Skyline Weekend, Kind of the Peak Turbo Blue

9-22-24, The Hill Speedway, Written by AJ Hunsinger, Photos by AJ Hunsinger & Michael Benjamin

What a weekend. More high’s and lows but absolutely a truly amazing experience. And the best part of it all, was that I had my youngest daughter, Camber Jane with me to share the experience with. She absolutely loves this stuff and its truly amazing to see. It reminds me so much of myself when I was a little boy and going racing with my father.

There were a lot of uncertainties heading towards the weekend. For the first time, I didn’t have anyone to go with us to help out with Camber while I was on the track or trying to work on the car. It was hard finding someone that could dedicate an entire weekend to myself and Camber as it was a two day show, racing on both Friday night and Saturday night. Michelle had to work and also had her children.

I made a post on Facebook asking if someone would be able to help out as far as “child care” at the racetrack. Someone reliable to help out, someone convenient, someone there at the track willing to help out. Several people reached out to me after seeing my post. JJ Courcy, a fellow IMCA driver who was making an appearance for the first time in a while in the IMCA Modifieds who I have always had a lot of respect for and even looked up to over the years. He said his daughter would love to help out.

Others reached out as well. Tyler Belcher, also a fellow IMCA driver and competitor. It was amazing to see how much people involved in IMCA were willing to help make what would eventually be amazing memories for myself and my daughter.

This woman right here, she is a big part of my life. Her name is Pam. Michelle and I fell in love her her and her husband last racing season when we were in attendance at one of the series races last year. Her husband is the official NY-Penn IMCA Series announcer.

I could write an entire article or story on just Pam and her husband Morgan and how amazing they are and how important they are to me. Last season, we had a 2 day show but at two different tracks. We raced at Clinton County Speedway which is Michelle’s home track where she went every weekend her whole life. The next day was at my favorite track, Penn Can Speedway.

NASCAR driver Kenny Schrader raced with us both nights. Many of us, camped out at the track at Clinton County and then went to Penn Can the following day. In the drivers meeting at Clinton County, Morgan told us all that they would have dinner prepared at their camper and everyone of the IMCA family was welcome to come get some food after the racing concluded. Michelle, myself, Camber, Daytona, and my dad all took them up on their offer and went up to their spot after racing done over.

Michelle and I took to them immediately. Same with my children. We fell in love with them and it was an amazing experience as we talked and talked and talked. They invited us to come back up the next morning for coffee and breakfast. Well, this season at Skyline Raceway was another two day show where we were all camping again. Pam and Morgan had their RV and were the host of not only dinner Friday and Saturday night, but also breakfast Saturday morning.

Camber absolutely adores Pam so Pam ended up being who helped out with Camber throughout this weekend. I would take Camber up when I was ready to hop in the car and go racing but Camber also requested to go see Pam on many occasions over the course of the weekend. Which gave me time to work on the car when I needed to.

On the way to the track, Camber and I stopped off at Walmart for supplies. We bought a small tent, a bunch of water and other drinks, all to prepare for a long exciting weekend of racing and camping.

Remember how last week, Camber drew the number 2 chip? Then then for the redraw, I got the number 2 chip again? Well Friday when we got to the track and got the car unloaded, Camber and I were walking to draw my chip to set the heat race starting positions along with JJ Courcy and his daughter. When it came time to draw my chip, I of course had Camber draw it. Well, she drew the #2 chip again.

In Friday’s drivers meeting, it was announced that Kyle Baker and Nimble Hill Media was sponsoring the heat races. He was putting up money for the top 3 in each heat race. $120 to the winners, $60 for second, and $40 for 3rd. Money is probably more important to me than any other driver considering how little I have compared to everyone else. I needed to make as much money as possible. The money I was spending on racing was supposed to be for bills.

I took Camber up to Pam and got ready for the heat race. I was starting first in heat race #2. My only mission was to place “in the money”, in one of those top 3 spots so I could cash in on some of that sponsor money from Nimble Hill Media. The car was a little tight, but I managed to finish 3rd out of 7. $40 went into my pocket about 10 minutes after I climbed out of the car.

Finishing in the 3rd position also granted me a redraw spot for the feature meaning Camber would have another opportunity to work her magic. This time, she drew the #4 chip, allowing me to start the feature from 4th position. Nice work kiddo!

In the feature, the track was so…not dusty, I guess a little bit. But the amount of dirt, fine powdered dirt, the was being thrown into our faces off of the rear tires of the cars ahead of us, was crazy. You can see here in this picture, the dirt smacking off the front of my car. This was happening to my helmet as well.

It made it very difficult to see. It was like a waterfall full of dirt. A wall of dirt, you could literally see it and then have to drive through it. I don’t have a helmet blower so the dirt and dust got inside my helmet and into my eyes. Visibility wasn’t really a problem because I couldn’t see visually, but because I had so much dirt in my eye balls that I could barely keep my eyes open.

After starting 4th, I worked myself up to 3rd place for awhile. Eventually I slid back to about 5th place or so. After 18 laps, just 7 laps from the finish, I would relinquish a good finish as entering turn one, the driveshaft came out as I bent the pull bar rod AGAIN.

After a strong run, but demoralizing finish, I had to get on top of the issue with the pull bar. Something is clearly not correct. Something is wrong. But I also had a decision to make because my car is now broke and I need parts in order to race the following night. Luckily, the driver of the #99 IMCA Modified Brandon Smith, mentioned in a group chat on messenger that all of us drivers are in, that he was going to make the 3 hour drive in the morning to Close Racing Supply to get some parts and that he would be willing to pick up anything that any of us would need.

The remainder of the night was to be spent setting up our tent and spending time with Pam and a ton of others involved in IMCA as we all ate some great food. Once our bellies were full and our tent was set up, Camber and I got some sleep. Which was really fun for camber with the whole camping at the race track experience.

The next morning, I woke up to my alarms I had set. Brandon said he would be leaving around 6 and CRS opened at 9. So, Camber and I woke up, went up to see Pam and everyone and eat some breakfast, then at 9 I called CRS telling them everything I needed. Which at this morning, my driveshaft was finally beaten beyond repair. So I had to order a complete driveshaft. The guys at CRS, knew we were at the track so they fully assembled the driveshaft for me with new u joints and a new yoke since I didn’t have access to my bench vise like I would have at my garage.

Of course I didn’t want to spend all this money on a new driveshaft just for this driveshaft to fall out from another pull bar failure. After talking it over with others, I felt as if the biscuit style pull bar was too week and causing the pull bar tube to bend. When I let off the throttle on corner entry, the pinion on the rear end would lay over. Like the pinion where the driveshaft connects to the rear end, would try pointed towards the ground. This puts a ton of pressure on the pull bar and with the pull bar being too weak, I think that was what was causing it to bend.

We brought so many spare parts to the track just in case something broke. One of the things I brought was the pull bar I used last year. I didn’t use this one all year because I didn’t have the right length radius rod for it. I was able to get it to the right length just barely to get the right pinion angle though. I swapped it on while waiting for Brandon to get back with my new driveshaft. I also added a pull bar shock as well to help with dampening.

Camber and I made the best of our time while waiting. We played soccer and goofed around. Once the driveshaft got to the track, that was around the time Camber was ready to go have her play date with Pam up on the hill.

So we were able to get the car all back together and situated. After spending all this money on the driveshaft that I did not have, I absolutely needed to take the green flag in the feature so I could get money. It was so important that I was going to skip the heat race Saturday to ensure nothing broke in the heat that prevented me from being able to start the feature.

It was time to draw our chip. Which seemed silly considering that I was going to skip the heat race all together. But, I still had Camber draw anyway. She finally drew a really bad chip, like 48 or something, which made my decision to skip the heat race even easier knowing I would be starting last in whatever heat race I was in.

Shortly after the drivers meeting, the line-ups were posted for the heat races. I was set to start in last in 7th and Rich was starting 6th. This complicated things for me a lot. I bought my car off of Rich. I have a lot of respect for him and I always wanted to run near him to use that as a tool as to how good myself and the 2017 Harris I bought from him stacked up against he and his newer Harris’.

It would have been like me seeing that my dad was in my heat race. I would have immediately wanted to race against him, especially in a smaller field during a heat race as opposed to a full field during the feature where we may never end up running near each other. So, I decided to run the heat race. Also, Kyle Baker was sponsoring the top 3 positions in each heat race again. I had a lot of work to do to finish in the top 3 after starting 7th, but my goal was to finish in the top 3 so I could collect more money.

Green flag came out and Rich and I made quick work getting around one car in turns 1 and 2. Coming off of turn 2, Rich and I were now 5th and 6th. Heading into in turn 3 and 4 still on lap 1, a couple cars got together and brought out a yellow flag. Rich and I got around them and would now be restarting 3rd and 4th.

After the restart, we went into 1 and 2 and I took right off on the high side. I pulled away from Rich and set sail on the series promotor, Jake Maynard for 2nd place. Jake was very tight and I was much faster than him in the corners but he killed me down the straights as he had a ton of forward drive.

I couldn’t tell but there was a car battling next to me and behind me that I assumed was Rich. It turned out to be Tyler Belcher but I thought it was Rich. So, I was driving very hard to catch Jake but also to stay ahead of Rich.

Jake was able to hang onto 2nd, I finished 3rd so I got my $40, Tyler fell back a little bit and then slipped up on the final lap and lost a few spots. Rich finished 5th. The car felt great. Just a little snug but otherwise great. One of the funnest races I have ever done as I was battling hard with Jake.

Camber drew the #7 chip for the feature which was the best possible chip we could have drawn left on the table. So we started 7th. There were so many cautions. We were on the track for a good 30 minutes and only completed 1 lap. Finally we got a few laps together with no cautions.

On lap 7 in turns 1 and 2, there was a big pile-up. Unfortunately, there was nowhere to go as several cars in front of me were sideways. I piled right into two of them, hitting one with my left front tire and the other with my right front tire. Both tires blew, the radiator got destroyed as my front end went under one of the cars, even my air cleaner got bent really bad. The suspension was toast, our weekend was over.

All in all, one of my most favorite racing weekends of my life. So much fun and like I said earlier, having Camber with me through all of it made the experience so awesome. This will unfortunately end our season, so much damage, so much money needed to fix everything before next week at Woodhull. But, we had some strong runs to end the season and I already can’t wait till next season.