photo by RPM 360
EAST MONTPELIER, Vt. – Emily Packard and the Northstar Fireworks/Packard Fuels team were looking to continue the momentum from last week’s race, but the car just did not want to cooperate this weekend. Fighting an ill-handling race car throughout the race, and the lack of rubber on the outside groove, Packard and the team came home in the 15th place position in the New Hampshire Governor’s Cup 150.
Saturday, Packard and the team spent the three American Canadian Tour practices working on trying to loosening up the car to Packard’s liking. “We had a tough day of practice on Saturday,” said Packard, “the car was just unresponsive to anything that we tried to do to it, it was just tight, tight, tight. By the end of practice, we thought we had gotten it better, and we were positive about how it would be on Sunday.”
With two practices on Sunday, the team unloaded the car and readied it for Packard to run. The first practice Packard was 9th on the speed sheet, and was 3rd fastest in final practice. The team was cautiously optimistic as Packard headed out to run the heat race. “During practice on Sunday we thought we had the car better,” said Packard. “We started second and the car ran really well. Brad (Babb) and I had checked out on the field and we thought we would have a competitive car for the race. After the heat we made an adjustment to the car that we thought would free the car up for the race.”
Packard started the race in the 9th position and ran in the top ten through the first 40 laps. As the race wore on, the car started to tighten up, and Packard fell back to 17th position by halfway. On lap 86 after some contact with the 10ma car, Packard found herself back in the 21st position. Things got a little tougher when the cars that Packard was running with brought out the caution, and with nowhere to go, she got caught up in it. Crew chief Neal Woodward called Packard in to make some adjustments to the car to see if they could loosen up the car and again on lap 117 to give her more drive off the turns.
Packard fought her way for the remainder of the race back up to 15th where she would finish the race. “When I went out for the race the gar just tightened up, bulldozer tight, and it didn’t help that the bottom lane was the only one that people wanted,” Packard said. “The outside lane was just green track, it’s been a long winter, and there was no rubber down there so we could race out there. The problem with the inside lane being the only lane for everyone to run, when someone checks up, there is nowhere to go and it is a chain reaction. We will put this behind us and head off to Thunder Road next weekend.”
“Thank you to my mom and dad, my crew, Neal, Sammy Wright, Scott Colburne, Kasey Collins, and my sponsors, Northstar Fireworks, Packard Fuels, Rutland Regional Medical Center, Be The Match, Yipes! of Barre, Fecteau Homes, Berlin Optical Expressions, Creative Visions and GossCars.com. Also, a shout out to Frankie Woodward, we miss him being with us at the track this season.”
Packard and the Northstar Fireworks/Packard Fuels team head to Thunder Road next weekend for the 17th Annual Merchants Bank 150 on May 3rd. The weekend starts with the Thunder Road car show in downtown Barre from 9am to noon on May 2nd followed by the parade of cars up to the track.
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