The month of July has been a busy one for Butch and the Lambert Racing Team. After back to back FASTRAK Northeast Tour races at Raceway 7 & Expo, the race at McKean County Speedway was rained out on Saturday, July 11th. The team camped for the night at Tri-City Speedway on July 12th, where Butch picked up another heat race win in the crate and had a good run from 9th to finish 5th in the feature. Butch also piloted the Chuck Neely owned #27 Wexford Racing Emod where he finished a solid 6th in the feature.
The Pro-Late Model race at Lernerville Speedway and the FASTRAK Northeast Tour race at Dog Hollow Speedway on Friday, July 17th were also rained out. Tri-City Speedway held its first of two FASTRAK Northeast Tour events on Sunday, July 19th. Butch was able to overcome a bad pill draw to race his way into the feature re-draw with a 3rd place finish in the heat. He re-drew the 8th starting spot for the feature and finished a strong 6th in the 30 lap non-stop event.
The FASTRAK Northeast Tour evet at Dog Hollow was re-scheduled for Friday, July 24th and we decided to make the trip. With not having raced at Dog Hollow in years, and not getting any hot laps, Butch struggled a bit in the heat and got caught in a wreck in the closing laps. He was able to rally to a 5th place finish, which was just good enough to make the starting grid of the feature. He took the green flag in the feature from the 19th starting spot and started working his way to the front. When the dust settled, he had finished 10th. Saturday, July 25th the FASTRAK Northeast Tour made it's first ever visit to Pittsburgh's PA Motor Speedway. Rainy skies and cooler temps made for a lightning fast surface and we were happy with the car after hot laps. Butch started the heat in 5th place, only to be caught in a wreck on lap 2. Unfortunately, he was not able to continue. The crew quickly got to work fixing sheet metal and replacing the front bumper and nose piece. He barely made it out to start on the pole of the B-main when it started raining. That bought us a few extra minutes to get the car back together. Once the rain stopped, the completed the show with Butch finishing in 3rd in the B-main to get the 21st starting spot in the feature. From the drop of the green, he started working his way forward. He was running in 15th position when he got a flat tire on lap 21 of the 25 lap event and had to pull out. He was credited with a 20th place finish. Our bad luck on the weekend spilled over onto Sunday at Tri-City Speedway where we just couldn't seem to hit the set up. He started and finished the heat in 7th place. He started the feature in 13th place and advanced to a 10th place finish. We also had problems with the emod, as he had to pull out of the feature on lap 6 with a broken rocker arm.
This weekend's event is one that we have been looking forward to all year. We will be attending the FASTRAK National "Chassis Challenge" at the famed Eldora Speedway. Last year was our first visit to the Tony Stewart owned track, and Butch qualified an impressive 23rd, only to be caught up in a hard crash on the first lap of the heat event, ending out night.
We will practice on Friday night, then attend an autograph session/car show at the Walmart in Greenville, Ohio on Saturday. We will start the racing off Saturday night with time-trials, heats, b-mains and finish with the 50-lap main event feature. We are expecting there to be 60-70 teams there all vying for a spot in the 24 car starting lineup. We will head home early Sunday morning so we can make it to Tri-City for their regular event.
Send out some good luck vibes for this weekend! We need to get our season turned around!
Until next time...
The Official Blog of Butch Lambert & the #27 Lambert Racing Team.
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