CORONA, California – It was the second weekend of races for the Lucas Oil Off Road Racing Series at Lake Elsinore, and Casey Currie was ready to take on the Pro Lite class at his home track. After the first two rounds in Arizona in his backup track, he was expecting to have his primary truck back in working order for rounds 3 and 4.
Unfortunately, due to a rule change by Lucas, the production crank in the engine now was changed to a full race crank which turned the off-the-shelf time frame to 9 weeks. Therefore, the new engine was not delivered in time for Lake Elsinore, so he, once again, had to run his backup truck – but they were hopeful since Casey was able to pull out top-five finishes in Arizona. Sure enough, Currie had an incredible race on Saturday when he started on the last row and still came across the line in another top-five position. Sunday, however, his luck was not there and he got caught up amongst some young drivers and had to limp around the track to finish. But with all the adversity, Currie and his team showed great resolve to find a way to make this weekend a positive one.
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Rounds 3-4 from Lake Elsinore
After Friday’s practice and Saturday’s qualifying, there were many changes that Casey’s crew made to the truck to get it in better running order for the Lake Elsinore track. He had qualified in the top 10, but failed the post-qualifying tech inspection so he was sent to the back of the field to start the race. This did not discourage Casey, though. At the drop of the green flag Casey started working his way through the field. By the fifth lap, he had already worked his way through over half of the field. Over the next 8 laps, he found a way to make it into the top 5 and use his experience to stay there. Casey’s experience, perseverance and ability to find a way to the front no matter the circumstances showed through in Saturday’s race, and he was hoping that it would carry through into Sunday’s race.
Sunday’s qualifying was incredibly close, with only .7 seconds between first and tenth. Casey was in that top 10 grouping, and knew it was going to be another race to the front. At the start of the race, Casey got a good jump and looked like he was going to get to the front quickly; however, in the tight, right-handed turn three, Casey got tangled up with some of the younger drivers and had to pull into the hot pits for his team to look at what broke. They were able to get his truck back moving, but he was only able to turn laps at a slower pace. Ultimately, he was able to keep himself on the track, but he was forced to finish early after completing a few more laps.
After the race, Casey commented, “it has been a mixed weekend. Today was frustrating getting caught up in that group and breaking so early, but that is racing. But I am focusing on yesterday’s race – coming all the way from the back of the field to finish in the top five. There was a lot of incidents that I was able to stay out of, and my crew gave me a truck that I could drive to the front with. For having the backup truck, again, we are finding a way to still turn in some good results…so I can’t wait for when we have the primary truck back in working order for Utah.”
In May, Casey’s next test will be rounds 5 and 6 in Utah for the Lucas Oil Off Road Racing Series. The Currie team is going to do all that they can to make sure the primary truck is ready to go for that weekend’s races; but, no matter what adversity he and his team face, Casey knows that his team will give him a good truck, and he has the experience and ability to race to the front.