Chris and his crew returned to the drama of the Formula USA / wrenchead.com dirt track series on August 26, visiting the half-mile oval at Texas Motor Speedway for the second time this season. With many of the regular AMA competitors electing to compete at Sedalia in that series, the final grid was filled with a few unfamiliar names, but some fast and familiar faces like Terry Poovey and Jay Springsteen were there as well.Poovey got the holeshot and held off a spirited charge by Carr to take the win, but Chris took a strong second, claiming the lead in the series, and also holding on to his AMA series lead even as he was absent from the race. The chances of winning both championships are slim with several conflicting dates ahead, but if anyone is in the driver's seat, it has to be Carr.
"Texas went really good. We were pretty much second fastest all night long. Terry Poovey was pretty hot out of the gate, was running real hot on his 660 or 670 Rotax, whatever it was, and I was just a couple of tenths off to him earlier in the night on my Rotax. He won his heat race, I won mine.
"In the main event, he (Poovey) got the holeshot, the Yuasa Batteries Hard Charger award, by leading the first lap. I got off the line about fifth, got by Greg Tysor, then Charlie Orr. Four or five laps later, I got by Springer, and found myself about fifteen bike lengths behind Poovey. We stayed pretty steady at that distance for quite some time. Once we started getting into lapped traffic, which was quite a lot, considering we had a split field of riders with the AMA race going on, I started to gain on him. Lap traffic hindered him more than it did me, and I was able to get near him, but I didn't really have much for him. He was riding really well. The only reason I got anywhere near him was because of the lapped traffic. But I tip my hat to him for doing a real good job. He was fast out of the gate and tough to beat."
You now lead both the AMA and F-USA championships. Does that apply any additional pressure?
"No it doesn't, because I can only do what I can do each and every race. I mean, there's more pressure on the other guys, to be honest with you. I've got not an overly comfortable lead in the wrenchead.com series over J.R. Schnabel, and certainly a slim lead in the AMA series. It certainly puts an emphasis on this weekend at Springfield like we discussed last week. This is a big weekend. There's a lot of points to be made and anything can happen. In the end, in the AMA series, it's about the championship. If it were about the money, nobody'd be racing to be honest with you. Saturday's race alone (the Hall of Fame race) pays more money to win than it does to win the AMA championship. That kind of puts that whole thing in perspective. Saturday's race is a real big race. It's something that has a lot to do about the history of our sport. We all want to win it, not only because of the historical value of it, but because it's the largest single dirt track payday we have this year."