Six features in four nights on July 4th weekend!
It was a busy weekend for the Bernhagen gang! Not many teams go racing for four straight nights any more. Here is a recap of each race:
Friday: Drew #27 Big 8 Race – Drew made his Big 8 series debut at Tomah, struggled in qualifying and started in the rear, but did a great job staying out of trouble and found himself restarting 3rd with 4 laps to go. Contact was made exiting turn four with two to go that resulted in our rear bumper being jammed underneath the gas tank! Drew hung on and stole a fifth place finish from some touch competition!
Friday: Brayden #11 Sixer – Brayden made his second start of the year in his six cylinder car, qualified 8th of the 12 car field, and started the feature 3rd. He was running 5th when the brakes seized up, but hung on for an 8th place finish. Came a long way from is first start at Tomah!
Saturday: Drew #11 Sixer – Brayden couldn’t make it to the Dells on Saturday so Drew drove the sixer for some fun, he qualified 11th of 17 cars, but had shown more speed than that throughout the day. He ended up being stuck in traffic during the feature and came home with a 9th place finish. Drew said he had a blast!
Saturday: Jesse #32 TUNDRA Super Late Models – Jesse and the ME Motorsports team went to test some electrical problems that were faced at last weekends Trickle 99, after having a good deal of speed in practice the car did not pick up speed in qualifying, and ended up 15th of the 18 car field. Missed set up adjustments for the feature, and made some sparks fly (see pictures) but survived for a 9th place finish!
Sunday: Jesse #28 Slinger Bounty Race – With the added bounty money placed on Bernhagen after winning five straight features, the team knew they were in for a tough night, many new cars came to see if they could claim the top prize of a $1,000 to beat Jesse. After a frustrating qualifying effort we managed to win our heat race, then started 9th and drove a tight car to a 4th place finish. The team made a simple air pressure mistake that cost them a better handling car, but Jesse said after the race he didn’t know if he could have pulled off another win either way. Congrats to the Gutknecht team on the feature win, you deserve it!
Monday: Jesse #27 Rockford Star Spangled 76′ – The last time Jesse was at Rockford it was covered in dirt in 2016, the last time he raced at Rockford with the 27 car was 2012! So when the team put the set up in the car they were pretty much just guessing. It turned out pretty good, as they qualified 8th of the 16 car field, started the feature 6th and got drug back on the start of the race to around 12th. Took a while to settle in and get the ‘Rockford’ feel back, but once the car and driver came around we were able to drive back up to a 6th place finish, and Jesse was putting up a strong fight for the 4/5th spot in the closing laps, unfortunately lost brakes with 5 laps to go. Still a special night, was so fun to be back at that awesome race track.
Thank you to all of our crew members, Andy, Ken, Evan, Cam, Jeff, and Becca officially became a part of ‘the crew’ on Monday night, as she got to be a part of the set up changes at the halfway break!