Well the time has arrived. That time is race season. The start of yet another journey on the road. This year we will be driving two transporters to the track. Matt and I both have been so blessed to have sponsors. Over the last two weeks I have been trying to get everything organized for our trip to Gainesville. The Klement transporter got an awesome Coffman Tank Trucks wrap on it. It looks amazing.

After the completion of the wrap it was time for Matt to go to Qatar again. It was the last race of the season. During Matt’s time in Qatar, Robby, Michael and I stayed home and unwrapped his trailer. Boy was that a job and a half. We had blisters on our hands after two days. I am so glad that’s done. Right before Matt left to go to Qatar he hired a new guy fulltime to help us. His name is Justin Beaver. I am sure some of you guys know him. He did an internship on another Pro Stock Bike at one time. He has been a huge asset added to our team. Justin is currently in Indianapolis waiting on Matt’s bike to be done from Olson’s Paint and Body. Brain Olson painted both of our bikes and let me just say “They look awesome!”

In Qatar Matt has been trying to figure out a way to run with the Pro Mod bikes. Matt and Sheikh Khalid talked and they decided to put some NOS on the Buell. Matt's first pass back on the Buell he had to think a little bit about letting the clutch go. What I mean by that is he did everything from flooring the bike to putting his feet on the pegs. The most important thing he forgot and that was to let the clutch go. So he redid it and made a good pass. He had a smoking .480 light. After that he was back in sync with things. His worst light all weekend was a .050. Matt qualified second with a 4.39 at 162. That was with a stock motor. Matt lost in the second round of eliminations after the motor broke the crank. Matt is now home through November. His main focus is for us to win as many races as possible.

With six days left before we leave to go test a lot still has to be done. We are working at the shop sun up to sundown trying to get everything complete. On Sunday, we completed another motor for me. Today we will build another motor for Matt. I think we have two more to build. Robby and Michael are helping out on Sunday and we are very appreciative for that. This week's agenda is very full. We will give our final approval for our crew shirts and approve the layout for our handout cards.

On Monday Matt approved the print proof on the trailer wrap and they will be here on Wednesday to start the installation of the new wrap. By Friday morning they should be complete and we will still be working. Saturday morning our plan is to start loading the transporters up. On Sunday we will be headed south for sunny Florida for a two- to three-day test session. We are hoping it goes well. Next Thursday we will be pulling into Gainesville with a lot of confidence with our two new teams. Just want to say thank you to JD & Terrisa Coffmans, Sheikh Khalid, Karl and Kim Klement, Matt Smith, Robby, Michael, and Justin for helping put all of this together. It’s going to be an outstanding year for MSR!!!
 

If anyone keeps up with Matt and I on Facebook most of you know he has been away for three weeks in Qatar training an Al-Anabi racer how to ride a Pro Stock Motorcycle. Last year Sheikh Khalid Al Thani purchased the orange Pro Stock Motorcycle I rode in NHRA competition in 2008. Mohammed has been doing great on the bike. Matt talked with Sheikh Khalid several times about getting involved in the US with Pro Stock Motorcycle. Matt and Sheikh Khalid have formed a partnership for the 2010 season and we are very excited. Matt’s intention this year was to run a few races and to tune my bike. Sheikh Khalid came to Matt’s rescue. It’s such an awesome feeling for Matt. He is even more excited for the race season to begin now. Matt and I want to say thank you so much to Sheikh Khalid for sponsoring Matt this season. This year is going to be unforgettable. Matt’s focus is for our whole team to do exceptional this year and winning a Championship. We have been working hard on new valve train and headwork for our motor. Matt flew out yesterday to Qatar.

Life has been crazy since the first of the year. I have been ordering everything from racing parts to crew uniforms. We are scheduled to have our transporter wrapped on February 15. My Coffman Tank Trucks/Klement bike will be back from Brian Olson’s paint shop on Friday. I am so excited to see my new bike. Robby East joined our team full time as of January 1st. He has been my crew guy for the last two years with the help of Michael Middleton. Everything is coming together as planned and it’s a blessing. I am so thankful to have everyone involved in my racing operation. I am counting down the days until our test session in Valdosta. After Valdosta we are headed to Gainesville with lots of drive and motivation with our new team. My sponsors JD and Terrisa Coffman and Karl and Kim Klement will be in attendance. We are going to have fun.

Matt and I have been building a house for the last four months. Its finally complete. It’s a relief. Now all of the complicated stuff comes in. Moving. We started moving some of our big furniture on Friday evening. We did the majority of it on Saturday. Matt ordered some new furniture for the theatre room. The furniture company delivered it on Saturday just in time for the Super Bowl. As always we had a Superbowl party. Matt’s mom Nancy helped me out tremendously. She helped me get food ready for the party. Our friends and family came over and we had a very enjoyable night. Needless to say we still have to move all of our little stuff but at least we get to sleep in our new home. Just want to say thank you to Robby, Michael. Rickie, and Nancy for helping us with everything along the way.

On Jan. 30, Rickie Smith was inducted into the North Carolina Drag Racers Hall of Fame. That is a huge accomplishment. Rickie has done more in drag racing then some people will do in their entire lifetime. Rickie Smith is a legend in drag racing and he is still doing it. He will be racing with Troy Coughlin this year and will serve as crew chief for his car in the NHRA Pro Mod category. Congratulations Rickie!!! You deserve it.

Matt and I are so blessed to have the amount of support we have in our racing careers. Its really hard at times because we don’t get to spend the amount of time with our families that we should spend. We want to say thank you to our families for all the support they have given us and will continue to give us through the year.

Since I started racing about 10 years ago I have always dreamed of racing full time. Sometimes you think your dreams are never going to come true and that they will always be dreams. I will tell you one thing that dreams do come true!

Karl and Kim Klement have been friends of ours since they started racing several years ago. They were always very nice and would always come by to check on us to see if we ever needed anything. At the end of 2008 the Klements decided to take a break from racing. During the 2009 season they still kept in close contact with Matt and myself. During August, Matt and Karl had conversations of running his bike at his local track, which is the Texas Motorplex in Ennis, Texas. Little did I know that this was happening. I will never forget this moment. We were on our way home from Charlotte at a restaurant and Karl called Matt. He said, "I want Angie to ride my bike for the Dallas event." I was so excited I couldn’t finish my meal. I didn’t care. I want to tell everyone so bad but I didn’t until we did the press release.

I raced the Dallas event and I think we did well. Prior to the event I had never been on the bike. On Saturday in qualifying we were fighting a couple of issues with the bike. We were not in the show going into Q4. There were a lot of people coming by to see Karl and Kim. Two of those people were JD and Terrisa. They were so nice to all of us. At that moment when we got into the show JD told me he got chills over his body. He knew he wanted to be involved in racing again. Karl and JD talked several times and decided to put this team together. I was the lucky person that gets to ride the bike.

In December Matt and I flew down to Texas and signed my contract with the Klements and Coffmans. I also went over and spent time with JD and Terrisa learning about there business. Matt and I both were intrigued by the business. JD and Terrisa own Coffman Tank Trucks out of Chino, Texas. What they do is haul salt water from the oil wells to another well, which is owned by the company. They have five wells. One of the wells is more than 10,000 feet deep.

On December 10,  my dreams of being a full-time rider came true. JD, Terrisa, Karl and Kim have all made this happen for me. Matt Smith (my husband) will be doing my motor program. He has been working really hard on finding more horsepower. I will be racing full time this year with Coffman Tank Trucks as my sponsor. I am so greatful for this to happen. This is a blessing from God. Thank you to the Coffmans and to the Klements for helping me live my dream!!!

Since our last blog, Matt has left the country. He is in Qatar teaching someone how to race Pro Stock Motorcycle. It’s been really hard. He has been gone for three weeks and I have had to take over a lot of duties. We have done everything from stripping the wrap off the trailer to getting it prepped for another one to cleaning everything inside. On our agenda next is to rearrange everything so we know exactly where everything is located. Our trailer is getting wrapped Jan.25 so I will have pictures up soon. It’s going to be beautiful. Matt is suppose to arrive in the U.S. on Saturday evening so he will write a blog about his trip in Qatar for three weeks next week.

Talk to everyone soon.
 

It’s been really busy since we arrived home from our honeymoon. We are not that far away from the house being complete. Currently they are painting all the rooms and putting the tile in the bathrooms. They are also putting in our granite countertops. This house project has been a huge deal for me because I have been very involved during the whole process. Ang is the one that picked out a lot of the interior colors. There a few things that I like that she didn’t like and vice versa. We did good coming to an agreement. Everyone always tells me if you can build a house together then your marriage will last forever.

Last weekend the weather forecast was calling for a light snow. Then it changed to a moderate snow. Changed again to a heavy snow. I don’t think they knew what it was going to do. It started snowing on Friday. I called Ang and made her come early from work. It snowed from noon on Friday until Saturday morning early. We had six inches by 8 p.m., which is a lot of snow for the N.C. region. We eventually had eight inches of snow. On Saturday we couldn’t get out of the house much because we both have cars. We stayed around home and Michael came to visit us. We got some bad news about 8:30 a.m. Robby called and said his carport had collapsed on all of his personal belongings. He had a Mustang that he raced along with a trailer and a toy hauler under it. It damaged all of it, including the lawn mower and some other things. It was devastating to see it happen to such a good person. We were just happy that no one got hurt. The carport must have collapsed during the night when the snow was heavy at times.

The Smiths had planned on Christmas dinner on Saturday. The snow was so bad that all of the restaurants were closed. So my Grandma Dot decided to have it at her house. I was so glad that the whole family was able to get together. My grandma is one of the best cooks and I love to eat her home cooked food. After dinner all Ang wanted to do was go sledding. That’s all I heard all day Saturday so I promised to go. Amanda, Ang, Rex, Tristan and me went to Michael’s house sledding. His house is on a big hill. Michael and his kids had already been sledding so they made some good trails. They iced over that night so they were pretty fast. Michaels neighbor has an even bigger hill in his yard. So we went over and it was hilarious watching everyone go down. There was another hill half way down that would send the sled in the air about two feet. It hurt when you hit but it was fun. We did that for about three hours. Amanda drove her 4Runner over so she would drive us back to the top of the hill after we went down. That was much better than walking. We had a blast but now I am ready for the snow to melt. It’s a big mess on the roads here.

As for my racing plans they are still up in the air right now. There is a lot of news going to be released in the next two weeks regarding Angie. I can’t say what’s happening but just make sure you check out all the racing Web sites everyday for some new and exciting news with Ang racing in 2010.