This racing season started without me due to a torn miniscus in my knee, requiring surgery. I couldn't climb into and out of my car. Surgery was done on April 24, I tried to race May 5th, but that was a bad desision, as I was struggling just to get in the car (I had a LOT of help from some good friends!).
Fast foreward to this past weekend, the 7th and 8th races of the series (total of 18 points races in the series) Now I am 4 1/2 weeks out of surgery and can climb in and out of my car unassisted. Fri night test and tune I made 8 quarter mile passes in a 4 hour session, with good results. Car was running good and reaction times were .065, .055, .045, .056, .040, and .053. Then I deep staged the car and was .016 and .005.
Saturday morning, raceday and I feel good! I ran Pro (1/8 mile) and Sportsman (1/4 mile), both true footbrake classes. During Pro eliminations, my reaction times were .036, .042, .043, .035, then my opponant went red and I took a shot at the tree and came up .003. At this point, there were 6 cars left and we were placed on a sportsman ladder, based on reaction time from the previous round. I am in qualified position #1. (a good place to be because if I win this round, I get the bye into the finals!)
The plan is working just like I drew it up! I'm paired with #4 guy, and its almost heads up (me 6.90, him 6.88), I go .006 / 6.904, to his .000 / 6.885. You know its a rough night when a .010 package is no good.
In sportsman, my reaction times go from .031 to .044 with a -.005 red light first round. I bought back in and got to 4 cars and lost to the points leader by .0042 at the stripe.
Four of my last 6 rounds on saturday the finnish line margin was .0013, .0035, .0042 and .0054. The other two, my opponant went red!
Sunday wasn't quite as good, (lost rd 4 in Pro, rd 2 in Spt) but all in all, a good welcome back weekend!
In 3 days I made 29 passes (17 of them 1/4 mile) with a WORSE reaction time in eliminations of .043 and a couple of red lights just for good measure.
Sorry this turned out so long, but I'm excited to be back!!!

Brian Dunnigan

nice job, looks like you got the knee all tuned up, good to see you are back

Cool Brian you go get them!

Sounds like a good weekend. Glad to see you back in the saddle. Hope you catch back up to the points leaders. I agree, .010 package and not turning on the win light is tough.

Thanks for the kind words guys! I went back and looked at the 1320go live timing results from this weekend and including ALL elimination rounds (dash for cash, mid season shoot outs and regular races) saturday and sunday, both classes, there were only 4 passes that the total package was .010 seconds or less. I owned two of them. Unforunately, mine were #3 & #4. Oh well, shake it off and try it again next week.
I also won dash for cash saturday AND sunday in Sportsman, Sunday with a .009 package.
Good news, my knee didn't hurt. Everything else hurt, but my knee was fine!

Brian Dunnigan