5/11/2011
Jack Walker
Opening Weekend - Twin State Speedway 2011
Our First official “Race Weekend” of 2011 is in the books. Jack Walker Racing attended final practice at Route 106 on Saturday April 30th. This was Jack’s first time out on the track with some competition. All in all it was a good day. Shook down a new kart, broke in a new motor and ran a few green flag laps. 106 has some new competitors in the Jr Sportsman division so it was good to get to mix it up with them for a bit as well.
Sunday found the team at Twin State Speedway for the first race of the year. This first race will also be counted towards the New England Challenge Series which is a 4 race money event running at the track. Jack took to Twin State really well last year so we had high hopes for him in this first event of the season. There was a total of 14 Jr Sportsmans at the track so they broke up the practices and heats to avoid the “big wreck” before racing even got underway.
Both rounds of practice went really well. The kart handled perfectly and Jack drove with determination lapping almost the entire field multiple times. Because there were so many karts and Twin State hand scores they decided that 14 was too many to have on the track at one time so the Sportsmans were broken up into 2 Heats, an A main and a B main. Jack started on the pole in the second heat and never looked back, taking the win and cruising onto the A main.
Jack started outside pole in the 10 kart A main but ran into the leaders rear tire causing him to drive up over the tire and lose traction. He slipped back to 6th before the first lap was even completed. Jack kept his cool and found his groove picking them off one by one. Driving in the fourth position and gaining on the leaders the caution flag flew.
Jack started in 4th place behind TJ Bleau and easily pushed him to the front to take over second spot with 5 to go. The front 4 were mixing it up for a few laps and caused another caution as the 2nd and 3rd place drivers each spun out.
With 2 laps to go Jack took the green on the outside in 2nd spot. Jack fell in behind TJ Bleau waiting to make a run for first. A last corner effort found Jack 2 ft from the win. JWR would settle for 2nd.
This was our highest finish at Twin State Speedway and an excellent start to the 2011 season. If we have a few more runs like that this could turn out to be a great year for the JWR team. Next week is Route 106’s opening day Saturday May 7th. Follow Jack on Twitter, Facebook and jackwalkerracing.com for race updates all year.
Submitted By: Admin Account