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Brandon Wimmer – Gaining Ground!
(Bill W) April 20 – After struggling in the Ohio All Star opener at Attica
(OH) Raceway Park on April 11, sprint car pilot Brandon Wimmer and his
owner, Rick Ferkel, rebounded with a solid charge through the feature field
last Saturday at the Fremont (OH) Speedway. This week finds the team
competing in local events at Attica and Fremont, before they head for
Pennsylvania with the All Stars the following week.
The night started with a familiar refrain. The #0 was not handling in time
trials. The result was a 19th place showing in the 31-car field. “We
struggled in qualifying,” said Brandon. “We were off on setup, but in the
heat, things started to click and the car felt good. They say we drove away
with it.”
Drive away with it he did, after starting outside row one and beating
pole-sitter Brandon Martin to the checkers. Unfortunately, his qualifying
effort still haunted him, and he started outside row nine for the 30-lap
main event. “We tightened it up a bit for the feature, because it was
slicking off,” says Brandon of his setup decisions before the feature.
“Otherwise, we didn’t do a whole lot to the car. We were good in the heat.”
The car was dynamite the first 15 laps, and Brandon cut through the field
nicely, gaining ten positions up to eighth. “We had the car where I could
run high or low with it, and it was the best it has felt in awhile,” he
says. “We gained most of our positions the first half of the race though.”
The car went away a bit and Brandon was hanging on the last half of the
race. He finished eighth, a good run after starting eighteenth. “The
handling of the car went away a little bit the second half of the race,” he
says. “We didn’t move forward much after that, and stayed right where we
were. It was definitely an improvement from the last couple of weeks that we
ran.”
This weekend marks the start of local Fremont/Attica Sprint Title (FAST)
racing, and the #0 will be on hand at Attica Friday and Fremont Saturday. On
May 1 and May 2, the All Star Circuit of Champions will head to Williams
Grove Speedway and Lincoln Speedway in central Pennsylvania. Brandon’s
confidence is growing each time out in Ferkel’s machine. “We’ve definitely
struggled with the car the last couple weeks, but we’re getting there,” he
says. “We’re getting to a point where we can work with it and drive forward.
We were quite a ways off before. I think we’re getting to a point where we
can start running up front.”
Brandon and Rick Ferkel would like to thank the following sponsors for all
their help: Shorty’s Truck Repair, Smith’s Farm, Goodyear Tires, Griff’s
Engines, Kear’s Speed Shop, Huggins Cams, BRODIX Heads, Barnes Oil Pumps,
Prism Lubricants, Zeis Land Development, Butlerbuilt, Simpson, and WRT Web
Designs.
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