11/11/2018
Lauren Butler
End Of Year Summary And Banquet
As the 2018 season is officially over, I would just like to take a minute to reflect on the season as a whole. We just had a wonderful night on Friday at the 2018 Jennerstown Banquet. Congratulations to all of the champions as you all worked hard to win them!! I recieved 6th place in points (not our best year) but we had a lot of curves thrown at us for sure. We had a shot at possibly 2nd in points, but had a couple wrecks that we had to push Nikita aside in order to get Medusa ready for her events. Therefore, we fell backwards in points. It is disappointing to not come home with any wins at all, but some years are great, and others not so much. We were able to make history again at Jennerstown Speedway with Angie Kimberly being the first time two women have finished P1 and P2 in a feature race, this was also her very first win in the division! Very exciting to be a part of that. We finished out our year in the Street Stocks with 12 Top 10's, 7 Top 5's, 3 Heat Wins, and 0 Feature Win's. Talk about a busy season as well trying to get the Super Cup ready for its debut at our home track in July! There was so much hype over this event because we were also pulling double duty with the street stock. Well this ended up being a flop because of the little quirks started when the fuel pump went out after only putting 4-6 laps on the car in practice. So our debut night was postponed til the following race which was in Virginia. This event was televised on MavTv, so this was very important to us as well. We had a great day down there, then the attention turned to our oil temperature as Medusa was running hot. So I made the decision to run until I felt it was best to bring the car in. We only completed 14 of 50laps, and mother nature claimed the 2nd 50 lapper. I did not want to blow the engine up as we were trying to make it last the rest of the series scheduled 2 races. These races are also twin 50-60 lappers. We brought her back to the drawing board to figure out how to make her better for the 2nd attempt at my home track debut. This time at Jennerstown, the quirks just kept coming from the car just dying on the track, to the gear shifter popping out of gear bringing the field to a couple yellow flags. It was embarrassing and frustrating but, we got it figured out but were unable to finish another race with this division. We adjusted more and found a temporary fix for the 2nd race. I started in the back and things started going right for us. I managed to pick up my first Top 5 with the Super Cup and to us, that was a win!! Our final duals for the season were back in Virginia and we wanted to end our whole season on a high considering the first visit. I qualified inside the top 10 and picked up more then a half second. This again was a win in our book for such a challenging division and being no where near powered like the rest of the competitors. In the first of 2 i was able to lock up 8th place and in the 2nd race, 7th!!. Thats 2 top 10's and of course it wasn't without issues as our radios gave us a lot of trouble and caused high tensions with my spotter and myself. This was scary as I was driving blind and had to rely on my senses and 17years of experiance. I was still new and didn't wanna get in the leader's way, but still wanted to be able to race a good line to gain seat time experiance. So with that being said, I was able to bring home 3 Top 10's, 1 Top 5, and 13th in season points over 47 drivers between the North and South divisions. We have learned so much in this short period of time and are ready to get started making changes to be able to come back strong for the 2019 season. We have made TV with the MavTv station which is exciting for exposure opportunities!!! I of course want to take the time to thank ALL of my sponsors, and the people that have helped us out between the divisions. My sponsors are as follows:
- Edlin Automotive Services, Inc
- Night & Day Sealcoating (Shana & Tawaan)
- Ligioner Trucking
- Hillsview Landscaping
- Kimberly Contracting
- Roof Repair Experts
- Cornwell Tools (Bill Veschio)
- Motive Parts of Homestead, Inc
- Fleegle's Graphics
- 3 C's Signs
- Shootin' Bull Tavern
- Myracepass.com
- #TeamChampion
I hope to see these sponsors back on the cars for 2019!!
I want to specially thank my mom and dad Linda Lea (Logistics), and Eddie Butler (Crew Chief) for believing in me and allowing me to get into this sport and continue my potential career. My mom keeps us all fed and organized and makes sure I don't forget things( which happens a lot). My dad works countless hours on both cars, especially now with me in school. He amazing and has never steered me wrong and has taught me everything I know and still learning. I wanna give a shout out to my spotter Justin Guy who has previous experiance with racing and started out as a fan and is now the person who keeps me out of trouble on the track. He and I have made such a great bond on and off the track which will only fuel our team. Another person is Dave Shultz, he also started as a fan who reached out and now helps keep my girls looking beautifully detailed and sparkly as well as become a great friend. I've gained 2 big brothers out of them who want the best for myself and the team. Dustin Gursky has become another part of the team and family from being former competiton to part crew, he has his modified to worry about, but always helped us out at the track and took the time out of his schedule to make the trip to Virginia to help us out. Rick and Nolan(Hillsview Landscaping) and Shana and Tawann( Night & Day Sealcoating), these sponsors have also become great friends and have taken the time out of their schedules to join us on the road a few times to see what this is all about and give us some great laughs. Without ALL of these indiviuals Edlin Motorsports would not have gotten as far as we have so far. To the owners of Jennerstown Speedway/Rush Series, I think there is still more to come and I still think this is a great pairing!! The track is beautiful and is gaining national recognition which is Huge!! Most importantly THANK YOU TO ALL OF THE FANS!!!! You guys are what keeps us drivers going and keep the tracks going. I am forever greatful to all the same and new faces I have/keep meeting along the way!! New and exciting things are in the works for 2019 and the first of many is The World of Wheels car show!!! I will announce the date as it nears. I will still be running the street stock until she sells but my focus has turned to the Super Cups and being hopefully a fierce competitor. I apologize for the book, but there was a lot to cover lol.~Lauren53 #Medusa53 #SuperCupStockCarSeries2019 #EdlinMotorsports #TeamChampion
Submitted By: Lauren Butler
