing the rest of the race. This weekend we are off to Homestead. It's the last race of the season and hopefully we will have a good run there. I raced there last year. It is a real big and fun track to race people on. This year is the first time for the Winston Cup guys to run there so that will be great to have them there also. I just hope to have a good finish if we can, hopefully try to repeat our Memphis weekend and have a big confidence booster going into Daytona next year. Thanks for your support as always. It's great to read on this web site that so many of you are cheering for me either at the racetrack or at home. I'll talk to y'all soon after I get back from Florida. I promise that there will be a lot to talk about after this weekend. God Bless, Adam