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"TEAM F&F UPDATE"

  By Uncle Gummy PRIMETIME vs Golden State Challenge #24 “ IT’S SHOWTIME FOR PRIMETIME” The final race in the 2009 Golden State Challenge “King of California” series roared into the history books on a beautiful Saturday evening in the sierra foothills at Placerville Speedway on Saturday, August 22. FnF Racing, which normally runs 360 stuff, dropped a 410 between the frame rails courtesy of Mason Moore Motorsports and went after it to give Mason “Primetime” Moore a chance to go fast and turn left. As many of you hardcore sprint fans are aware, Primetime has been on a medical hold as he recuperated from an earlier mishap at Chico and was just released by his doctor on August 17 to resume having fun in the cockpit of a sprint car. So, after turning in a few hot laps at Chico on Friday night, Mason and the World Famous Pukin’ Dogs of Team FnF pulled into the Placerville pit area on Saturday to blow off a little rust and get ready for the remainder of the 2009 season. Unfortunately for the x1, the brake troll came along for the ride and almost caused an earlycurtain call for Primetime. But first,how did we get into this situation? The 2009 season had gotten off to a pretty decent start with Primetime and the Pukin’ Dogs pushing the x1 into the top 10 in the Civil War point battle with a 7th place finish at Petaluma. The team then had a chance to run Golden State Challenge #5 which is officially known as “The Dave Bradway Jr. Memorial” in memory of Alan’s older brother Dave. This annual 410 event held at Chico’s Silver Dollar Speedway is generally considered one of the largest one night pay-outs in the West and usually attracts the best 410 teams in NorCal. To FnF Racing, “ the Bradway” is much more than simply a race; it is an emotional night filled with memories of “Junior” and what might have been. Mason drove smoothly, made the feature event and finished a respectable 10th. All in all, a good , solid showing for Primetime and Team FnF. Then disaster struck. Two weeks later, the team decided to run the May 23 Saturday night “fair race” at Chico as a tune-up for Civil War #3 to be run the next day. OK. Primetime strapped in, checked everything out, and shoved off for hot laps. Mason had completed his first session of hot laps and had the x1 leaving vapor trails around the track. Race officials had asked the second session to pack and run the top and Prime took the green as he was exiting turn four. As he was on the top entering turn three, it appeared he caught a little of the cushion, biked and flipped off the backside of turn four landing almost flat upside down on the left side frame rail.The team knew he was in trouble when the race car landed awkwardly with a flat left rear and smashed left birdcage as there wasn’t much to absorb the force of the landing except the driver’s seat. Not good. Mason compressed in the seat and fractured his 4c vertebrae. He went off the track on the backboard and the x1 went off on the hook and it was a somber bunch of sprint car racers in the FnF pit the rest of the night as we waited for news of Mason, the extent of his injuries and what we could do to help. After the diagnosis, the team learned Mason would be out 8-12 weeks and we were all thankful things were not any worse. Then things got worse. After the team disassembled the race car to perform the “Bradway magnaflux” and hoping Mason was a fast healer, word came down from the Moore household that Mason had contracted or was showing signs of that dreaded teenage malady “text message thumb”. Oops, sorry Mason. It was mononucleosis. Ouch! When it rains, it pours. Team FnF stood down and then stood by our driver by simply telling him that the car would be ready when he was. So, there you have it FnF fans, the condensed version of events between the Chico fair race of May 23 and Golden State Challenge #24 on August 22 – a three month hiatus from the sprint car wars. Released by his orthopedic guy but still showing the effects of the mono, Primetime showed up for a little showtime fun at the Placerville bullring along with Alan, Tooch and the rest of the World Famous Pukin’ Dogs of Team FnF. Even to the casual observer, the race car looked awesome! A redesigned graphics package that featured more old style black was intended to put a little swagger back in the team and it looked tight! Prime hopped into his black and cream driving suit that featured the FnF logo patch and Mason Moore Racing on the outside leg seam and announced he was pumped! Or as pumped as the mono would allow him to be. Mason Moore Racing has a couple of options when it comes to 410 power, and tonight the x1 would be powered by the Shark assembled 410. Since team FnF knew what the motor would do, we concentrated our efforts on fine tuning the chassis as the car had been apart for most of three months. Tooch was doing the Digipac shuffle as Mason and the sprint car were pushed off for mud pack whereupon he quietly announced the brakes were terrible.Alan quickly bled the brakes while the crew readied the car for hot laps. After the session came the same reply of no brakes. Uh oh! Thinking we had left the brake troll at Petaluma earlier in the season, the team bled the brakes again and pushed Prime down to the infield for qualifying. Mason was 16 out and tripped the timing lights for a 10.584 which put him in the 19 slot out of the 25 entries. He cruised back to the FnF pit with the same story of no brakes. What the heck? The team decided to change the master cylinder and since we were in heat #1 there was no time to lose. All we saw were ankles and elbows as the change was made just as the track officials were finishing up the National Anthem. Prime never budged from the cockpit after qualifying and patiently waited while the team juiced up the x1 and got him over to staging. Lining up on the inside of row four put Mason in the seventh position which meant he would have to do some shootin and lootin to make the transfer. On the green and on the gas saw the x1 make a decent start when on lap #3 Sweeney (20j) running fifth got loose coming out of turn two, hit the berm on the back straight and flipped. Primetime avoided the carnage as the track went red and then signaled for a push up the back pit road to allow the crew to wrestle with the brakes once again. Lining up for the single file restart saw Mason and the x1 in the 8 spot as leaving the track meant he would start in the rear of the field. Getting a smooth start, Prime got past Davis (11md) in turns 3 & 4 to finish seventh with partial brakes and earn a ticket for the B main. Back in the FnF pit, the crew bled the brakes once again and put a fresh tire on the left rear and hoped we had the brake troll locked up in Tooch’s ice chest as we pushed Mason off for the B main. Primetime’s qualifying time put him on the inside of row two for the start when Carey (55) pulled off the track in turn 3 on the flag lap. Spooling up for the double file restart, we watched Harvey (15) and Bjork (7b) get together rolling out of turn 4 to bring out another yellow. The 7b headed off the track and 15 tagged the rear on the restart which saw Prime try both the top and bottom lines looking for the sweet spot when race leader Gutierrez (007) went out with a flat right rear. Mason was running second on the single file restart and finished the race without any additional entanglements as the B main second place finisher. Time for the A main saw yet another brake bleed prior to shoving Mason and the x1 out of the pits where he lined up on the outside of row 8 for the start. Twenty-two 410 powered sprinters make beautiful music and everybody was on key as they took the green for the final Golden State Challenge A main for 2009. Lap #1 did not make it into the books before Bloom (27) hit the wall coming off turn 4 and came to a stop on the inside of the front straight. A clean restart saw the field make it to lap two where Larson (83v) spun in turns one and two, and Mason was 15 on the restart. The race made it to lap six where Krum (m5) spun in turns one and two, and Mason was 16 on the restart. Another couple of laps were completed before Harvey (15) whirled off turn 4 and out of the race, and Mason was 17 on the restart. Lap twelve brought trouble for race leader Hirst (6) as Krum (m5) spun exactly where he did in lap #6 and Hirst drove into (m5), flipped and was out of the race.Things looked a little tense down there in turn two when the dust settled, but cooler heads prevailed and the cars were pushed off on the usual single file restart where Mason was 15 The leaders had hardly driven through turn #1 when Forsberg (92) provided the most spectacular pile-up of the race as he tried to pass a couple of cars in the turn without turning and win the race on the restart. Maybe Andy thought he was still at Calistoga as he stood the 92 up on its rear like the space shuttle, spun around and seined up Gregg (16x), Farr (7), and Gutierrez (007). Of the four, Farr (7) was the only dude able to keep his car in the race where he went on to finish in sixth place.The officials declared an open red on the track, so the team gave the x1 a splash of fuel and isolated the left front brake as the brake troll was along for the race after all. Primetime was 11 on the restart just staying out of trouble with partial brakes and letting other drivers self destruct as the x1 has some racing left to do in 2009 (see schedule). On the next lap, Larson (83v) did the moon walk in turn #2 which put him out of the race with two charged yellows, and Mason was 10 on the restart. Another lap down and Zimmerly (94) and Davis (11md) bopped one another in turn #1 to move Primetime and the x1 up to 8 on the restart. Mason took the race car down to the bottom of the track where he finished out the race in 12 place. After gingerly bringing the car back to the pits, he poured himself out of the cockpit and settled into a camp chair to decompress. He looked totaled as one might expect after three months of inactivity as he tried to put some distance between himself and the mono plus the compressed vertebrae. Most of you, including this writer, don’t know Mason very well. However, after observing how he handles himself and what the level of commitment and talent is that he brings to Team FnF, I can safely say this young man has the “right stuff” to be as good as he wants to be. Don’t take my word for it – ask Alan, or Tooch, or Scott, or Terry or any of the World Famous Pukin” Dogs crew that make FnF a serious player in the winged 360 class. Mason is the real deal and he verbally committed to the team to hit the gym in an effort to regain his strength and stamina to finish off the season with an all out effort. The brake troll was discovered hiding in a fitting that leaked fluid onto the headers which quickly burned it off to make isolating the problem more difficult, so we left him in the track dumpster. The current plan is to run the 29th and 5th at Placerville to get things dialed in and then mix it up with the Outlaws at Chico on Sept 10-12 in the Gold Cup. Thanks for hanging in there with FnF Racing and the team sincerely appreciates all of your kind thoughts and prayers on behalf of Mason. We are all going to be stronger as a result. See you at Placerville.

2010 Stats

Starts-15

Wins-0

Top 5's-5

Top 10's-7

Fast Time-2

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