Nephew Nate prepares for Rookie graduation at the Little T

Next Sunday, May 6th, LB's nephew Nathan Smith (son of crew member Ron Smith) will graduate in the rookie class of .25 midget drivers at the ripe old age of 5.  This past Sunday, we went to cheer him on in a mock race at the Little T.  He is driving the black and red #4. 

Nate placed 5th in his heat race, and then came out in his "mock" feature race and finished third!  Congrats to Nate, Ron, Melissa & Rob! 

LB has entered a formal request with Nate's parents to change the color scheme of Nate's .25 midget to match LB's classic yellow and red scheme, so they can be team cars.  Surprising, I know... 

Good luck to Nate for his rookie season!  Nate might only be 5, but he does have his own webpage - check it out Nathan Smith Racing

Monadnock Videos Posted on barnett73.com

Jonny uploaded the two videos the team took at Monadnock.  The first is the in-car video of the consi race. 

This second video is the view of the consi race from the Monadnock pit stands. 

Also, the MyLaps page was updated and you can check out the Monadnock Lap Times for all cars here.  LB got consistently faster as the night went on and as the crew made adjustments to the car.  He was surprised to see that he eventually got under thirteen seconds when I showed him the results. 

                                                LB's fast times in each segment

Practice 1                13.678

Practice 2                13.510

Practice 3                13.148

Heat Race                13.190

Consi                       12.934 

It's also interesting to note that at least at Monadnock (and other short tracks), the fastest cars don't always win the race.  Consi winner Dwight Jarvis posted a fast time of 12.864, but the fastest guy in that race was Todd Annarummo with 12.751, who finished 3rd.   

The same can be said for the feature race, where Jon McKennedy posted fast time of 12.812, but fastest time was Jim Boniface, with 12.724, who went on to finish 5th in the race. 

The guys who finished between 8th and 12th mostly posted times in the 12.934 range, so this is a pretty good sign that once LB gets more comfortable driving, he's already got the "speed" part covered.   

Monadnock - Race 2

LB had been considering what he could do in honor of Earth Day (April 22nd) all week. Yesterday afternoon, it finally came to him:  he could SAVE:

a) approximately 15 gallons of Sunoco race fuel,
b) about 18 Hoosier rubber trees, and
c) energy in his arms so he could go out and plant a tree or two,
if he simply didn't make it into the 100 lap race!  And so, race 2 is complete and LB's name doesn't have any points next to it.  And you thought he was just a jackass oblivious to the fate of Mother Earth...

The positives:  the car rolled off the trailer in one piece, and did its part in saving the earth. Special thanks to Stan Chmura for building the new ramp system.   

All joking aside, a couple thoughts on Monadnock...

from the female perspective (lol)...
I can say I'm still not disappointed LB didn't make it into a 100-lapper, yet.  It's not easy to watch someone you know and love hop into one of these cars.  I'm sure it gets easier with time, but to start out, man is IT scary.  My dad -Yer Dad- (LB's father-in-law) was sitting beside me at the start of the consi.  As the cars entered turn three, ready to take the green for the start of the race, he spoke three words with conviction which summed up my thoughts, exactly.  "OH...MY...GOD", he said.  It's funny thinking about it, now, but truly-he nailed it.  'What is our LB doing out there?  I don't want to see this!  Is he nuts?'  We'll get over it, I'm sure, with time.  At least, I hope we do!

from LB's perspective...
Practice...
During the practice session, he was upset at how bad the car was handling.  Monadnock is a straaaannnge track to begin with (turn 1 and 2 are completely different than turns 3 and 4) and it has a very rough surface.  Everyone told him it would take a few times out in practice to begin to figure out how to drive the car to respond to the track.  First time out in practice, the car was so tight it was hard to even drive it.  With a half hour of practice to correct it - the crew did indeed do just that.  However, it cut down on the time LB could use to actually learn the track and figure out how drive it. 

On to the heat race...
LB started 5th and during the race incurred the first penalty of his rookie career.  Now, that's progress!  The 04 of Joey Jarvis went around the outside of the 73 and then dove in front of him going into turn three, braking hard while entering the corner.  LB quickly realized that his brakes aren't as good as Jarvis', because he couldn't slow the 73 down fast enough.  LB bumped him, causing them both to spin.  To the rear went the 73, and so too went his hopes for qualifying in the heat.  Such a delinquent!

Cousin Mike Holdridge, behind the wheel of the 0 car, would not be outdone.  He ALSO exhibited delinquent tendencies. "Anything Larry can do, I can do better.  I'm actually fast enough to run into a champion!"   (Mike didn't really say that out loud, but we like imagining that he did...ahahahahahaha.)

Keeping it "All in the Family", Mike spun out the 28 of Dwight Jarvis (father of Joey Jarvis) and also got sent to the rear for his role in the incident.  They tell me they are not trying to start the Jarvis vs. Holdridge Family Feud, they both just made honest mistakes.  I am glad to hear that, because Dwight is one of my all-time favorite drivers and personalities in the vMRS series.  

And now for the consi...
When drivers with names like Jarvis, Mechalides, Annarumo and Holdridge are four of the six guys starting in front of you in the consi...and you're a rookie starting seventh...and you need to finish in the top four to make it to the feature....and you're thinking that amongst the four of those guys they probably have more than a hundred wins....and the guy beside you is Bateman, who is probably thinking "Dude get out of my way or I'm taking my engine back..."  Uh....uh......uh..... what do you do?  What do you do? 

You give it your best shot, that's what you do.  And sometimes your best ain't good enough. But at the end of the day, I think LB can say that he had fun and he gave it his best shot.  Sights are now set on Thompson, where LB thinks he'll have a better chance at qualifying.  "The track is so big there I'm thinking they won't have to send anyone home.  Maybe I'll finally get a chance to race!"

Later this week...
In-cockpit video from the consi race...and some stats on time/speed, etc. 

Waterford Practice

LB and the crew took the car to Waterford Speedbowl to get a few more laps in the car before this weekend's Monadnock Speedway Race.  Don't watch this video on a full stomach. 

Waterford Practice 4/19/12 Video

LB's brother David Barnett competes in 18th consecutive Boston Marathon

Larry's older brother David Barnett completed the Boston Marathon yesterday in 3 hours 19 minutes and 36 seconds! 

David has been running and raising money for 18 consecutive years now for the Barr Program in Innovative Cancer Research of the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.  The cause is near and dear to David and the rest of the Barnett's, as their brother Jack and father Phil have battled with the disease.

David has been an inspiration to the whole family, having raised over $203,000 for the cause with his son Jake and daughter Marie, who have also ran alongside him over the years. 

Inspired?  Want to donate to the cause?  Visit www.RunDFMC.org/2012/davidb, Dave's fundraising page. 

 
The smile does indeed say it all. Congrats to David on this spectacular achievement.  Thank you to Eileen Barnett for these fabulous photos and Happy Birthday!

Chrome Horn Link

Mary Hodge's Photo of the 73 on the track at Waterford

Howie and Mary Hodge are two of the best racing photographers this side of the Mississippi.  Plus, they are super-nice and always fun to talk to.  Mary captured this image of LB at Waterford during a practice sesssion.  If you haven't seen the 73 on the track, yet, check it out. 

Cousin Mike finishes 4th

Uncle Dale warms up the Bob Bruneau powerplant

Not qualifying for the race on Sunday was tough for LB to accept, but knowing Uncle Dale and Cousin Mike and the rest of the 0 team were able to finish so well made it all worthwhile.  They started 9th in the field on Sunday afternoon and worked through some serious engine skipping/popping issues to finish a solid 4th.

Starting around lap 20, the popping noises were apparent to anyone in the stands, and Mike came over the radio ready to call it a day.  His father Dale told him he was running great and to just keep going - he was confident it wasn't going to hurt the motor.  It was touch and go for a few restarts where Mike started right behind the leaders.  He was afraid the motor wouldn't come up to speed and that he would end up in the wall in a crumpled mess.  Thankfully, that never happened.   

Turns out that one of the spark plugs was broken external to the engine, so Mike got the awesome finish despite finishing on only 7.3 cylinders. 

Check out everyone's qualifying/finish times on MyLaps - Speedbowl Opener Results

Recap of Race 1 - Waterford Speedbowl

You would think that these two cousins are talking about racing...I overheard the conversation, however.  LB: "Mike, you look great - I can't believe you've lost 73 pounds."  Mike:  "Thanks, LB.  You don't look quite as good after losing 0."  ahahahaha

The short story is that LB didn't qualify for the 100-lapper today.  He's pretty bummed about that.  Now, here's the rest of the story....

LB says, "The fact that we made it there at all...it wasn't easy.  When I had to pull an all-nighter just for the car to be painted...it's not easy."

The team showed up Friday to run an alloted one-hour practice session.

"I decided to run the practice session on two-year old SK tires - rather than spend $580 on a set of new practice tires. If we bought them Friday, we never could use them again", LB explains, "We basically ran to get some laps in."

In the three practice sessions LB was able to run on Friday, he got down to about 14.5 seconds and worked to get comfortable driving the car. 

In Saturday's practice, he looked even better and posted the 9th fastest time out of 21 cars in the second round. This proved that the car had some speed and that LB could actually turn those times.

Saturday afternoon - time for heats.  Twenty-eight cars showed up to qualify for the race, and vMRS had 26 spots available.  There would be 3 heats where the top eight drivers would qualify, and two provisionals awarded.  LB isn't eligible for a provisional because he's a rookie.  There would be no consi. 

In the two heats before him, everyone finished the race, no DNF's, no mechanicals...nothing.  That meant 16 cars qualified and there were only 8 spots left.  LB started seventh in the 3rd heat race in a field of 9 cars.  Pretty good odds, right? 

Wrong.  As LB wrote Saturday night in an FB post, "I started 7th in my heat race, got a firm shove going into turn one. Knocked me up into the marbles, and into 9th position.
The 10x car that gave the shove, then blocked Charlie Pasteryak until two laps to go.
When I had my one chance to make a pass the 10x ran me down into the wet grass. Race over."

The crew and driver are just a little disappointed that they didn't get to qualify.  However, when you consider he drew a poor position for the heat (LB pulled number 37 - not exactly an advantage) and had to run nearly the entire heat race behind two guys running side by side, well...we're choosing not to dwell on him not qualifying. 

The positives:  the car had no mechanical issues and no failures, he posted respectable times (he was within a .10th of a second of two-time series champion Chris Pasteryak), and he got some valuable seat time. 

But you still can't help but be disappointed that the team has to wait three more weeks to race. 

Now, on to the photo highlights...

The 73 and 0 cars pit next to each other.  Much thanks to them for imparting their wisdom to us rookies all weekend long. LB could be heard joking to Mike and Dale, "Now that we just went so fast, are you going to start copying MY adjustments?"

The crew makes some adjustments.  L to R, Yer Dad, Jimmy, Rob, Jonny & Amy.

LB and daughter Michelle: "Sorry I didn't get here sooner, Dad, I couldn't pry Justin away from our goat"

 

Norwich Bulletin post about LB

Today's Norwich Bulletin had LB's first news coverage  as a modified driver, written by Marc Allard of the Norwich Bulletin. 
Leadfoot story