Countdown To Pocono. . .

            NASCAR was at Daytona, Indycar was in Toronto, and the racing was great at both places.  While the racing was great, the sanctioning bodies were also handing out penalties, fines, and suspensions this weekend too.  Eventual NASCAR race winner Tony Stewart was found to have an open cooling hose during qualifying, and had to start in the back of the pack Saturday night, though he did win the race, NASCAR still took 6 driver’s points away from him.  AJ Almendinger was temporarily suspended from competition, for violating the substance abuse policy.  Until his “B” sample is tested he will be sitting out of the car.  For his sake, I hope this test comes back negative.  Ryan Hunter-Reay won his 3^rd straight race on Sunday.  The points took a major toss this weekend as well.  Mike Conway had a podium as well, but during post race inspection, was found to have to big of a fuel cell.  10 points and $15,000 later, the team still ran very well and hopefully it’s a sign of things to come.

            As for me, our cars have been loaded up and are ready for their trip to the Pocono Raceway.  This will kind of be like a homecoming of sorts for me; the first road course I competed on was Pocono’s North Course.  NASA will be using the North Course plus NASCAR turns 1 and 2 plus the frontstrech as our course this weekend, 2.5 miles around.

            This weekend is a little bit different for us, while we will be racing during the day; we will be attending “Our Lady Queen of Peace” (Brodheadsville, PA) Church Festival Saturday evening.  I hope we avoid any contact on the track and keep the racecar in one piece during the day, because it will be on display Saturday night.  We let the kids sit in the car and sign some autographs, take some pictures and get some time to hang with our fans.  We also are going to use the time to talk about RAD and why it’s important to live a drug free and healthy lifestyle.

            We should have some good video and pictures from this weekend.  Since the race is so close to home, we will get to have a lot of people at the speedway supporting us.  Friends, family, old crew members, are going to be there to see us race.  My Mother, who is kind of our team photographer, is able to come this weekend as well.  I always enjoy when she comes, because there are always great shots that she is able to get.  She is going to get a test, she is used to oval short track racing, but this is a whole new dynamic.  Look for her photos on the site after the races.

            Speaking of the http://www.justinonderko.com/ site, one of our sponsors- OC2 Interactive- is currently working on designing our new site.  I actually had a conference call this afternoon and I can’t wait to see the site go live.  Special thanks to Michelle for taking time out of her day to discuss the progress of the site.  OC2 is the real deal- if you need web based design- they will create what you need.  Check them out www.oc2interactive.com- look at some of the work they’ve done, it speaks for itself.

            Next week we will review the race weekend and how it went.  We are prepared for a good weekend, hopefully the weather stays nice, but we are bringing our rain tires just in case.  I kind of hope it does rain- I really enjoy racing in the rain- you have to be very technical and precise with your inputs- you’re on the razors edge the whole race.  Till next week. . .