6/14/2020
Eric Blumer
Tapping Out
“And Now They All Hate Me.”
We’ll start at the end of the Legend’s feature for this week’s racing report from Beaver Dam Raceway. Eric led from lap-three to lap-nineteen, of twenty. Coming to the checkers, one of his toughest competitors and one of our good friends on the track and in the pits, Ryan Sullivan, had powered to the inside of Eric. Eric made contact with him in the middle of turns three and four. Eric spun while Ryan crossed the finish line ahead of the rest of the field. There was a huge cheer for Ryan’s apparent win. Meanwhile, Eric faced the oncoming field, got clipped by another car and received a flat tire in the process. He came to the pits ASAP incase there was the chance of a green, white, checkered restart (that’s the short description of the actual race).
Later, after all cars were in the pits and the drivers were unbuckled, Eric and the team learned that Ryan had been relegated to the back of the field. “It was my fault I wrecked,” Eric said as he exited the car. He immediately went to try to make it right with track officials.
There is a track procedure that allows a driver involved in an incident to notify the Competition Director that it was their fault and the other drivers who got penalized should not suffer punishment. In this case it didn’t occur to Eric that Sullivan would get a penalty for the contact Eric was responsible for.
The field idled around for several laps after the incident, while Eric was in the pits. At that point, any information reported over his “Raceceiver,” went unheard. If he got back on the track for a restart, he would have noticed that Sullivan was penalized as they both would have started in the back of the pack.
Justin, Cody and Bill got the new wheel on and just as Eric was ready to leave the work area the cars were coming off the track. There was no chance for Eric to know Ryan had the win taken away at that point.
As noted, Eric plead his case, but the track’s position was the rules are the rules and it was too late to “tap out,” now that he was out of the car. Eric felt horrible for Ryan and his team.
“What did we learn?” a question Crew Chief Justin Hoium often asks. If there’s an incident that causes a yellow and it was your fault, just do the tap out so others get their spots back. And had Eric just done that, in hindsight, Ryan would have been the winner.
Eric and Ryan spoke about the situation. Ryan wasn’t mad at Eric, but mad at how things turned out. On the ride home Eric noted that Ryan told him all the fans were booing when it was announced the win was taken away from him. “Now the fans all hate me,” Eric concluded.
THE REST OF THE RACE DAY
Eric started sixth in his heat and at the drop of the green was in second by turn-two. He went on to win the race over Jordan Miklas.
In the feature, Eric started tenth and was in the lead by the third circuit. He survived two or three cautions and was able to pull ahead each time, usually keeping a five car length lead over Miklas or Brian Peterson depending on the lap.
The last caution came with about five laps to go. Sullivan and Mike Mueller were reeling in Eric and on the white flag lap Ryan got under Eric and edged ahead between turns one and two. Going into three, Sullivan had a slight advantage as they drove to the checkers and the rest is history, as noted above. Unfortunately Jordan we believe was the driver that caught Eric’s front left and it ended his race too. Eric recalls seeing the Hartland, Wisconsin driver coming head-on toward him. Fortunately Jordan maneuvered at the last second so as not to cause a worse wreck.
On a good note the rest of the twenty or so cars managed to miss the 6E and other than a flat tire, dead bumper, busted fender and bent steering arm, we think the car is OK. A photo was immediately sent to our body specialist, Bill Tefft to check on the prospects of repairing the fender that had only three races on it. To paraphrase, Tefft simply declared, “I’m not a miracle worker.” We’ll take that as a, “Hard ‘no.’"
NEXT UP- PROGRAM NOTE FOR BDR RACES THIS SATURDAY JUNE 20
The original Beaver Dam Raceway schedule had the June 20th race as a World of Outlaws show. As most know, due to the virus, things have been changing. WoO came to BDR last weekend. The June 20, event is now an IRA Sprint Car race. Here is the info, as obtained from the BDR Facebook post. THIS IS NOT OFFICIAL FROM US, please check with BDR’s various methods to secure the best information:
Bumper to Bumper IRA Sprints - with support classes of Legends, & Street Stocks (THIS IS A NON POINTS EVENT FOR THE SUPPORT CLASSES)
Pit Gates Open @ 3:30 PM
Front Gates Open @ 4:30 PM
Qualifying @ 6:00 PM
Racing starts at 6:30 PM
General Admission Prices: Adults $25 and Students 6-12 $10
Pit Pass: $25 IRA Member or $35 for Non Members
Contact the Track at (920) 887-1600 for VIP Table Availability - Only $125.00 in advance!!
IN OTHER EBR NEWS
Eric is on the Honor Roll at UW Platteville’s School of Business.
Thanks to Justin Hoium and Mike Hughes for all of their hard work on the 6E this week, between you two and Eric, you guys made a really fast machine! Thanks to Cody Weisensel and Stephanie Blumer for helping out at the race last night!
AS ALWAYS
As always, thanks to our sponsors: Dog Guard of Wisconsin; BRS Radiator, Machine & Fabrication; Northern Air Systems, Inc.; Storage & Handling Systems; Club LaMark; Bullseye Games; Ground Up Lifts; Sieg Law Office; OWL Graphics and Lettering; Grandpa Blumer and Phil Espenes.
We couldn’t do it without the folks who helped put the 6E on the track this season! Justin Hoium, Big Dumb Guy, Greg Leatherbeary, Joe Wipperfurth, Bill Tefft, Brian Benisch, Cody Weisensel, Brady Kruchten and Stephanie Blumer.
Photo credits for the 2nd and 3rd photos to Mech Photography.
Submitted By: William Blumer
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