4/19/2015
Cabot Bigham
First Win, First Sweep
Today was the end of a double race weekend, and a successful one at that! I owe my 2/2 wins to the hard work that my entire team put in on Friday's practice session. We only had a total of three, twenty minute practice sessions to dial our car in before qualifying. The team, Brian, Ron, Berk, and Andrew hustled to get the car into winning condition. After a few quick setup changes the day was over.
SATURDAY was an action packed day. Our car was fourth quickest in morning practice, partly due to a cold track and tyre combination. There was a confident feeling despite our slower pace, and I had no worries heading into qualifying. I qualified P2, just a hundredth of a second off of pole position. I was eager to secure my first career win and when the race came around I was in my zone. When the green flag flew I had secured first going into the high speed turn 1. I saw the lights bouncing on my MoTec data system and knew that taking it full throttle was the only way to go. Several laps later I had secured a 15 second lead on the pack. A mid-race double yellow ruined my lead on the field, but my team kept me focused and calm on the radio. Fellow racer, Hunter Pickett, was in the #6 car and was hot on my tail at the restart. Despite the added pressure I was able to stretch a three second lead and secure my first victory!
SUNDAY was a very good day for Keck Racing. The night before I could only think about what it would feel like to "sweep" the weekend. Our car was very fast in morning warmup, which put smiles on everybody's face, even the engineer! We did a single pit stop in our 20 minute qualifying session. I pulled into the pits about halfway through the session. After a few minutes with my race engineer hovering over the 200 degree car we knew what needed to be done. On my out lap I secured the pole by over four tenths of a second. Instead of setting a faster lap I kept my tyres fresh for the race. The next three hours were a blur, until I got into my car. I took the lead again on the start into turn one, but I did not think about the quality of my tyres and the severe tail wind into turn 1. I took it full throttle and drove right off the exit curbing, a quick split-second reflex saved the rear end from coming around and I kept it full throttle until reaching the track surface. To my surprise, I kept the lead. Shoutout to Hunter Pickett and Jayden Conwright for anticipating a spin and keeping order on track, while I ran a Baja 500 stint. I extended my lead to over twenty seconds and swept the weekend. What a feeling it was/is/and will be. I cannot thank my team enough for their efforts and am looking forward to Laguna in a month! #Motivated #ToTheTop
Submitted By: Cabot Bigham
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