By: Joe Burrage
Tulare, CA. – (March 8, 2010) – For the past week Chad Kemenah and crew member Cale Powers have been in California preparing for the two day World of Outlaws show at the high banked Tulare Thunderbowl Raceway and the hard work paid off on Friday night.
The Thunderbowl Raceway has always been a very fast and exciting track with lots of action and Chad Kemenah certainly loves these types of tracks. Kemenah has only raced a hand full of times at the fast 1/3 mile and after qualifying was completed the Golden Flavor Sesame Sticks No.63 was 18th quick overall.
After qualifying was completed Kemenah and Powers went to work on the car making a few adjustments hoping they could grab a transfer spot in the second heat race. Starting in the fifth position for the quick 10-Lap heat race Kemenah was feeling pretty good about getting into a transfer spot. Kemenah would get a good start along the cushion and make his way into turns one and two where the cushion was right along the fence. Kemenah would miss the cushion and was forced to hit the breaks to avoid hitting the wall, and while this was happening two cars would get by him leaving him in the seventh position after the heat race was finished.
As the night continued on the track conditions were changing in a big way and the No.63 sprinter still had to run the 12-Lap, B-Main. After his heat race was completed and the cushion was right along the fence, Kemenah decided to set the car up for the middle and bottom lines for the B-Main. After the B-Main was completed Kemenah would finish in the second position and transfer to the A-Main.
Starting in the 18th position for the A-Main, Kemenah knew he had some time to make his way to the front with the track starting to get rough along the cushion. Cale would make a few more minor changes to the car and Kemenah was pushed off for the feature.
When the green lights hit the Thunderbowl Raceway, Kemenah immediately got to the bottom of the track and held his position for the first lap. The bottom of track was starting to come in really nice for Kemenah as he moved up a couple of positions. After a couple of red flags Kemenah took complete advantage of the double file restarts and advanced a few more positions with the half-way point of the race a few laps away.
Kemenah would make his way into the tenth position around Lap-25 with a very sneaky pass on Kraig Kinser. From there Kemenah, Kriag Kinser, and Fred Rahmer would put on a show for the Tulare fans with good clean side by side racing until the feature ended with Kemenah finishing in seventh place. Kemenah would also earn the KSE Hard Charger Award of the night with a very impressive run from the 18th starting position.
“We were pretty good tonight,” said Kemenah. “We didn’t get the qualifying lap we were looking for and then heat race didn’t go our way but we made up for it in feature. The cushion was really tricky tonight, I found a couple of spots on the track during the B-Main and the car responded really nice to the changes we made so we decided to run the middle and the bottom and it paid off for us tonight. Cale Powers has worked really hard on this car and we are getting things going in the right direction. Hopefully next weekend in Texas we can put this Golden Flavor Sesame Sticks, MS Motorsports, Hampshire Racing Engines, Maxim in victory lane. I also have to thank Garrett Ishii for all of his help this past week, he made our trip out to California a lot easier and fun.”
The Sponsors: Golden Flavor Sesame Sticks, Hampshire Racing Engines, Maxim Chassis, MS Motorsports, Kears Speed Shop, Champion Racing XP Performance Lubricants, Bell, Awesome Racewear, Pro Shocks, Banshee Graphics, SSE Helmet Designs, ButlerBuilt Motorsports Equipment, TP Wings, Winters Performance Products, Media Camping Center, Real Racing Wheels, All-Star Performance, EBay ED, KSE Racing Products, Inc., Tim Hogan’s Dalton Georgia Carpets, Chiappelli Motorsports.
Up Next: The CKR Team will make the long trip to the beautiful Lonestar Speedway in Kilgore, Texas on Friday March 12th, the following night Kemenah will be in action at the Houston Raceway Park in Baytown, Texas on Saturday, March 13th. Be sure to check www.chadkemenah.com for all the latest news and info on the CKR Team. CKR would also like to thank John’s Racing Photos for allowing us to use his photos for this write up. John took a lot of great photos of Chad at Tulare this past weekend, to view them please check www.johnsracingphotos.com
