High Point Racing rolled into Las Vegas Thursday morning with the same plan as millions of tourists a year: win and win big. The four car late model team had spent the previous three days prepping the cars after Irwindale’s open competition in which they finished with all of their cars in the top ten. Earlier in the year, drivers of the #55 and #56, Jace Meier and Chris Carmody, had come to the Bullring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and finished first and second, respectively. This time, HPR brought four cars and hopes to finish 1,2,3,4.
In practice Thursday night all four cars proved to know exactly what it takes to get around the Bullring as quickly as possible. In his first trip to the Las Vegas track, Ray Robinson took only one practice session before he was turning times equal with those of his “Blue Crew” teammates. “I know with High Point that I have top notch equipment and it gave me a lot of confidence coming into this weekend. I’m just trying to get comfortable in the car without trying to go out and be a hero,” Robinson said.
By Friday morning the team walked in with the confidence to get things done in qualifying. After a short practice session High Point Racing had three cars running in the top eight fastest times. Jace Meier in the #55 was unable to practice due to sponsor obligations so team owner Tim Huddleston jumped in the car to shake it down.
Practice times determined the qualifying group for the new European style format adapted into this year’s Fall Classic. At the end of the first session, Huddleston’s time of 15.738 had his #50 Justice Brothers Racecar Factory late model sitting first on the leader board. When the second group rolled out, teammates Robinson and Carmody each took four laps to place themselves second and third respectively. Despite missing practice when it came time for his qualifying, Meier was able to post a time that landed him an outside front row starting position. Bumping his teammates to third and fourth, Meier’s effort solidified all four High Point Racing cars into the top four qualifying spots. Keeping the original goal in mind, owner Huddleston said, “This is pretty awesome, but the weekend’s not over yet, and we came here to win.”
As of this morning the blue crew was one of the first teams to arrive at the track and continue preparation for the main event. “With some practice time today, the goal is to make sure that the cars can be just as fast on the long run. We should all be pretty close right now, we’re just fine tuning,” Carmody said of his #56 team.
Main events start tonight at 6:00 pm at the Bullring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Look for High Point Racing to create some great racing up front and a great finish to their weekend efforts. For more information on High Point Racing contact HighPointRacing@hotmail.com.
