NASCAR

BNS: New Hampshire III: Greg Schaefer race notes

Fourteenth place finish at NHIS moves Greg Schaefer back into top ten in points. Rite-Way Electric Chevrolet driver Greg Schaefer, from Hatboro, Pennsylvania, had recorded finishes of eleventh and thirty-second in two previous NASCAR Busch North ...

Edited: Dec 22, 2003, 5:59 AM

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Fourteenth place finish at NHIS moves Greg Schaefer back into top ten in points.

Rite-Way Electric Chevrolet driver Greg Schaefer, from Hatboro, Pennsylvania, had recorded finishes of eleventh and thirty-second in two previous NASCAR Busch North Series races held at the one-mile New Hampshire International Speedway. Looking to complete the third and final race held at that track this year with a top-ten finish, he struggled throughout the weekend and ended it with a fourteenth place finish in the New Hampshire 125.

This finish moves Schaefer back into tenth place in the championship points standings with just three races left to run.

The weekend at New Hampshire was a struggle for Schaefer and his ParksSchaefer Motorsports crew, as they were dealing with a tight car through both pre-qualifying practice sessions. Sixteenth in the first session, he slipped to 26th in the second. Prepared for qualifying, Schaefer's car turned the seventeenth fastest time, 30.875 seconds (123.362 MPH).

"I think we had a bad right front shock on the car in practice," he said. "That's about all we changed, that and a few minor changes. The car was a lot better there in qualifying. It still got tight in the center and drifted up the track a little too much, that hurt us since it took a while before I could get back in the throttle. Other than that, I was pretty happy. We're going to make a few changes to try and free it up a little bit."

Schaefer dropped back out of the top twenty in the race's early laps, but stayed on the lead lap as the first caution came out on lap 38. He pitted along with the rest of the field, with the crew making adjustments in hopes of improving the car. The changes didn't help, though, and Schaefer was hanging on to finish the race. He stayed on the lead lap until lap 100 of 125, when he allowed the leaders to pass by because they were fighting for the win. Schaefer soldiered on through three late cautions that extended the race distance to 137 laps, completing 136 of them and finishing fourteenth.

"In the race, the car was the worst it was all weekend," he said after the race. "It picked up a really bad push. We made an adjustment when we pitted, but it didn't get much better. I just cut my losses and just tried to get a decent finish. It's real tough to drive a car that's not handling. You're just searching for a place where you can run the thing where it won't go straight up the track. I was all the way down on the apron trying to get it to turn, that's about the only thing that would help. I'd cross the yellow line and that would free it up. It's not really racing, it's just hanging on trying to get it around and not get passed, and get a decent finish. That's all we could do, just try to get some points.

"We've got a whole car we can take to Dover, that's a good thing," Schaefer continued. "I like Dover, I thought we had a really good car there last year, but we blew the motor up. Hopefully we can go there and get this thing back going again. We've just been struggling too much lately."

Dover International Speedway, the Delaware superspeedway where Schaefer ran strong before engine problems forced him to retire from the event last year. Practice and qualifying are set for Thursday, with the race set for Friday afternoon.

-ajc-

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