Catchfence

Concord, North Carolina (9-19-11) – Sixteen year-old Clint King continues to raise eyebrows as he earned his second consecutive ARCA Racing Series Menards Pole award Saturday night at Salem Speedway in just his second series start for Venturini Motorsports.

“Another pole award is really cool. I can’t believe we have two in a row; I didn’t think we had the car to do it at this track. I thought we’d be in the top five here, but I didn’t expect to be on the pole. I just laid down a heck of a lap again. I can’t say enough about this team and their commitment to perform,” said King.

Unfortunately, King would not get the opportunity to use his fast car and early track position to test his skills and pressure the field for a chance at victory. As the green flag dropped, King was immediately challenged from behind giving up his top spot to eventual race winner, Chris Buescher, before crossing the stripe on lap-1.

The pressure would continue as the field of cars attempted to fall in line and find their rhythm for the 200 lap event.

It didn’t take long for the first six qualifiers to separate themselves from the pack and take-off within the first few laps. However, it soon became evident that setting a race rhythm was not on everyone’s agenda and getting to the front early was the priority.

By lap-7 the rookie was being challenged hard as the third place car driven by Chad Hackenbracht, unsuccessfully tried to drive under and clear his No.25 Warehouse Design Chevrolet coming out of turn-2. The pressure continued down the back stretch as King’s car was battered from the side. The constant blows delivered to the side of King’s car proved too much. The hard contact ultimately cut his left rear tire sending the King hard into the outside wall between turns 3 and 4, causing major damage and taking him out of contention.

“I feel terrible for the guys on the team. They put their heart and soul into preparing an unbelievable car for me and it was taken away from us so early and unnecessarily. We had a great chance tonight. I’m very disappointed with how everything played out!”

With a severely damaged car behind the wall, Billy Venturini made the quick decision to do whatever it took to make the repairs and salvage as many laps as he could for his talented rookie driver.

“Clint has shown me so much in the limited time he’s been with our team. He’s got phenomenal talent…he might just be 16 years old but his maturity level and determination goes far beyond his age. He’s out there to prove himself and is not afraid to back down to anyone,” said team owner, Billy Venturini.

Showing their team strength and competitive drive, the Venturini crew shined as they made the improbable repairs in just 77 green flag laps allowing King to rejoin the race. Although down laps and out of contention, King surprisingly picked up where he left off and ripped off some of the quickest laps of the night.

“I can’t say enough about the effort of these guys tonight! We could’ve easily packed it up tonight and went home. It wasn’t even an option for them,” added King.

King picked up ten spots after returning and finished the race in the 21st position.

Clint will make his third and final start of the year with Venturini Motorsports at Toledo Speedway in the season finale on Sunday, October 16th. The race will be aired live on SPEED Channel at 2pm EST.

Warehouse Design Inc.

Warehouse Design, Inc. is a Nationally recognized material handling specialist providing Concept through System Acceptance. Based in North carolina, warehouse design inc. provides material handling Design and solutions to corporations of all sizes. visit them at WWW.WAREHOUSEDESIGN.NET For more information and CLIENT CASE STUDIES.

- Venturini Motorsports Press Release