WENATCHEE ARCA EVENT TO GET LEWIS’ SEASON STARTED

Source: Gary Lewis Media Relations/dp
Date: 05/01/2008

While The Sign Factory USA Impala made a few practice runs prior to being snowed out for an event at Evergreen Speedway, Lewis indicated his car was ready for racing and brings that attitude to Saturday’s 125-lap main event.

“Our car was very good. We could have just made some set-up changes and loaded back up for Wenatchee but we took this month-long break to go back to work on the car and try to make it even better. I took the front end off of the car and made some improvements in regards to our aero package that should be good for this weekend,” Lewis said.

Some teams have been able to get some track time in preparing for the season opener but Lewis sees that as a mixed blessing.

“Testing is always nice if you can afford to go out and do it,” he said. “We have only tested maybe two or three times in my career and with the way this crazy weather has been I think it will help us to have not done a lot of that now.

“Based off how we’ve started the season in the past we have usually run strong at the openers and knock on wood we can do that again.”

As the defending series champion and winner of this event one-year ago, Lewis feels no pressure to back up last year’s accomplishments, he added.

There’s no pressure at all. We treat every race as its own and try not to get all wrapped up in points and such. Our main goal is to just be as competitive as possible and to keep learning as much as we can.

“With an additional practice session this Friday night we can go out and try some new technology as we’ve switched to a real high-end spring package from Swift Springs USA that should help the handle of our car.”

A change to the spring package is about the only thing that will be different for the team this season, according to Lewis.

“We have the same great Nutter Racing Engines pit crew as last year, thankfully. For the car we updated the body with an ARP Impala and the Swift coil springs but we’re real happy with our Leary Racing Products shock package so we left that alone.”

Should Lewis capture a late model touring series championship this season it would be his third consecutive title allowing him to join the ranks of Jeff Jefferson and very select group who have reached that plateau.

Aiming for a third title is a good goal to have but may not be in the cards for 2008, Lewis noted.

“That would be one heck of an accomplishment however with some of our sponsor commitments we will have to miss at least one ARCA race later on in the season that will obviously take us out of the hunt for that.”

The ARCA West Late Model Challenge Series season opening event gets underway Saturday night at 6 PM on the high-banked .250-mile Wenatchee Valley Super Oval.

To learn more about Gary Lewis Racing log onto www.garylewisracing.com

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