Brian Brown – Victory at Knoxville Sets Up Busy Week!
(Bill W) May 20, 2013 – Brian Brown and the Casey’s General Stores/FVP #21 team came one spot short of perfection last Saturday night at the Knoxville Raceway. First, came a thrilling win from tenth in the 360 main event. The 410 feature was up next, and in a classic Knoxville showdown, the Grain Valley, Missouri driver settled for second in the end. This week, the schedule gets intense for the team.
Things started out a little shaky when you qualified 11th with the 360 at Knoxville Saturday.
It’s tough sometimes with the 360. We had a motor from Jaymie Moyle that we hadn’t run. It was kind of a guessing game. I’m not sure if the track went away, or if we weren’t as good as we needed to be. I felt like the laps were decent. Qualifying 11th makes your night tougher with the (feature) invert always being eight now.
You started the heat fourth and drove to third.
Our heat race had some good cars with Kaley (Gharst), Logan Forler, Tony Bruce and Nate Van Haaften to name a few. We didn’t show where we needed to be speed-wise. I wasn’t really catching Kaley or Logan. The guys kept working on it.
Obviously, you found something for the feature.
(Crew chief) Chad (Morgan) had some ideas different from what I wanted to do. I started tenth, and I knew it would be tough, especially with Jason (Johnson) on the front and Clint (Garner) and Jeff Swindell in front of us too. There were some guys who can win anywhere they go in the country.
It looked like you gained some spots early on.
We were able to get to sixth on the first lap. We had a yellow there and I kind of got settled in. I ran the bottom. If I’m going to beat Donny Schatz at the Nationals, I’m going to need to do that, and that’s our goal…to get better down there.
Nate and Jason were setting a good pace out front. There were a lot of green flag laps, which got things into traffic.
We were able to get to third, and Jason and Nate were running well. I kept watching the board and we were down to five or six laps. I didn’t think I’d be able to do it. Lapped traffic can win or lose you races, and it seemed those guys slowed down a bit in it. The seas kind of parted for me, and Jason got pinned behind a lapped car.
It had to be awesome to get that first win at Knoxville for 2013 after coming so close.
It was great. Obviously, we had people there from Casey’s General Stores and FVP. Don Long from Searsboro Telephone Company provides our 360 engines. He’s a huge part of our program. We’re really proud to have him with us and that win’s for him. I’m really proud of all our guys, my crew chief, Chad Morgan, Travis Marsch, Greg King, Mark Clemons, Glen Wignall and my grandpa George Lasoski.
Your team put in overtime running two classes Saturday.
Doing double duty is not easy. It’s a lot of work and preparation. Your jobs are doubled. Those guys make it look easy. They’re the ones that deserve the pats on the back.
You picked up where you left off with the Outlaws a week earlier, coming out 23rd and timing in second quick with the 410.
Our Charlie Garrett engines make my job qualifying a lot easier. It’s such a big part of what you need to do, and it’s been a strength for us this year.
After you ran from sixth to third in the heat, you lined up seventh for the feature.
I knew this feature would be just as tough as the one we just ran. Sometimes it’s tough to hop from car to car. You have no time to talk with the team about what needs to be done.
Davey Heskin, Terry McCarl, Bronson Maeschen, Dusty Zomer and Lucas Wolfe were setting a pretty good pace up front.
We were able to get to fifth or sixth before we had a yellow. I thought the track was a little tough to pass. It seemed like it was getting better. We had some issues trying to pass a couple of cars that I thought we were better than at the time.
You got up to fourth, and then a yellow came out on the white flag lap. That gave you a chance at the win.
If it wasn’t for the last yellow, I think we were going to run third or fourth. That was a breath of fresh air, and it let me get up on the wheel to try and make something happen. We were able to make a run there in one and two, and that gave us the opportunity to get to second in three and four.
Did you think you had a shot at Davey for the win on the last lap?
I honestly thought when I got to second, that I was going to win. Davey did a really good job of disguising what he was going to do on the last lap, and it worked out for him. He did what he needed to do, and we ended up second.
You have to feel good about your team on nights like this.
From where we were four or five years ago to now is amazing. I think we can compete for wins wherever we go now, whether it’s 410’s or 360’s. That’s huge for my confidence as a driver.
You get to race in your hometown Wednesday, and that will start a busy week.
It will be good to get back to Grain Valley (Valley Speedway) on Wednesday with the ASCS National tour. Thursday can’t come soon enough. Getting back to I-80 (Speedway near Greenwood, NE) is great. That ranks up there with Knoxville as my favorite track. McCool Junction (NE, Junction Motor Speedway) is a place I like too, and we’ll be back at Knoxville on Saturday. Sunday and Monday, our options are kind of open. This is when the race season really starts, and we get really excited!
Category: Brian Brown, Driver Updates
