{"id":2718,"date":"2010-07-09T05:55:19","date_gmt":"2010-07-09T10:55:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/?p=9076"},"modified":"2010-07-09T05:55:19","modified_gmt":"2010-07-09T10:55:19","slug":"derek-ramstrom-survives-long-day-to-finish-2nd-at-thompson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/2010\/07\/derek-ramstrom-survives-long-day-to-finish-2nd-at-thompson\/","title":{"rendered":"Derek Ramstrom Survives Long Day To Finish 2nd At Thompson"},"content":{"rendered":"

Derek Ramstrom Survives Long Day To Finish 2nd At Thompson<\/strong><\/p>\n

THOMPSON, Conn. — Derek Ramstrom of West Boylston, Mass., finished second in the 30-lap Super Late Model feature at Thompson International Speedway on Thursday night, July 8. Ramstrom battled a myriad of problems in practice and a tight race car in the feature to post his fifth top-2 finish in seven starts at Thompson this season. Unofficially, Ramstrom took the division’s points lead, breaking a three-way tie with Mike O’Sullivan and Dennis Maxfield as he tries to win a second consecutive Super Late Model championship. Ramstrom started third in the field and battled eventual winner Larry Gelinas for the lead throughout the caution-free feature event as part of Thompson’s NASCAR Whelen All-American Series program.<\/p>\n

WHO: Derek Ramstrom, West Boylston, Mass.
\nWHAT: No. 35 Charter Communications\/Matthews Truck Service and Towing Chevrolet
\nWHERE: Thompson International Speedway, Thompson, Conn. (.625-mile oval)<\/p>\n

STARTED: 3rd
\nFINISHED: 2nd
\n
\nNEXT: July 13, PASS North Series Bastille 200, Lee USA Speedway, Lee, N.H. (.333-mile oval)<\/p>\n

***********************<\/p>\n

DEREK, IT WAS A LONG DAY. TALK ABOUT ALL THE PROBLEMS YOU ENCOUNTERED.<\/p>\n

We definitely had a pretty crazy day. We got there, and we had trouble with the shocks right off. We couldn’t get gas in them, so we were running around like animals trying to get that figured out. Then in the second practice we went out and the rear end of the car caught fire. It was the fuel cell, so I pulled into the pits and they told me it was the fuel pickup line that was loose, and we fixed that.<\/p>\n

Doing all of that, we missed one of the practices, so (Thompson Speedway official Ben Dodge) gave us some extra practice time. As soon as I went out on the track, I could tell it was down a little on power. I called my crew, and the pickup line was all burnt. I guess it was crushed on the inside, so we had to change that.<\/p>\n

It was definitely chaos. We had no crew chief and he’s also our spotter, so my dad had to spot for the first time. But I’m really impressed with the whole crew and the way they kept working so we could get out of there with a second-place finish.<\/p>\n

SO, YOU HAD NO HEAT RACES TONIGHT AND YOU WENT OUT WITHOUT GETTING BACK ON THE TRACK?<\/p>\n

Yeah, and we didn’t have our crew chief tonight, so I was calling the shots. I over-tightened the car a little bit. We were pretty tight right from the beginning, and it was tough to pass Larry. He was really quick. With our crate engines, when the car gets really tight, it becomes really hard to pass.<\/p>\n

DID YOU THINK YOU HAD A SHOT TO CATCH LARRY GELINAS FOR THE WIN?<\/p>\n

We were right there, side-by-side right up until the final lap. I was working him and working him, and I really thought I could get him. I thought his car would slow up more than it did. I was right there though, and it was a thriller right to the checkered flag.<\/p>\n

With all the power Larry has under that hood, though, it was going to be really tough to get by him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Derek Ramstrom Survives Long Day To Finish 2nd At Thompson THOMPSON, Conn. — Derek Ramstrom of West Boylston, Mass., finished second in the 30-lap Super Late Model feature at Thompson International Speedway on Thursday night, July 8. Ramstrom battled a myriad of problems in practice and a tight race car in the feature to post […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[196,41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-connecticut","category-thompson"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2718\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}