8/23/03

Ford QCCPOV Team Battles Hard, Takes Sixth at Sedalia.

Sedalia, Missouri is a half-mile track used mostly for sprint car racing, and it can be quite a tough proposition for the motorcycle guys when they arrive each August - full of holes and bumps, soaked in oil and antifreeze, the surface is difficult and unpredictable. This year, Steve Morehead and the AMA crew did an admirable job of making the track raceable, and Chris took advantage of the racy track at the start, getting a holeshot and leading early on.

The rest of the field took to the well-prepared surface as well and dropped Chris back to sixth at the end, but with a fairly comfortable point lead, the four-time champ rode comfortably and stayed out of trouble to keep the momentum going as the season begins its final stages. A short track in Milwaukee looms nest and the rest of the field cringes as they know Carr is almost unstoppable on short tracks, especially in 2003.

"Sedalia was a little bit of a struggle for us. Throughout practice and the scratch heats and the heat races we were off the pace of the guys that were going the quickest. Early on in the day we were about a half a second or more off the pace, and then in the scratch heats we narrowed it up a little bit, and the heat race had some decent times. Got off the line second in the heat race behind (Bryan) Bigelow. He got away from me a little bit early in the race, and I started catching back up and I was within three or four bike lengths of him, and I slipped off the groove in turn two, and that killed my momentum. He got away and beat me by a straightaway. I had a lonely second from that point on.

"Going into the main event, we made a few more changes. I got a great start in the main event and led into the first lap or so, and then Joe Kopp went by, and he was really hauling ass. He was getting away from everybody, and I started fading a little bit and dropped back as far as fifth before the red flag came out. I guess it was (Geo) Roeder, (Chris) Boone, and (Shaun) Russell who had gone down on the front stretch. That was kind of scary for everybody. We were hoping everything was alright, and nobody took a ride to the hospital, so that was good.

"I got going on the restart, got off the line decent, ran third for a while, kind of fell back, and guys were picking me off, and the top five guys were getting away from me, it was (Kenny) Coolbeth, (Johnny) Murphree, who had come through the pack from a third row start and was probably the fastest guy on the track from start to finish - to come from the third row in a half-mile and have a chance to win, he did pretty good - Bigelow was up there, Kopp kind of faded back, and (Mike) Hacker got in there for while too. Those five guys got away from me, and I just kept plugging away, plugging away, and I gained on them at the end. I didn't really gain on the leader, but I gained on the pack of guys. I got to them at the end, but there was no time to do anything. We ended up sixth and got beat by guys who were better from green light to checkered flag. That's the way it goes.

"We have a 31 point lead, which is comfortable, but nothing to get overly excited about. This thing's not over with. We're going to buckle down this week and we've got a short track coming up there in Milwaukee and we know we're capable of winning short tracks, we've been strong on them all year, and we expect to go up there and do what we're capable of doing."
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