October 1, 2006
Rougemont, NC

Good Day, Beginning to End at Orange County Speedway

Coming off of a top five finish in the last run, and three consecutive top ten finishes, there was a lot of optimism heading into Saturday nights race at Orange County Speedway. Josh has run well in every race this season at Orange County; however, wrecks have taken him out of two of those races while running in the top 10. A test session last Tuesday showed that the car needed to loosen up before we went back on Saturday, but that overall the car was ready for the 50 lap race.

In the first practice of the afternoon, the Horizon Technologies/Conterra Ultra Broadband car was good but was still too tight off the corner for Josh’s liking. A wedge and stagger adjustment by Crew Chief Blake Harris prior to the second practice quickly proved to be exactly what Josh was looking for as he only ran eight laps, but turned top five times. Josh went out 14th for his qualifying lap and turned his fastest lap of the day, putting him 3rd in the 23 car field.

The race was exactly the way we all wanted it to be…uneventful. Josh ran third from the start and ran with the leaders for the first 41 laps of the 50 lap event. On a restart at lap 41, Josh got a great run on the second place car and the next time he crossed the line he had the spot with eight laps to go. We knew; however, that the last eight laps were not going to be a joy ride as the fastest car on the track (car spun in qualifying but was running faster laps than everyone) had now made its way to the 3rd spot. With five laps to go, the battle was on. Third place got inside Josh off of turn 2 and the next two laps were spent side by side racing for position. With Josh up out of the groove, both the third and fourth place car got by him with three laps to go and Josh settled into fourth. He would cross the finish line in fourth for his second consecutive top five finish (third top five in the last six races) and his fifth top 10 in the last six races. Also for the second week in a row, Josh was the Rookie of the Race and received the Bell Helmet 4 – Safety award.

Josh on Saturday’s run: “That was the kind of day that we had been looking for all year. Blake got the car just right, I got a good qualifying lap in and nothing weird happened during the race to put us behind. We picked up a miss in the engine towards the end of the race and I just didn’t have enough to hold off those last two cars. The car was great and it’s good to finally be finishing races where we feel we should be. In two weeks we go to the road course in Kershaw, SC and I have been looking forward to that race since we got the schedule. Blake and dad think I’m going to tear the transmission out, I think I’ll surprise them…I can’t wait.”

The Allison Legacy Series takes another week off before heading to Carolina Motorsports Park in Kershaw, SC for the first of two Road Course events on the schedule.