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Gainesville: Tim Wilkerson Friday report
WILK'S "SHAKEDOWN" RUN GOES JUST FINE Tim Wilkerson really wanted to make two runs, as scheduled, on Friday. With a new chassis, a new Shelby Mustang body, some new parts, and even a new fire suit, the Levi, Ray & Shoup driver knew his first ...
Published: Mar 14, 2010, 5:09 AM
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WILK'S "SHAKEDOWN" RUN GOES JUST FINE
Tim Wilkerson really wanted to make two runs, as scheduled, on Friday. With a new chassis, a new Shelby Mustang body, some new parts, and even a new fire suit, the Levi, Ray & Shoup driver knew his first pass down the Gainesville track would basically be a shakedown run, just to make sure everything was in order and working as it should. Drizzle throughout much of the morning, however, only allowed the pro classes to make one late-afternoon run (and it took a bit of meteorological luck to accomplish that much) so Wilk was faced with making his maiden voyage while still hoping to land in the top 12 after the first day. Both missions were accomplished, as he streaked to a 4.136 to eventually spend Friday night in the No. 7 position.
Wilkerson and the LRS team were actually still sitting in the No. 1 spot with only six cars left to run, but those six drivers were named Hight, Force, Force Hood, Hagan, Capps, and Beckman. As the final three pairs they ran the table, going six-for-six to end the session, knocking Wilkerson back to seventh.
"Not a bad shakedown run, if you ask me," Wilkerson said. "I mean just about everything is new, from the chassis to the body to the rear end and the suit I was wearing. With this new 2010 Shelby Mustang and the new chassis under it, we went from being 60 pounds overweight to having to add 40 pounds to the car just to make weight, but this chassis is really what we're used to running, and if it went out there and ran like it should I figured it would be easier to tune than the last one. It did just what I wanted it to do, so that makes this a very good day.
"It was one of those frustrating days at the track, with the rain coming down for half of it and then even after it stopped it still kept looking like it was going to rain again. I don't think anyone really felt all that confident that we'd get to run, but I might have been the guy wanting to the most. I didn't want to go into Saturday with no runs on this car, knowing we'd have to be right on it from the start just to make the show. At least now we have that first one under our belts and we can go from here. I'm pretty encouraged, to tell you the truth, and hopefully we can step it up a little tomorrow and stay really competitive here."
-source: team wilkerson racing
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