BORENSTEIN RACING MAKES HUGE GAINS

 Last week, the Borenstein Racing Team was eager to hit the track with their virtually brand new car, however after the first three races of the season were rained out, weather again forced the cancellation of Friday night testing. With the minimal amount of practice time given on race days, they could only pray that they would not suffer from the typical “new car blues”. Unfortunately their prayers were not answered and pretty much anything that could go wrong, did go wrong as the team spent the entire day trying to sort through electrical and fuel problems. The problems prevented the team from being able to qualify, forcing them to start the first race of the season last in the 34 car field. With the motor not running at full strength, driver Nick Joanides was forced to just ride around and salvage a 20th place finish.

Finally after more than a month of rainouts, the weather stayed clear and the team was able to hit the track on Friday night for some much needed track time to work through the bugs and dial in a new car. With the electrical and fuel problems solved, the first lap times on the track were in the 19.7 second range. By the end of the night, they had improved to 19.3. On Saturday, the team was able to improve to 19.2 second laps in the only practice session, which put them 22nd on the chart. Working with Jackson Race Cars, more changes were made to the car just before qualifying and Nick posted his best lap in the car with a 19.02 second run that put him 16th on the 36 car grid. 

Satisfied with the progress the team had been able to make in the very short amount of track time they’ve had with the car, the goal was to just survive the race and bring the car home in one piece so they could continue to make gains next week with more test time. Nick did however manage to steer clear of a few accidents and picked his spots to make some timely passes on the race track and bring home a solid top 10 finish. The first top 10 finish for car owner Loren Borenstein and the Borenstein Racing Team in just their second start.

 “I’m really happy with the progress we were able to make in such a short amount of time. It takes most new teams several races or even seasons to get up front and for us to go from the back of the pack last week to a solid top 10 in just one week is great! Jackson Race Cars worked their tails off this week to make the car better and their effort really paid off. I am very thankful to Loren Borenstein for this opportunity and all the effort he has put into giving us the equipment we need to run up front and am happy that we were able to get him a good finish so quickly. I see great potential with this team and think we are very close to being a consistent top 5 team” said Joanides.

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