Eric, we ran at Thompson.
That had to sting him a little..lol
Oh, if you only knew. Here's a little back story. I've known "Roger" for quite a few years, back when I first starting running at Magnolia. Now, nice guy, but I'll say he is a bit of a bully, or arrogant in a way. He likes to throw his weight around(big built guy). He likes to talk smack and try to rattle you. It doesn't work with me and he knows it. We run on a ladder for eliminations so your opponent is predetermined. A couple races back I had to run Roger second round. He was 4 rounds ahead at that time. I went .001 RED and gave it away. I was not happy. Last race I had to run him second round(ugh, again). This time I whacked him with a .510 light and put him on the trailer. Roger runs a '69 Chevelle that goes 8.30's in the 1/4. He is the quickest car we have in the group. At that point I knew if I won the next round I had a bye to the final. I choked and broke out next round(with a .514 light to boot). So I only gained 1 round on him going into Saturdays race, where my hopes were to be only 1 down or tied.
Second back story: Roger has a son(Troy) that runs a new Camaro in the street class. Troy has a son named Conner who just turned 5 this summer. Now Conner absolutely LOVES my car. He drags mom/dad down to see me at every race and I MUST wave at him coming down the return road(or I hear about it from dad). I always go out of my way to stop and pick him up and talk. Conner wears a dark green shirt(grandpas car is dark green) and it has "Crew Chief" on the back and his name on the front. I've joked about making him a crew chief shirt with my car on it. Well, I finally did. Big picture of my car on the front, name on the pocket,"Official Crew Chief of the coolest drag car in town" on the back. I signed it also. Now I told Troy about this and he thought it would drive his dad NUTS and couldn't wait for me to give it to Conner. Saturday was the PERFECT time to do this with the points chase so tight and Troy knew it would rattle his Dad. Seems he likes to give his Dad grief whenever possible? Like Father like son?
So we get to the track Saturday morning and I wave to Troy and his wife Heather brings Conner down to my trailer for the presentation. Conners eyes lit up and was so happy to get his shirt. He quickly took grandpas shirt off and put on mine!!! LOL!! Perfect(I was worried that Conner might want to wear it that day). They walk back down through the pits and the group of us all watch to see Rogers reaction. Uhhh, it was PRICELESS!!! Roger grabs Conner and comes running back up to my trailer all puffed up!!! LOL!! Now it was all fun(he surely didn't want to yell at Conner for wearing a shirt that was given to him--even if it was me). We all laughed and joked around. Conner spent the day showing that shirt off to everyone. Lots of people kept stopping to tell me about it.
After I beat Roger, Roger and Conner came up on their 4 wheeler. Conner stuck out his hand and congratulated me, though you could see the tears in his eyes because grandpa lost. How priceless.
Roger and I both had two championships, this will be his third.
As for motor? I don't run it hard(as most may) and it is all bracket racing and making stuff last is my number one priority. I should do a leak down just to see if anything is noticeable? With old flat tappet camshaft I don't beat up rockers and springs. I used to unload the valvetrain over winter but quit doing that. I used to pull the heads off every two years and didn't do that. I used to go through the bottom end every 4 years so that is on track. In my 20 years I've never really had any issues with bearings. They always look brand new even after 300+ passes.
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Unfortunately #1 in points made it to the final also. That means he had the championship wrapped up. I did win the final to take home all the marbles, a nice payout and 30 gals of fuel. It was a very tough 5 rounds, and with a little luck I pulled it off. With only a couple classes running it was basically round robin all afternoon. 
