April 16th 2005

It was a long week leading up to Saturday night race, with running the Sprint car for the last month, we got behind schedule on getting the Midget ready. Saturday afternoon about 2:00PM we finally fired the car for the first time since it's complete rebuild. Sounds great, no leaks, looks good, loaded it up and headed for the track. At the track we put on the numbers and checked the car over. There were 20 cars entered. Cole was in the trophy dash inside 2nd row, coming out of turn two he was in 2nd behind Mike Welker. The two ran away but Cole couldn't get by Mike and finished 2nd. The heat race finds Cole on the pole. Outside front row is a car owned by Mike Berkhart. Cole knows the car and know's it is fast, but he didn't know it was Jerry Coons Jr. driving it. At the green it's a pretty good start and theyr'e side by side until the back straight, where Coons pulls ahead of Cole and they run away from the rest of the pack. At the finish it's Coons by about 3 car lengths over Cole. Not bad but still hoping for better. In the main event somehow Jerry Coons Jr. and Brad Kuhns and another one of Berkharts cars are all up front. Also in front of Cole is Mike Leslie and Jim Sarna with his new Mopar. Cole starts 6th at the green Coons pulls out and it's single file for 5 laps. They run nose to tail with Cole trying to find a grove on the bottom to pass Sarna. As he's coming into turn 3 Mike Leslie gets it sideways in front of Cole, with no where to go he slid into the side of him and so do the next 3 cars, one rolled upside down on the nose of Cole's car and Leslie's car catches on fire. A scary minute but it is extinguished quickly. We pull the cars apart as the wrecker comes. We look the car over, it's OK. Cole says let's go. So we push it clear of the wrecker and notice the left rear tire going flat. So into the pit for a new tire. Now we get to see the car a little closer. The wats link is bent and the nurf bar is torn up bad. No time to fix it, just the tire and get back on the track. Now were 18th place. He runs for about 4 laps, another caution comes out Cole comes into the pits and parks it sideways, says there are no brakes. We check the fluid, it's real low, so we added some. He says OK, and back out and it's last place. When the green drops so does his motor, running on 3 cylinders. He brings it in, a disappointing 14th place. As the night went on we check the engine and found a plugged injector nozzle. A tough night but we'll be back. May 14 is the next Midget race. We have 2 Sprint car races, one on April 30th at Canyon and then back at Manzy on the 7th of May.