Flying Dutchman Off-Road Race Team

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Owatonna, MN
Round 1 & 2

Friday - Welcome to the start of the WSORR series! We were excited to see Owatonna for the first time. Owatonna is a new track that has a very rough, technical layout. Mike commented that this fun track suits his driving style, but also makes it easy to get into trouble. After Friday's practice sessions, it was clear that the 177 car would be a contender again this year.

Saturday - Round 1

A random drawing put Mike way back in 24th place out of 29 buggies, lined up in rows of three, so he was stuck in the middle. The green flag waved and Mike exploded through the field! Throwing caution to the wind, he dove in and out of traffic. Wherever a hole opened up, the 'red rocket' was there to fill it. After barely missing crashes in turn one and turn two, the dust cleared enough for the crowd to see Mike already breaking into the TOP FIVE!- only halfway through the FIRST LAP! Unfortunately, the start of a lifetime would be ended when a rookie driver landed sideways just in front of Mike, who couldn't avoid a hard collision to his left front wheel. The crash was hard enough to explode tires on both cars, and rip out the steering on Mike's. You could say, 'what goes up, must come down,' Mike never made it back to the starting line and was scored dead last.

Although his points season was off to a bad start, Mike was all smiles. "Just have to stay out of trouble better"

Sunday - Round 2

With the buggy's steering all fixed, Mike was ready for more racing, except for two major problems - track position and MUD. Not only was Mike's starting spot now dead last from his poor round one, but it rained all night, leaving standing water all over the track. This only meant one thing- tear-offs, lots of tear-offs. The WSORR crew did a good job of draining the track and luckily, there were two classes of racing out before the 1600 Lites that cleaned off a lot of the mud.

When the green flew, many drivers mashed the gas like this was any other race, but Mike remembered that 'slow is fast' in the mud and got around a couple drivers right at the starting line. A very slow, sloppy front straightaway led to a greasy turn one where there was sure to be at least one spinout. Mike was directed to the very outside of the corner by his spotter and brother, Dan JR, and safely made it through while passing several more cars. Very carefully, but quickly, Mike felt out the track for the first lap- deciding what lines were possible. At lap two, Mike knew where to be careful and where to get going. Most drivers were slow through the tricky whoop sections, but Mike absolutely flew them, passing as many as five cars at a time! Soon, lap traffic became a big problem and the drivers didn't know who they were racing against and who was a lap down. Mike worked hard and just kept chipping away, any car that he caught was quickly left behind. Finally, the checkers
came out and the exhausting race was over. Dan JR came over the radio and said "Yeah, you just got third." It was the drive of the weekend! To everyone's amazement, Mike came from dead last to third in a mud race. The team couldn't be more happy with the finish and to make things better, JR's brother in law and our good friend Matt Gerald won the race, congratulations to Gerald Racing.

Off to a decent start, Mike is very anxious to bring the buggy back to Crandon for rounds three and four, where he is always fast.
See you next time!