Authors

• David Thompson (9)
• Jim Schreier (3)
• Larry Clement (1)
• Matt Carter (5)
• Travis Carter (2)

I was definitely excited about going to Pocono, for a few different reasons. Number one was that we were coming off a win at Toledo. I had been there many times when I was a kid, hanging out in the pits, and would never have imagined that I would be racing there. It is an awesome race track to drive. It's shaped like a triangle and has three straightaways - one seems about a mile long. Every corner is different and we can use an overdrive transmission there, so we can shift gears in the corner, sort of like a road course. We didn't get to test, so when we got on the track for practice, it was a very surreal feeling. I couldn't believe that I was driving a racecar at 200 mph down a 1 mile straightaway at Pocono. Man, what a rush. The Stine car was pretty good in practice. We ended up 7th quickest and backed that up in qualifying with an 8th place run.

I was definitely excited about our chances in the race. I knew the car was good. I knew that as I got more laps, I would get better, so I was confident about the race. The one thing that was different is that it was a lot hotter and the sun was out for the race. In practice, it was cooler and overcast. That really changes how much grip is in the track and how well the car handles. Well, maybe it was my inexperience or something, but we were not nearly as good in the race as in practice. The car was a handful; it was sliding all over the place. We stayed around 5th or 6th for most of the first half of the race, until I tried to get a little too much out of the car and smacked the wall off of turn 3. That was very disappointing. It flattened the right side of the car, so we had to pit and fix the damage. That dropped us all the way back to 23rd place with 20 laps to go. Although we had some damage, the car wasn't that bad. We worked back up to 6th place. When it looked like we were going to get a good positive finish out of a bad day, our bad luck struck. We cut a right rear tire with a lap and a half to go and had to limp it home for a 12th place finish.

After all that, I was just happy to get a chance to race at Pocono. Thanks to Stine and Larry Clement, my dreams of racing at this level have come true and hopefully will continue to grow.
Now we are headed off to Michigan. We had to work on Sunday to fix the damage, since we are racing the same car this week, and we have to be there on Wednesday morning. So it's work work work. I have a great race team, with great people who are dedicated to me and what we are trying to accomplish. So I am definitely looking forward to the rest of the season.

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Stine Racing driver, Matt Carter is the subject of a feature story on the official NASCAR Web site, www.nascar.com, by senior writer Raygan Swan, as part of their "future stars" series. Click here to check out the story. It certainly is cool to get to work with such a great, young driver. I think we'll be seeing a lot of Matt for many years to come!

The Clement Racing team is looking forward to a great race at Pocono this weekend (Saturday, June 7th, 1:00 p.m. ET, and will be televised on the SPEED channel at 10:00 p.m. ET)! After our team's big win at Toledo a couple of weeks ago, we're excited to get back on the track.

Be sure to check back after the Pocono race to get an update on our team's performance!

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Although the victory at Toledo was sweet, the celebration was short-lived.   Travis Carter and his team - consisting of Shorty Edwards, Darrell Dodson, Jimmy King, Garrett Lambert, and Charlie Stevens - went right to work preparing for testing at Michigan International Speedway this week. 

The crew did a great job of setting up this former Cup car acquired from the Yates camp, a car which the #46 team has not run yet.  SunTrust Rookie Matt Carter says that the changes made to spring rates and overall setup resulted in a really well-balanced car.  The results showed this week, as Matt was the third fastest in the field of 16 drivers to participate in the full day of testing at Michigan International Speedway.

As Travis has explained, practice doesn't always make perfect.  The team will evaluate how they tested, and then they have to be ready to make a number of adjustments to the car when the team returns for practice and qualifying on race weekend. Race day conditions can vary significantly from testing, and conditions can change profoundly even between qualifying and the actual race, making the whole process a lot like trying to score a bullseye on a moving target.

In another week or so we'll know a lot more about how good this new car really is, as this is the same car the team will run at Pocono Raceway on June 7.

Hats off to the entire #46 team for their hard work and dedication in their quest for another win!

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That win on Sunday was really special. Matt had a lot of pressure, with it being his first year of driving for the team that won so many championships in the past, and being new to ARCA.

I talked to him before the race and told him we were proud of everything he's done so far and, if we didn't win this one it was no big deal because we know we'll win one next time. But I know he still puts a lot of pressure on himself because he wants to please his dad and the sponsors.

We're real proud of Matt and the team's win on Sunday. That field of drivers was unbelievable. David Ragan had just driven the night before in a NASCAR Sprint Cup race and Ken Schrader is one of the best short-track drivers there is. That was a tough bunch of drivers and that makes our win even more special.

This was Matt and the team's first win in ARCA, first win for Clement Racing and first win for Stine Seed as a sponsor. That's great. It also marked the 15th consecutive year that Clement Racing has won one or more races during a season. Sunday was a very special race for all of us.

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The win on Sunday was a very big thing for our team. The car was good, handling-wise, but we didn't have the speed I'd like to have seen, so we had some struggles. Our pit stops weren't great but they were better than most. We were able to get out of the pits in front of three or four other guys and that put us in third place before the rain delay.

The rain wasn't necessarily a bad thing. You learn that there's nothing you can do about it, so you just have to wait it out. But a rain like we had on Sunday does wash away the rubber that's built up on the track, making what we call a "green condition."

After a rain, the track is clear and the guy that can get out in front has a big advantage. The car runs better and there's nothing in your way.

What's frustrating are the restarts. That always gives the guy behind us a chance to hammer down on us...and one guy did. If we had lost the lead at that point, it would have been difficult to get it back.

Our practice at Toledo wasn't great, but that's OK. Sometimes when your practice goes well, you don't want to mess with the car and, because things can change overnight, the race doesn't go as well as the practice. If you run into problems in practice, you go back and work more on the car to get it right. So a rough practice isn't always bad.

Now that we have this win, we can kind of relax a little, but not really because next we're on to Pocono.

You know, it might seem to everybody that we run a race, have a party when we win, then just wait for the next race.

Actually, we go back to the garage and work on the car to fix what didn't work as well as it should have and get it ready for the next run.

To me, Pocono is the most difficult track. I'm hoping we get a chance to get a test run in before the race, but I don't know if that'll happen.

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