News Feed
May 26, 2010
BY DAVE GRAYSON
When the Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series, presented by Rockstar Energy Drink, journeyed to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway May 22nd for their third race of the 2010 season a lot of the teams were looking for some of that famous Vegas good luck. When the series' 75 lap feature was over, Chris Gerchman was the recipient of that often elusive Las Vegas luck. The Rockstar 75 was Gerchman's second, consecutive, series win and came to him under some extraordinary circumstances normally not associated with a Lucas Oil/Rockstar Modified Series race: fuel mileage.
Gerchman truly thought he was going to finish second in the Rockstar 75. In the final laps of the event he was doing everything he could to chase down race leader Andrew Phipps the reigning series champion. Phipps is running a part time schedule this year and arrived in Las Vegas completely confident that he would be the one to party like a Rockstar in the Las Vegas Bullring's victory lane last Saturday night.
The Simi Valley-California driver appeared to be strong enough in this race to back up his word. On lap 13 Phipps staged a beautiful low line pass, coming off of turn four, to take the lead away from Gerchman. From that point Phipps was simply formidable and completely in control of the race. The only time his race rhythm was disturbed was due to the presence of the six caution flags in the race.
It was later speculated that these caution flags may have been part of the surprising fuel mileage situation that altered the outcome of the Rockstar 75. There has been a long time standing policy that says the racing series does not count yellow caution flag laps in order to present its fans a full 75 laps of green flag racing. The extra caution laps, that came with those six yellow flags, may have been the catalyst that caused a reported four gas tanks to go completely dry during the waning laps of the race.
With nine laps left in the race, Chris Gerchman was still doing everything he could to retake the lead from Phipps. At the same time Gerchman was having to fend off a hard charging Jim Mardis who was running in third. One lap later Gerchman pulled low on the inside of turn two and set up a pass on Phipps. One more circuit Phipps shockingly coasted his way onto pit road completely out of gas. Any intent Mardis had towards taking the race during the final laps ended when his empty tank left him sitting motionless on the race track.
The new, and final, race line up at the conclusion of the Rockstar 75 was Gerchman, Shelby Strobel, Doug Hamm and Tom Lovelady while Austin Barnes was credited for completing the top five.
After the race there was a lot of pit road buzz regarding race winner Gerchman's extraordinary Las Vegas luck. That streak began Saturday afternoon following qualifying Shelby Strobel won the Budweiser Pole Award after blistering the Las Vegas Bullring's three eighths of a mile oval with a lap of 15.425 seconds. The pre race inversion ceremony turned up the number six and Gerchman was the sixth driver on the qualifying speed chart. That inversion moved him to the front row of the starting field. Gerchman also won the Dart Machinery Trophy Dash and the $200 check that comes with it.Then there was, of course, the surprise fuel issue that put Gerchman in the Sunoco Race Fuels Victory Lane.
But it's been often said in racing that for a driver to take advantage of a seemingly silver platter situation he has to put himself in position. In all fairness, Gerchman did exactly that. After Phipps took command of the Rockstar 75, Gerchman never once laid down and never reverted to a wait and see what happens position. He was charging hard to keep pace with Phipps and, for several laps, was actually turning laps in race traffic faster than Strobel's pole chart topping qualifying time.
Winning the Rockstar 75 was also a major boon to Gerchman's presence in the series' championship points rankings. His 2010 racing season got off to a horrible start. At the March 27th season opener, at the Lucas Oil I 10 Speedway, Gerchman hit the wall hard and left the track that night with only 14 championship points and a badly damaged race car. Round two of the series' schedule, April 17th at the Havasu 95 Speedway Gerchman's home track, saw the Lake Havasu City-Arizona native return to the Sunoco Race Fuels Victory Lane. The win moved him from 19th to sixth in the standings. Saturday night's second win of the season will move him even further up the points rankings and will place him back into the title hunt.
After the Rockstar 75 was over Saturday night a very happy Gerchman said "I never really expected this tonight. We're coming out here to collect wins, that's the only way we're going to gain our points back and that's kind of nice. We threw things at the car today that, if I were leading the points, I would not have even thought about doing. I would have tried to keep my points and kept things conservative."
When asked if he was aware of how fast his car was going, while trying to chase down Phipps, Gerchman said "I figured I was turning some faster lap times in the middle of the race. I could catch him going into the turns but I think at times he was just motoring me out and he just had too much motor for me obviously. I'd catch him coming in through the center of the turns but he just killed me on the stretches. I tried sneaking the nose of my car in there a couple of times but it didn't work."
When asked about his two toughest competitors, Phipps and Mardis, running out of fuel at the end of the race, Gerchman said "I'm not worrying about it. I'm just going for the wins."
Shelby Strobel was also all smiles at the end of the Rockstar 75. From Meridian-Idaho, Strolbel and his team heads south to participate in the series' Las Vegas events. With the recent purchase of a new modified racer, Stroebel and company are formidable at every track they race on.
Commenting on his Las Vegas evening, Strobel said "we started out fast qualifier tonight and I then I rolled the six inversion spot. Then, on the start, we went backwards on the outside groove to about ninth and then we started picking people off. Overall it was a good run and a good night for us."
In the waning laps of the race, Strobel was in fourth watching Phipps, Gerchman and Mardis go after each other. When asked to if he was waiting to see if the trio of drivers were going to run into each other at the end he said "no, they all kind of drive aggressive and move each other out of the way. I really didn't think about Phipps running out of fuel. That was a blessing and helped a bunch. I passed Mardis on that last ten lap adventure that we took, He drove me real fair, real hard, and it was a lot of fun."
Las Vegas home town favorite Doug "Hound Dog" Hamm was happy with his third place finish in the Rockstar 75. After the race he said "I'm a Vegas boy and I got lucky tonight. We tried a few things on the car that was different from what we usually do. We're trying different things trying to catch some of these guys. We got lucky tonight. I feel bad for some of the boys running up front who broke or ran out of fuel."
Regarding the fact that fuel mileage played such a huge role in the final outcome Hamm said he really wasn't that surprised and added "we ran a total of 131 laps the last time we were here. I think tonight that the boys up front were really running hard and they weren't leaving nothing on the table. It was a battle all the way to the end."
As he always does, series co-promoter Greg Scheidecker was carefully scrutinizing every moment of the Rockstar 75. After the race he made some observations regarding the outcome of the race being about fuel mileage and said "at any race track that we go to there's different configurations. For example, our next race is at Tuscon Raceway Park is a larger and more challenging track than what we had here tonight. What's happening is some of our teams are running their cars on methanol and what they want to do to get a balance on their car is run either a 14 or 16 gallon fuel tank. We've been racing in this series for four years now and, regarding the issue of fuel mileage, everybody knows the game. They can run gasoline, they can run Sunoco Racing Fuel and they don't run into gas mileage situations. The use of methanol can sometimes create a different situation."
Commenting on the speculation that the total number of caution laps, added to the 75 green flag laps, played a major role in the outcome, Scheidecker said " We can't control the amount of yellow flags during one of our races. I think the yellow flags during our race tonight were kept very much to a minimum and very much at a hurry up pace. So, regarding the teams who ran methanol tonight they know the rules, it's been this way for four years and nothing has changed."
Scheidecker was impressed with Gerchman's second consecutive win and his quick rise in the points standings in light of his rough start in the season's opening race. "I think everybody in auto racing knows that you sometimes have those bad nights. For example, this weekend we had quite a few blown motors and a some cars were torn up in practice. These things are really devastating to race teams. For him to be able to rebound from that wreck that he started the season with is just fantastic," he said.
The Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series, presented by Rockstar Energy Drink, returns to action on June 12th when the teams will hit the freeway to Tuscon-Arizona for a 75 lap main at the always challenging Tuscon Raceway Park. The ante will be raised for this event. This race will feature a $10,000 purse, a $1,400 winner's check and each team is guaranteed at least $300 for staring the main event.
In addition to its title sponsors, the series is supported by a highly potent marketing concept known as "Team Lucas." Team members include Lucas Oil Products Inc, Magnaflow Exhaust Systems, E3 Spark Plugs, General Tire, K&N Performance Filters, GEICO Powersports, CANIDAE All Natural Pet Food, MAV-TV, Dart Machinery and Rockstar Energy Drink.
The series is also enhanced by the presence of a group of official series sponsors that includes: Eibach Springs, Hoosier Tire West, Budweiser, Blue Water Resort & Casino, Sunoco Race Fuels, Frank's Radio, Racing Plus and MAC Tools.
