#73 Limited Sportsman 2004&2006 Sportsman Division Champions Thompson International Speedway Thompson Connecticut

- 7/1/08

2008 Results & Points 2006 Results & Points 2005 Results & Points 2004 Results & Points Schedules Thompson Press Releases Track Weather Links Team  Leadfoot's Bio Crew Sponsors Simlick Reality      Voice Mail # 1-860-848-5921 Pettit Racing Engines      Shop # 1-860-345-3339 Rayline Racing Bodies The Joie of Seating Becoming a Sponsor (Contact Larry) T-Shirt Sponsors --Quaker Lane Tools of RI --Pauls TV of Groton CT --Sound Medical Associates of Ledyard --Outback Steakhouse (NL, CT) --John Simlick, Coldwell Banker Realty of Ledyard --Liberty Hill Home Inspections of New London --Dr. Robert Barnett, Gales Ferry Chiropractic Photos Photos of Thompson Speedway Photos By Cliff Moon Merchandise T-Shirts Pens Contact barnettracing@comcast.net To Order   Email Us      -Driver: Larry      -Web Master: Jon Comments

7-1-08 Well we fixed the skip in the truck... and gave it a paint job... What do you think? Click to enlarge Click to enlarge Brand new 2007 GMC 2500 HD 4x4.  We mean business. 6-17-08 My faithful…at least up to recently, truck is for sale. 1989 GMC 2500 2wd 8600GVWR  5.7 engine At least $5,000 invested. Installed very recently: Complete engine (built by Mike Pettit), complete exhaust, including shorty headers, cat, muffler, pipes. 4 shocks, EGR valve, distributor, coil, wires, plugs, O2 sensor, temp sensor. Adjustable fuel pressure reg. Fuel filter. Also in last 10K.  had tranny rebuilt, clutch, slave cyl. Alternator. 4 new tires I have lost faith, as I can’t get skip under load to go away, and have trouble pulling trailer up drive way with out 4wd. Best offer….and looking for 4wd drive truck that can get trailer to track safely for a few years. I would welcome help repairing this truck also….out of ideas, time, and energy. Larry June 12th Race Report A solid 4th place finish, but not what we were looking for. The first few races each season can end up having a fast car start on the pole due to a couple of bad finishes prior. Sometimes a car is just plain fast out front, even if they have trouble passing cars. Jay Sundeen was very fast, got the win just prior to his rear end blowing up! My car has also been very fast on it own this season, but I have been having trouble passing a few cars that have mastered a certain line..... Jay's rear end started creating quite a stink by mid race, I had thought it might be coming from my own car. When my car wasn't acting quite normal, I was sure that is was my car stinking of burning grease and oil, and I just plain slowed down. My race....I started in 12th place cruised to 4th position by mid race, but could not find my way past Ernie Larose for third. My car was acting a bit quirky, then when smelling oil burning I got conservative, then just plain backed right out of it. When Jay Sundeen pulled up to the scales, I finally knew it wasn't my car about to break. We will be tougher next week. Win #49, and 4 wins in last 5 long distance races! But really the title could be....Larry doesn't screw up badly, in spite of no confidence in himself... I have never approached a race in such a poor frame of mind. Jonny and Jimmy had done most of the work on the car since the icebreaker. Not having my hands on the car more just felt weird to me. Tuesday I spent the entire day going from doctor to doctor.....What is probably a root canal / crown job gone bad (jaw was all swollen up on Monday).....has me pretty freaked out as they do tests to make sure the infection in my jaw is not a sign of bigger problems. I have not been feeling too peppy for a few months. Then come race day.....My birthday no less... Had to load up new enclosed trailer not certain how well it would tow to the track. Sure enough...truck issues....shaking, skipping, at times down to about 45 MPH on the highway..... then the exhaust blew a hole in itself and it ran a bit better. Maybe the CAT is plugged???? Time will tell. I arrive later than planned. 3 new tires to scuff, knowing the track is a mess from demo derby on Sunday night. I have to pull off after 4 laps since the engine is skipping so badly. I stumble back into the pits as the right rear tire goes flat..... Now I am a complete mental mess... We scramble and replace the brand new distributor with our spare, and put junk tires on. Second warm up goes OK. 2 more brand new tires are bought, and we bolt them on for the heat race. I don't like to race new tires right away. We qualify OK. For the feature we start in 10th. We run down leader Ernie Larose in just a few laps. I can quickly catch up to Ernie, but dog him for about 35 laps not quite able to pass him. On Lap 42 Ernie blows his right front tire and crashes hard into the turn 2 wall. He had been slowing gradually as the laps went by. Not certain if I would have been able to pass him if he had not crashed....I'll call it a definite maybe! I was able to get just a bit of breathing room in the last 8 laps over Scott Sundeen who had come from 24th, possibly using up some of his speed. First win since my dad passed away....feels funny not being able to talk it over with him. He was always there for me. Thank goodness for Jonny, Jimmy, Wayne getting my car in such good shape for me. Mike Pettit and crew seem to have gotten the engine issues from the Icebreaker squared away. And it was sure great to have so many family members and friends there to celebrate with in victory lane! See everyone next week, hopefully with a few less happenings prior to the race. Larry Click to Enlarge That's the face of a happy driver! Update 5/28/08 Tomorrow We Race! We are one day away from finally getting back to the track. The weather report looks good. The car has been looked over carefully. The new enclosed trailer is anxiously awaiting its first trip to Thompson. We are ready to put a couple of streaks to the test. I have always seemed to do well in the big races closest to my birthday and Memorial day weekend (that normally fall together). We also have won three of the last four long distance races, we settled for second place after a 20 lap duel with Glenn Boss in the 4th race. The expert contest players of Jeff-Pearl.com have chosen our team to win with 24 picks vs 15 for the entire rest of the field. I wish it was all this easy! Biggest challenge may be getting back into a racing rythym after so much time and non-racing activities since the Icebreaker. It will be interesting to see how many cars show up for this long distance race. I expect many cars that didn't make it to the Icebreaker. See everyone at the track, lets all hope for a crash free night. Larry Team news and happenings 5-12-08: Happy May to everyone. Things have been busy as normal. As recent photos revealed, we have had quite a bit torn apart on the car since the Icebreaker. Valve train issues that developed during race #1 required some additional TLC from Mike Pettit. Motor will be back in the car this week. A couple of adjustments I had made prior to the car having the body on etc. were not quite perfect. They may have contributed to the car not being quite good enough to pass Jess Gleason, or maybe he just outdrove me??? Guess we will see after the finish results of May22nd race! Jonny and Jimmy have been working hard on the car, my favorite race of the season is on the 29th. I really look forward to those extra lap races! This week should be my last week of night shift work at Millstone for a while. My last day "OFF" was the Saturday of the Icebreaker. I raced from the track on Sunday the 6th to get to work, and have worked every night since. I am ready for some time off. Also this month are some other big items. Michelle has Graduated from UCONN. Niece Sara will be getting married. Jenny will be moving back home following her Junior year at UCONN. Friday the 9th I picked up the Brand New Cargo Express enclosed trailer from Wright Trailers of Seekonk. We look forward to getting it all set up for the season and the benefits it will provide. Saturday the 10 we had our car at Post Road Market in East Lyme. John and crew were celebrating their second year of being in bussiness and we were there to help in the fun. One photo shows that the whole crew was sitting still just relaxing, what a novel thing! That does not ever happen at the track! Click to enlarge Click to enlarge See everyone on the 22nd Larry Crew Update 5/1/08: Work Work and more work.  Still Keeping busy over here, The car will be displayed at Post Road Market in East Lyme on the 10th of May, I will have more info on that posted later today. Icebreaker Race Report. 1st loser....well that is one way to look at it! Congrats to the Gleason clan for putting a pretty darn good car out there. They deserved the win. We settled for second place. Practice started a bit late on Saturday the 5th due to rain overnight. First practice went off without a hitch. During the second practice session we matched our fastest times we ever ran last season. No more practice for us. I headed up to spot for the Brady Tour Mod Team as Bobby Santos would be racing their car for the Icebreaker. In our heat race Jesse started up front in his 81 car, my race would be spent in a great battle with Ed Puleo in the Banta 55. We were side by side for many laps. I gave him one bump to test his new "Lexan rub guard". It held up OK they reported. I inched ahead to take second place. We would take the green Sunday in the third position. It had turned very cold and damp over night. Maybe it changed the track or our car slightly??? The race would go green for 18 laps, we dogged Jesse for nearly all of them. I could pull along side of the 81 car, but never finish the pass. Jesse drove his own race, never chopping down or mirror driving me at all. For that there was no way I was going to give him a fender on opening day sheet metal. When the caution came out on lap 18 things changed again....I guess it is a matter of trust. I have not forgotten last season quite yet, and I stayed conservative the last couple of laps. Todd Ceravolo finished 6th after getting sandwiched and put to the lawn. Lost power steering, but still came from the back to get the solid finish.  Bobby Santos got in a minor accident and parked the Brady 00 car. The rest of the story: Tuesday night of race week, the only body part on the car was the roof (from the old 73 car no less). Nearly all the mechanical items were done though. I was getting a bit nervous about finishing up in time. To add a curve ball to race car preps, I had also just started working the night shift for a re-fueling outage at Millstone Power Station. That meant that I was working during the day alone on the car, and Jonny, Jimmy, and Wayne were working in the evening. Thursday I left work at 3am with a long list that just had to get done on the car including: mock up last fender, weld seams, prep for painting, paint the yellow, (then sleep for a while) and then paint the red areas. Heck we had the car on the trailer at 1:15am on Saturday! Plenty of time to spare! The end result was a car that looked pretty decent, but we did not have anytime to go back and second check everything on the car. I bet we missed some minor things that we could have made better. Several times during the race, we needed just a few more inches to get ahead of the 81 car. Jesse drove a mistake free race. In hind sight, maybe if I pushed just a bit harder I could have made the pass for the win. I think I had a slightly better car, just not quite good enough to make a pass without Jesse making a mistake. we will be even better come May 22nd, and looking forward to the 50 lapper on May 29th. I look forward to the handicapped race starts. Passing lots of cars is way more fun. PS....Looks like the enclosed trailer should come off the assembly line by the end of the month. yee haa! Click to Enlarge Our team has helped show engine builder Mike Pettit's talents by winning Many feature events since 2001.  We were Mike’s first engine built for the Limited Sportsman division!  Go Pettit Racing Engines! Sponsor John Simlick/Coldwell Banker has gained increased business recognition as a direct result of his involvement with our team.  He has sold several houses as a direct result of his sponsoring our team!  We also hope his sore knees are not a result of his many trips dashing down to victory lane with us! Click to Enlarge The following business helped us purchase nearly 300 team shirts in the 2006 calendar year: Quaker Lane Tools of RI Pauls TV of Groton CT Sound Medical Associates of Ledyard Outback Steakhouse (NL, CT) John Simlick, Coldwell Banker Realty of Ledyard Liberty Hill Home Inspections of New London Dr. Robert Barnett, Gales Ferry Chiropractic Thanks to the support from these businesses, we have been able to wear the shirts as race team uniforms, give some away to young fans, use as contest prizes, and sell many to raise some pennies to help maintain our performance on the track. With all these shirts out there…our car, and these businesses names have been dashing all over southern new England! We still have some of the T-shirts, long sleeve T shirts, golf style shirts, and sweatshirts available. Priced from $10 through $20. Any problems viewing the Website E-mail Webmaster

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