Night 1

Speed week commenced on Wednesday 26th December in hot and very dry conditions at Speedway City in Adelaide. For those of you unfamiliar with the format of World Series Sprintcar Racing what happens is Time trials occur at the beginning of the evening to establish your place in the heats. The top 30 cars qualify and then work on a 10 car inversion. So the fastest qualifying car with start from position 10 in the first heat and receives 116 points to start the evening for time trailing fastest. Cars finishing outside of the top 30 are classified as non-qualifiers and will start at the rear of the fields in each heat. The order in which cars time trial is decided at the conclusion of the drivers briefing each night with a bingo style number draw. At speedway city Dylan was lucky to draw time trial position 3. This was very beneficial due the slick track conditions and resulted in him finishing 12th overall after the completion of time trials and giving the team 94 points to start the nights racing.

Dylan started out of position 7 in the second heat for the evening. He was driving very well when a race stoppage occurred due to a fellow competitors cars spinning out. Luck was not on Dylans side as at the restart the car directly in front of Dylan failed to start the race causing Dylan to crash into the rear of it along with another car. This resulted in some major front end damage and car was towed from the track with 4 laps remaining. SO a DNF (did not finish) was recorded for the first heat and no further points were awarded. Some frantic work from the crew was required to change the front axle and wing in ensure Dylan was ready for his next heat of the night.

Dylan’s second heat saw him starting from position 8 and it was essential for him to race well and make up some positions to gain some much needed points. The heat again saw another race stoppage, but this time the restart when well and although the newly fitted front wing of the car came loose making it very difficult to handle Dylan managed to hold onto his position and finish in 8th spot.

The results of the time trials and heats saw Dylan finish with a total of 101 points which resulted in him starting out of position 8 in the ‘B’ Main. With the rules stating that the top 6 finishing cars will transfer through to the back of the ‘A’Main Dylan had his work cut out for him, but it was certainly an achievable goal. However luck was not to be on the teams side and after being caught up in a mid race collision where Dylan was just in the wrong place at the wrong time he was forced out of the race. The team was quite frustrated and disappointed and had a busy day ahead to repair the car and have it ready for the next evenings racing at Riverview Speedway Murray Bridge.

Night 2

Riverview Speedway in Murray Bridge was the venue for night 2 of Speed week and again the conditions were hot and dry and the track was incredibly slick making an early time trial position incredibly advantageous. Unfortunately the ball draw saw Dylan pull position 26. The track continued to get slicker and slicker throughout time trials making the cars incredibly difficult to handle with even the most experienced of drivers struggling. Dylan was to be commended for his driving and qualified with the smallest of margins in position 30. This meant that Dylan would get a pole position start and number 2 position starts in his heats and starting points of 62.

Dylan started his first heat out of pole position and with some great racing and still on a very slick track he finished second. Track conditions were making racing incredibly tough with it near impossible to get any sort of traction to steer the 800+ horsepower machines around the track.

His second heat saw him start on the front row out of position 2 and he had the likes of current Australian Champion Brooke Tattnell, Northern Territory superstar Danny Reidy, and quick time setter Robbie Farr all behind and chasing! Dylan had a fantastic start and was leading when a crash at the rear of the field saw a restart. This closed the field right up and saw the race order become – Dylan Jenkin, Danny Reidy, Brooke Tattnell, Robbie Farr - 3 top gun world series sprint car drivers right on Dylan’s tail. To his great credit and fantastic driving Dylan drove wheel to wheel for 5 laps with Australian champion Brooke Tattnell pushing him every inch of the way. The lead changed many times but Dylan held onto his fantastic driving line. Much to the crew and his vocal supporters delight Dylan held off the Australian champion to win the heat! Dylan finished the heats with a total of 107 points resulting in a position 4 start in the B Main.

With Dylan needing to finish in the top 6 to transfer to the ‘A’Main and get some much needed laps the pressure was on for him to transfer. This race saw many stoppages but at its completion and with the crew holding its breath Dylan finished in 6 position resulting in him starting form the back of the field in the ‘A’ Main.

The “A’Main was a fast and furious race with a number of stoppages. After 35 laps Dylan raced brilliantly to finish in 14th position. The team and supporters were incredibly proud and excited with the evening’s results which has give the whole team and most importantly Dylan a much needed confidence boost.

Speed week now has a night off to re-group and recover before moving onto the third leg in Mt Gambier on Saturday night. Some much needed rest was called for with the team filled with anticipation to continue to improve over the remaining speed week events.

Night 3

Borderline Speedway in Mt Gambier was the setting for night 3 of speed week. After hot conditions all day typical Mt Gambier weather appeared with the evening being quite cool and the track much more ‘sticky’ than the previous two nights.

Luck was not our side again with time trial draw and Dylan drawing position 32! Times for the evening were all very fast and at the completion of the trails Dylan was in position 20 and earned 78 points to begin the night.

The team was a little frustrated with car and its setup as it just seemed to not be handling well enough for Dylan to be able to use full throttle. The team was hoping to rectify this for the first heat.

Dylan was scheduled to start from position 4 in his first heat for the evening with USA super star Jason Johnson, Australian champs Trevor Green, Danny Reidy and Max Dumesney all in his heat along with fellow Bordertown competitor Ash Cook. The heat was fiercely fought with many position changes throughout the race. The car was still not handling well and appeared to be lacking on power and Dylan finished in 7th position.

The team had to work fast as Dylan was scheduled to start out of the first heat in the second round. This time he was starting from position 3 with Trevor Green, Brooke Tattnell and again Ash Cook all drawn in the same heat. Once again due to some very rough track conditions the race saw many stoppages with one unfortunately due to Ash cook hitting the wall. This stoppage pushed Trevor Green and Max Dumesny right up on Dylans tail and the two highly experienced drivers managed to pass Dylan seeing him finish the heat in 8th position.

At the completion of the heats Dylan finish saw him starting out of position 13 in the ‘B’Main. Having to again finish in the top 6 to transfer to the ‘A’ main Dylan had his work cut out for him.

Again due to some very rough track condition the race saw many stoppages and many cars pulling to the infield. There were very few opportunities to pass with cars basically following each other around the track. Dylan finished a credible 9th. The positive was that the car set up for the ‘B’ Main was spot on, so although the team struggled most of the night it was great experience that they got the set up right for the final race.

The team made the decision to sit out the Night 4 race meeting at Avalon and have some much needed rest to gear up for the final night in Warrnambool on New Years Day.

Night 5

Sungold stadium, Premier Speedway Warrnambool was the scene for the final night of speed week.

The draw for the time trials saw a little more luck fall on the team for a change with Dylan drawing position 7. At the completion of time trials Dylan had finished in position 23 and a little disappointed but with starting points of 72.

Dylan was set to start from position 3 in the second heat. He raced very well only loosing one spot right from the take off and held onto his position for the remaining race to finish 4th.

He was not quite so lucky in his second outing. Starting out of position 4 he had a tough heat draw and managed to only finish 7th. The team was a little frustrated as again the car seemed to be lacking in power compared to other cars and the track was incredibly rough – one of the worst tracks the team had seen at Warrnambool. Dylan was forced to drive conservatively to avoid accidents and totally righting off his car which happened to many cars throughout the evening. Many comments were made on the track condition by numerous drivers but still we did not see the grader come out so drivers were forced to either go full throttle and hang on for dear life or back off a bit and preserve their cars. With the team running on a small budget Dylan chose the later understandably!

Dylan’s total points for the evening saw him staring from position 13 in the ‘B’Main. Due to the track conditions the team was almost relieved in a sense that he was not in the ‘A’ Main. Dylan drove superbly in the ‘B’ Main finding a lovely high and smooth line that was essential if you wanted to avoid the rough sections of the track. He maintained his position throughout the race and finished 14th. The race saw few positional changes as it was just too dangerous and difficult to pass with the track conditions.

Overall the team was a little frustrated and disappointed with results over speed week but looking at the overall picture the team had only competed in 2 events leading up to speed week and the majority of the other teams had been racing every weekend since early October.

We hope you have enjoyed reading about our time in the sprintcar season so far and we look forward to updating you again soon. We thank all of our sponsors for your support and we just love to see you at race meetings supporting us.

Regards,
Jenkin Racing Team

© 2010 Dylan Jenkin 'Jenkin Racing Team'
email:dylan@jenkinracingteam.com