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Team Enjoys Week Off After Wild Race
-Video Footage From The Stands Now Available- Hale Racing enjoyed their Memorial Day Weekend... there was no race to worry about. Instead the team's focus was making sure everything was ready to go for this weekend's event. 2 days after the May 16th event, the car was back on the scales and under the microscope for a good "check-up." The May 16th event certainly wasn't the prettiest of races, but Hale Racing still scored a first overall finish. "Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good" said Michael Hale after the race. That was no lie. May 16th's race was definitely the most stressful race thus far during this young 2009 season. Right from practice things looked a little shady for the Hale Racing camp. Every session resulted in a tight racecar. Lap times were still amongst the top 5, but with qualifying coming up, the team really wanted to score in the top 3. Did it happen? Unfortunately it did not. However, the end result after the night was all said and done; well let's just say Hale Racing scored one of the most unusual 1st place overall finishes anybody can remember. Michael qualified 5th overall in the 20 car field, and it was by just thousandths of a second that he didn't end up in that top 3 like the team really wanted. The team wasn't too happy with 5th, but focus was not lost, and Hale racing quickly prepped the car for their opening heat race. "The car was still really tight in qualifying, so we had to try and loosen it up some more for the heat. It had been tight all day, but I think we figured it out," said car and team owner, Red Hale. The car definitely looked better from my point of view in the stands during Michael's heat race. Michael started 8th and drove his way up to the 3rd spot... this proved to be a huge difference maker by the end of the evening in the overall points earned for the event. Main event time. The time when your rear end moves to the edge of your seat, you grit your teeth, say a prayer or two, and hope your favorite driver stays out of trouble. Well trouble seemed to find Michael early on in this one. 8 laps into the event, Michael got slightly tangled up with the #44 car and it was bye-bye swaybar for the next 42 laps. That's right, for the final 42 laps, Michael drove around putting on his own little fireworks show with a dragging front swaybar sparking around the high banked 3/8 mile oval of Rocky Mountain Raceways. Track officials took a close look, but never sent Michael off the track to have the problem addressed. Good thing. "We all knew it was the swaybar, it wasn't going to fall off, I'm glad they let him drag the thing around. Who knows what would have happened if we had to come off," said Red when all was said and done. It was probably a good thing they didn't send Michael off. Remember how I mentioned luck in the beginning of this article? It looked like bad luck had struck and was going to the cost the team their points lead. Tough practice sessions, a disappointing qualifying run, and now a broken sway bar. Well, apparently there was a little bit of good luck in the Hale Racing camp on this Saturday. Better late than never right? Michael managed to get by a few cars after the swaybar incident, and worked his way up to 8th. It appeared that is where he'd finish as nobody, and I mean NOBODY, was making moves in front of, or behind Michael. Oh but wait, I can't forget to mention that tiny bit of good luck the team had can I? That tiny bit came on the very last lap, yes, the VERY last lap. Like I said, better late than never. With just 1 lap to go, and 41 laps of driving with no swaybar, Michael was ready for this race to be over. "I'm beat. After the adrenaline wore off and things got to single file racing, I got really tired out there. Driving that car with no swaybar is not a fun task," said Michael. When the white flag waved, the man who was (and still is) 2nd in the points championship standings, Jason Aposhian, was two positions ahead of Michael. It appeared a certainty that he was going to overtake the points lead when teh checker flew. Unfortunately for him, his luck went down the drain and his motor started backfiring like there was a timing issue of some kind. Well it ended up costing him his 6th place finish as he lost 3 spots in the final two corners and fell to 9th. Michael drove by him down the front stretch to steal 7th place. Once again, those few spots made a huge difference in the end. If not for Aposhian's bad luck striking him, Michael would not have scored his 2nd first overall finish of the year and the team would be trailing in the point standings right now instead of still holding onto the 1st place spot. Amazing how luck works on some Saturdays. Oh yes, the camera was rolling and video footage will be available... it's definitely worth checking out. As stated above, Michael finished 7th in the main event and the entire team, myself included, cannot remember anybody else finishing 7th in a main event, qualifying 5th, and still placing 1st overall for the event. Well, like Michael said, "Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good." Hale Racing scored 1st overall by just 1 point, yes that's a 1. 1 point, the only thing closer is a tie. "In reality that's what we need to do every night. Because when you finish first overall, no matter how ugly it may be, or as lucky as it may be, when you score first overall, nobody can catch you in the points race," said Michael. The team hopes that luck is once again on their side this coming Saturday, but they're certainly not relying on it. That's why they spent their week off checking things over and making sure the car is ready to go. Don't forget to come cheer the gang on as the race for the championship is still ultra tight. Michael and the team hold just an 18 point advantage, and Hale Racing certainly doesn't expect it to be any less difficult this week and each week thereafter. A big thanks goes out to all of our sponsors and fans that continue to support us week in and week out. We can't wait to see you all again on the 30th as we wrap up the month of May. Thanks for stopping by HaleRacing.com. See you at the races! Short article written by Brad Edwards
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