I know I need to get better about blogging more often. Things have just been really busy with our back-to-back races along with pounding the pavement to help find a sponsor for our first-place race team.



We went straight from Topeka to Arkansas on Sunday night after the race. My best friend from high school, Chad Campbell, came up Sunday morning with some potential sponsors from Northwest Arkansas. I was bummed that we lost first round and gave up the points lead, but we got to spend some quality time with those folks at the race. We wouldn’t have been able to do that had we been racing so I guess we made the best of going out early.



Chad set-up a Hooter’s meet-and-greet one night for me. I have attached a picture with some of the Hooter’s girls from Fayetteville. The main reason I went home was to meet with some potential sponsors. That went well. The good thing about going back home is I get to spend some times with my parents. The coolest thing I did was work on my brother’s Super Street Camaro. We spent about three hours working on the car. I had to cancel dinner plans that night. We knew his car was prepared and all ready to go for Joliet. It was like the good old days working on our family’s Sportsman cars.



I flew into Chicago Thursday and went to dinner with some of the folks from Fabick CAT and CAT Global Petroleum. I was excited when I saw the forecast for the weekend. There was no chance of rain, which was a change because the other two times we ran the CAT car, Houston and St. Louis, it rained. We knew the weather conditions for Friday were great and Rob Flynn and I talked and thought we could set a personal best. That was important with all the CAT folks being at the race. We ran the 4.464 and our incremental numbers were really strong and right along with Tony Schumacher. It dropped a hole at 4.2-seconds into the run, too.



It really makes you feel good when we’re unsponsored and we’re down a few guys on the crew and we continue to run well. On Sunday, I had a great feeling about the day. I was really confident and felt we had the car to beat. The round I was most nervous about was running Hillary Will in the second round. The Kalitta cars have been running better and she’s a great young racer. The whole race, I saw her car and wasn’t sure who won until I saw the win light pop up. I was excited. I’m a fierce competitor that doesn’t have feelings on the track, and then there’s the personal side that I have. Hillary is one of the few drivers I’m friends with in Top Fuel. I mainly just stay in our camp and don’t socialize much. It’s hard for her to lose that way. It’s happened to me before and to every driver out there. There are a lot of factors in cutting a good light and sometimes it’s more than the driver. We come from the same backgrounds as Sportsman racers. She’s there for the right reasons and I know how hungry she is. She’ll win a race really soon.



We lost in the final round to Larry Dixon. We were too aggressive. We’re just an aggressive team. We race like Alan Johnson and Tony Schumacher race. They go for it and don’t leave anything on the table. We were just too aggressive and it got us. We could have probably run a 4.57 like all day and won the round, but we didn’t. We got our points lead back and all in all it was a great weekend. To qualify second, set a career-best E.T., go to the finals, and get the lead back, it’s all good.



We had a team dinner at Outback on Sunday night. It was fun until Freddy on Whit’s car and PR Ted put a shot of Jack Daniels into my Coke. I’m not much of a drinker. I flew home to Las Vegas on Monday and spent all of Tuesday doing sponsor calls. It was a productive day. Now, I’m off to the gym. Take care and remember those Peanut M&Ms for my cylinder head guy Dick Jackson at E-Town and Norwalk.