A sixth-place finish in a race is a solid result for many racers, but for Tim Russell, finishing sixth in the Brighthouse Challenge Series at Orlando Speedworld (FL) Friday night wasn't something he was celebrating. Russell had a strong car and had looked like he would win his first event since May of this year, but it just wasn't meant to be.
Russell's day started off strong by qualifying up near the front.
"The guy that runs the track, Rusty (Marcus), gave us our spot back, but someone overruled him and sent both of us to the rear. We came back from 14th to sixth with no cautions. We had a good car and I think we would have won the race if we would have gotten by him or if they would have given us our spot back."
Despite the results not being what he wanted, Russell was pumped about his performance on the track, heading into the next race back at Orlando next weekend.
"We had a strong car. We are going to make a few minor adjustments for the long run. I am looking forward to a good finish and hopefully a win."
Tim Russell will race in the Sunbelt Series Super Late Model event at Orlando Speedworld on October 24th.
"We had a good car in practice," said Russell. "We ended up qualifying third, but with the inversion we ended up starting on the pole."
On the start of the race, Russell lost the lead as the driver on the outside pole didn't have to avoid the pace truck exiting the track, giving him a jump to the green flag.
"We started the race and kind of got messed up by the pace truck," explained Russell. "I tried to slow down the field as much as I could, but the pace truck continued to slow down too, so I got blocked behind the pace truck."
Losing the lead early, Russell made a charge to get the top spot, only to be involved in a wreck and forced to make his way back up towards the front from the rear of the pack.
"We were really fast in the race. We were all over him (Matt Bowers) for the first 15 or 20 laps. I had a couple runs on him off two and he would block me, so I would go high going into three and he would move up to block me. I finally got a good run, diamonding the corner off four and got underneath him coming down the front straightaway. He came down on me; I had the brakes locked up trying not to wreck him.
