Doug West & The Month of May?

As everyone is aware Wilkins Motorsports did not start the month of May off the way it would have liked. To recap, Sandy wrecked on his first pass at Piedmont dragway at the Big Dog race. Then he found a used front end in Ohio and went their and back on a Saturday while using a lot of that high priced diesel. He then traveled to Chapman's Auto Body in Conover, NC to drop off the race car. A week later, (today), Sandy arrived by at Chapman's to pick up what appeared to be a brand new race car. As always Chuck did an outstanding job in a minimal amount of time. Now we are ready for Mooresville.

That leads us to our buddy Doug West. Doug began helping us at the beginning of the year and has been a great help in every area. He eventually went to work for Sandy at his engine shop. Last Thursday night while testing a friends 87 Camaro at Benson Dragway, Doug was involved in a single car wreck. We still do not know what happened. He made a pass in the 4.80 range at 145mph and the car ended up wrapped around a light pole at the far end of the shut down area. He was unconscious and had to be cut out. He is in a Raleigh hospital in intensive care. Doug is in a drug induced coma with a shattered elbow, a fractured eye socket and swelling on the brain. We did get excellent news today. They say that while he is still in a drug induced coma, he is giving the thumbs up to the doctors commands. That is wonderful news.

As you have read, the race car has become the least of Sandy's worries. His main concern now is to see his buddy get better. I can not believe I don't have a pic of Doug in my archive. If you go to the photo gallery on the home page and click on the first place at Rockingham gallery, y0u can see him there. Doug's pic is #28 and #30. Please remember to say a prayer for Doug West today. Come by Sandy's pit and ask about Doug this coming weekend in Mooresville, NC. See you there.

Don

A MOTHER OF A WEEK! Part 2

Hello everyone, i'm finally able to finish my story. As posted in the last blog we spent 15.5 hours and 1045 miles on the road last Saturday. Well of course Sunday was mothers day, and you have to spend mothers day with your mom! So i hopped back in the truck and headed two hours east to Wilmington. I arrived in Wilmington at 10:45 and headed straight to the surf club in Wrightsville beach. The entire family met at 11:00 for a wonderful mothers day lunch! It is always great to spend time with the family, but holidays and special occasions are my favorite. Mothers day is always special but my sister had some incredible news! She informed me after lunch that i was going to be an uncle again, YAY!!!!!!! The picture above was taken just after she told me. I'm a little red in the face. Lol. She had obviously kept the news close to her chest, as she was now in her 10th week. I am sooo excited for her and her husband Joel and son Banks. As you can see Banks is a precious nephew and will make a great big brother. That afternoon my mom, dad, and myself went downtown to visit my aunt Jane and uncle Dave. My cousins were there also and we had a great, but short visit. That evening it was time to head back to Raleigh, so back in the truck and west bound i head. Next weekend "Road Trip!"

Stay tuned
Sandy

A MOTHER OF A WEEK! Part 1

Hey everyone, Don normally handles the blogs but i decided to get everybody up to date with whats happening. Like the title says it has been a mother of a week, literally. It has been busy at the shop which is great, but trying to juggle work and play is extremely hard. Wednesday was my scheduled day to take the CDL driving test. My instructor made it seem like i was taking the SAT all over again! Good news, i passed on the first try. Towards the end of the week Mark Malcuit called and let me know that he had a 2003 cavalier nose for sale. It just so happened i was in the process of purchasing a new nose from GM so the call came at the perfect time. Mark and i made a deal over the phone, so off we go!

So here it is Saturday morning 4:45am, Jeff Whitley and myself head off towards Strasburg Ohio to pick up Marks cavalier nose. We make one stop for breakfast and arrive in Strasburg at 12:30pm. Mark Malcuit is a fellow top sportsman racer, and as you can see has a top notch operation. He is also one of the only other guys running a small block in top sportsman, therefore we have allot to talk about! The front end looks like what we need, so we load it up, grab lunch and head back to North Carolina. It was a marathon trip but we were back at my house at 9:45pm Saturday night. Ok so here are the stats!

Travel distance - 1043 miles

Travel time - 17 hrs. total 15 1/2 driving time

Miles per gallon - 9.5

Average mph - 67.3 mph

So we made it back in time to watch the last 70 laps of the Darlington race, very exciting. Believe it or not i was not tired, but i decided to head to bed around 11:30.

Sunday morning 8am, ROAD TRIP! but i will have to let you know about this one in another blog.

Sandy

Hero to a Zero!!! Ouch!!!

Hello everyone. If you keep up with Sandy, you probably know he crashed the Cavalier last Thursday at Piedmont Dragway. Sandy was OK, but car will need some plastic surgery. We will call this blog, Hero to a Zero.

I say Hero to a Zero because this was the first race after the big win at Rockingham. Sandy was still flying high with emotions and this was the first pass down the track. The car drove toward the center line and when Sandy lifted, the car bit hard left toward the wall. Sandy corrected and the car came around on him. From the starting line it looked as if he was going to save it and then the concrete wall jumped out at him. The front end supports were bent and broke along with pushing the fuel cell into the radiator. One of the fuel cell bars also broke. After checking everything out, Sandy said let's fix it.

With help from Chuck Chapman of Chapman's Auto Body, the front end was reworked and bandaged up to make another run. Everyone performed their routine maintenance while Sandy worked on the fuel cell situation. Can you believe he made it up for the first qualifying run. A 4.39 pass after crashing an hour before. On his second pass he stepped it up to a 4.34, but that fell short of the record 4.27 bump. Sandy ended up 14th and had to run Todd Tutterow in the consolation race. Sandy goes 4.36 to Todd's 4.18. Race over.

While the wreck could have been worse, Sandy estimates it will cost around five thousand to repair the car. He chose to sit out the Madd Dog race at Farmington Saturday night to go over the whole car. He is looking at six weeks on a 04 Cavalier front end. So he will probably miss Milan, Michigan. It will take some time, but he will get it fixed and come out strong as always. If you want your name on a new front end, now is the time to help. Sponsors needed.

Don

A WIN AT THE ROCK!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello everyone,

What a great weekend we have had. Sandy has finally gotten the monkey off his back with a win at the Rock. He has a few runner-ups there and has even put a car on it's roof, but a brides maid no more.

The weekend did not start as we had planned. Our first qualifying run produced a 7.14 @ 191 mph. While doing routine maintenance we found a leaking head gasket. That required the removal of the cylinder head and replacing the gasket which took less than 30 minutes. The second and third qualifying runs were back to back 6.81's @ 199 and 203.06 mph, which put us in the 6 th position. This year IHRA shortened the field from 48 cars to 32. Sixth is not bad for a 432 cubic inch small block.

Sandy drove like a mad man this weekend with his worst reaction time being a .020. We were looking back at the runs and noticed the finals were the only time Sandy ran the car all out. The first round was our lucky round when Mike Westmoreland red lighted and we shook the tires. Second round we ran Stacy Hall and he had ignition problems just past half track. Third round was John Benoit who when into tire shake. Benoit was dialed 6.67. Crazy! In the semi's we ran our friend from Ohio, Glenn Butcher. Sandy was .008 to Glenn's .042, giving Sandy room at the finish line. And in the finals he ran Travis Harvey in Russ Farmer's Race Tech 68 Camaro. Sandy was .012 and Travis was -.003 red. Sandy ran it out to a 7.16 @ 191 mph. And the crowd went wild. I know myself, Lucien and Doug went wild.

Like I said, we had a great weekend. It seems like the race weekend takes forever to run, but once it's over the celebrating goes by to fast. Sandy's dad Lucien was able to come down for Sunday and he could not have been any more proud of his son. He took a boat load of pics that we will have up on the photo gallery in a day or two. This was Doug West's first national event helping us and I think Sandy may have spoiled him. This was also the first national event with the new race support transporter (Jeff :). Again, this is the best investment Sandy has made.

Sandy said his phone has been ringing off the hook with congratulations and he wants to thank everyone for that. We all had a blast and we can't wait until the next race. See you there.

Don

Runner Up @ Big Dog! Sort Of !!!

What's Up!

Our last blog was from the rain out at Mooresville. Since then we had an off weekend and prepared the car for the Big Dog at Piedmont Dragway. It is usually held on the first Thursday of every month, but it was postponed a week due to rain.

How about that runner up? Well, it was sort of in the consolation race. We ran a 4.35 on the shake down run. Then came back and ran a 4.35 on the first qualifying run. Going into the second and last qualifying run, the bump was a 4.31. Sandy tuned it up a little and it went straight down the groove with a 4.33. Unfortunately that did not get us in and the bump ended up being a 4.30.

In the consolation race Sandy out ran Jack Gaddy and Jason Harris with two more 4.35's. In the finals against Robbie Kiziah, Sandy ran his best number of the day. A 4.32 against Kiziah's 4.34. Hole shot loss. That will hurt your heart.

Well, that is sort of how we got runner up. We can say we made it to the finals of a race. Of course the pay wasn't as good and we didn't get any press on Piedmont Dragway's web sight. You still need to go to their sight and check out all the hot photos Van Abernathy took of Sandy's car.

That's it folks. Rockingham is this coming weekend. Hope to see you there!

Don

Love That Awning!!!!!!!!

It is Sunday evening and we are back at the house. The race at Mooresville was called off this morning at 10a.m. It was rescheduled for Saturday, April 26th , the week after Rockingham.

As the title says we love that awning. The thing is we were thinking of how nice it would be to have all that shade. Well, we have used it the last two races and it's main purpose is to keep us from getting wet. The other plus is the heated trailer. It has been extremely cold and windy these last couple of races. I am so glad Sandy stepped up.

Friday it was perfect. I believe it was around 78 degrees and no wind. Everyone had shorts on and we all sat around outside socializing. Jay Zimmerman was parked next door and these guys brought us breakfast each morning. Thanks Tommy! Keri hung out with us and helped entertain my son Logan. He will be six on April 2nd. He thinks Sandflea is the bomb!!! Sandy's friend Katie from Huntersville met us all at the Texas Roadhouse Saturday night. She was way cool but has never been to a drag race. Maybe next time. Rain, rain go away!

We are going to the Big Dog at Piedmont Dragway this Thursday, April 3rd. We qualify on Thursday and race on Saturday. Hopefully we will be their on Saturday. The competition is going to be tough this year. I have already heard of someone going 4.11 @ 182 mph in Big Dog trim. If you have never seen a Big Dog race, it would be well worth your time and money. The crowds are huge and cars are crazy. See you there!!

Don