Hello Everyone,
I was very pleased to see that a number of you watched the online qualifying. I was happy to finish 7th in the session, particularly as the time came on our first full lap, before I was up to speed. The rest of the news wasn’t so good.
Even as we left the pit lane to begin qualifying, water was blowing out of the cooling system overflow (a tube points at the windshield so I can see if this is happening). Otherwise all the gauges read normally, so we decided to continue. On the 3rd lap, I suffered the biggest engine failure I have ever had, with so much smoke in the car that I was convinced it was on fire and I activated the fire suppression system at the same time pulling off the race track onto the grass (from about 100mph). I was very happy to have recently purchased a new helmet that has a fresh air inlet that we have connected to a NACA duct on the right rear window, so despite all the smoke, I had no trouble breathing. The in-car video is spectacular!!
2008 Runoffs Wednesday Qualifying – Ends with a bang!
After we got the car back into our paddock, the work of changing engines began. By 9pm last night most of the work was done. The oil pan on the new engine doesn’t fit quite right (the fittings to connect to the dry sump pump interfere with the left side half shaft). We are meeting with the guys from Prather Racing at 8am this morning to take to oil pan to their shop right here in Topeka and modify it so it will work. We will also try to repair the damaged oil pan from the other engine so we have a backup.