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USCS CLAYHILL NATIONALS
OCTOBER 17, 2011 --- This past weekend, T.J. Herndon was invited to pilot the #54 Super Stock owned by Charles and Carolyn Morrisett from Arkansas. Also, T.J. got a call from engine builder, Terry Tucker, informing him that one of his steel head engines had been repaired and could be picked up Friday morning. T.J. and crew worked feverously to prep his IMCA car to allow him to get a few laps on the repaired engine and hopefully pick up a few bucks in the process. At the conclusion of Friday night’s qualifiers, Herndon found himself qualified to start 9th in the Hobby Feature as he struggled to get comfortable in the #54 car. After starting on the pole of his Modified qualifier, the Atwood Outlaw managed to run second for the majority of the race before falling back to fourth with just two laps remaining after being pinned to the wall by an overly aggressive driver’s all-out effort to finish 2nd in a Heat race.
On Saturday night, in the Hobby Main event, Herndon continued to warm up to the #54 car throughout the night’s hotlap sessions as the Morrisett team worked to dial the car in. In the Feature, the #54 continued to get faster and faster as the laps wound down with Herndon emerging unscathed with a 6th place finish in the event won by the #10 of Barry Daniels. Daniels was followed to the stripe by Richie Hickerson, Claudie Cook, David Cooper, Harold Sullivan, T.J. Herndon, Devin Bawcum, Richie Berryhill, Scott Cunningham with Dale Nelson rounding out the top ten. In the Modified Feature, T.J. rolled the dice and tightened the car up in efforts to make a stab at a decent finish. Unfortunately, the track was pretty much used up by the Modified Feature and began to lock down on the bottom. Herndon’s car was so tight that he was experiencing major problems getting the #1 to turn. After riding in line on the bottom for a while, Herndon decided to once again roll the dice and move to the cushion in attempt to advance his position. Once again, the results of the gamble were unfavorable as he continued to loose positions the longer that he stayed in the outside line. Rather than returning to the bottom and risking damage to his car that had gotten too tight to get through the corners, Herndon chose to pull to the infield and watch the remainder of the event in which he was eventually scored 16th. The afore mentioned Modified Feature closed out the Clayhill Motorsports 2011 season with the #12 of Lucas Lee taking home the big check. Lee was followed closely to the line by 2011 Modified Track Champion, Bart Richardson. Following Richardson were Matt Cooper, Kenny Lovins, Michael Lee, Shane Akin, Michael Turner, Brandon Poppenheimer, J.C. Waller with Jimmy Halford rounding out the top ten.
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UP IN SMOKE
SEPTEMBER 24, 2011 --- In what seems to have become the theme of the 2011 season, T.J. Herndon once again experienced engine problems this past weekend in Columbus, MS. The UpFront Performance team traveled to the “Baddest Bullring in the South” in Columbus to participate in the $2,000 to win Modified portion of the Magnolia State 100. After a bad pill draw for qualifying on Friday night, Herndon found himself starting at the rear of the field in the 3rd Qualifier. In the Heat, the #1 Shaw by Outlaw was on kill as Herndon muscled his way to the front early on in the eight lap qualifier. Herndon was unable to execute a pass on the leader as the track had been one lane up top for quite some time. Although Herndon was able to pull door to door with the leader in every corner, the momentum of the high line proved to be too much to overcome as Herndon settled for second and locked into the Main event with title to the 6th starting spot. As the green waved on the Main Event on Saturday night, Herndon once again scurried to the front and was applying pressure to the leader in the opening laps before loosing a right rear brake rotor which caused the #1 to spin as it entered turn one.
Luckily, another car had actually brought out the caution previous to Herndon’s spin allowing him to reassume the second position on the restart. As the Feature wound down, Herndon could tell that something was awry with his power plant as he slipped into the 3rd position and maintained a comfortable lead on the 4th place challenger. With less than two laps remaining while occupying the 3rd position, the engine of the #1 Shaw by Outlaw erupted in a cloud of smoke midway down the back straightaway. Once again the Atwood Outlaw would be forced to watch the conclusion of an event from the infield. After the smoke cleared, the Modified portion of the Magnolia State 100 would be conquered by Mississippi’s Billy Collett. Following Collett to the stripe would be Randy King, Jason Markewitz, Noah Daspit, Ryan Allday, Rusty Duncan, Blake Koenigsberger, Jeff Scott, Todd Gray, with Rex Michaels rounding out the top ten. Herndon’s engine failure, which was later to be diagnosed as a dropped valve, relegated the Atwood Outlaw to a 15th place finish. The remainder of Herndon’s season is in question at this time due to all three of his engines being out of commission. T.J. is currently in negotiations with engine builders in efforts of turning his engine program around before the 2012 season. Herndon remains optimistic and is presently striving to get something together for the 5th Annual Texas Winter Nationals at Royal Purple Raceway in Baytown, Texas. The Baytown event in mid November happens to be the final Southeast Region as well as the final USMTS event of 2011.
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16th ANNUAL SCHOENFELD HEADERS STREET STOCK CHAMPIONSHIP
SEPTEMBER 17, 2011 --- This past weekend, T.J. Herndon parked his Modified and took on the role of hired gun as he traveled to Batesville, Arkansas to attempt to qualify for the 16th Annual Street Stock Championship sponsored by Schoenfeld Headers. On Thursday night, T.J. laid down the 5th fastest lap of the 95 drivers on hand to vie for the twenty eight available starting spots in the Main Event. After the event experienced a rain-out on Friday, it was determined that the remainder of the qualifying process as well as the Main Event would all transpire on Saturday. On Saturday, by virtue of 5th fastest time, Herndon started on the pole of the fifth qualifying Heat and managed to hold the point from flag to flag while securing his $800 start money as well as a spot in the Main Event. Later in the evening, a dash was held among the eight Heat winners to set the front four rows of the Championship Feature. In the dash, Herndon advanced to as far as second at one point only to be voided by a caution flag. At the conclusion of the dash, Herndon managed to cross the stripe in the sixth position and locked up a starting spot on the outside of the third row.
In the 50 lap Main Event, Herndon paced himself early-on and fell back to as far as the 9th position before starting an advance toward the front. By lap 20, Herndon had advanced solidly into the top five and occupied the 3rd position. With the event being uncharacteristically riddled with cautions, and the fastest groove being the outside lane, Herndon struggled with positioning on re-starts in efforts to avoid getting hung on the inside with no way to tuck back in line. Herndon bounced between the 2nd and 3rd positions for the next twenty something laps before turning up the heat on the #3x of pole sitter Wayne Brooks with five laps remaining. Just as Herndon opened the gap on the 3rd place car and closed tightly on the leader’s rear bumper positioning himself for a pass attempt, the caution flew on lap 48. By virtue of occupying the 2nd position, Herndon was destined to restart from the inside lane with a good possibility of being hung out with 2 laps remaining. On the restart, the Atwood Outlaw decided it was “go time” and executed a slide job on the start as the field exited turn four. Although the #3x car made minor contact with the rear bumper of the #35, the pass for the lead was successful and Herndon assumed the point just two laps away from a $10,000 payday. Unfortunately, as Herndon exited turn two just as he had the previous 47 laps, driver error allowed the #35 to hang the berm that had been the demise of several other cars throughout the night. As Herndon made contact with the irregular surface, the car sucked into the outside concrete wall resulting in a flat right front tire with one lap remaining. Herndon carried the #35 pit side and replaced the right front tire and returned to the rear of the field with one lap remaining. As the race resumed, it was the #11x of Richie Tosh that crossed the finish line first to secure ownership of the $10,000 check. Following Tosh to the line would be Jeremy Russell, Shawn Walsh, Mikey Bell, Chuck McGinty, Ray Phipps, Brad Buck, Joe Payne, Brad Helms with John Bubbus rounding out the top ten. In the final remaining lap, Herndon managed to advance from the 17th position into a 14th place finish at the conclusion of the event.
Asked after the race if he was upset by the turn of events, Herndon responded. “No, not really. Not for me anyways. I just hate it for Dee (Kelly), J.D. and Doug. I kinda feel like I let them down because they gave me a car capable of winning this deal. Luckily my car owner is a driver too. He knows the ups and downs of this business and he said that he’s not gonna fire me so maybe I’ll get the opportunity to redeem myself. I guess it would be easy to get down over a deal like this but I’ve won a $10,000 race before. There was 95 guys here this weekend and a lot of them haven’t won, led or even made the feature of a $10.000 to win so I try to just take it as it comes and not get to greedy. I just appreciate Dee Kelly for giving me the chance to get back in one of these things after a couple years on the sidelines.” For full results and the latest news associated with Batesville Motor Speedway, log onto www.bms-ar.com.
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2011 IMCA SUPER NATIONALS
SEPTEMBER 10, 2011 --- This past weekend, T.J. Herndon made his annual trek to Boone Speedway in Boone, Iowa to try his luck in qualifying for the IMCA Super Nationals. Starting this past Wednesday, Herndon along with 253 other Modified drivers would compete in thirty Qualifying Heats each day with only the winners of each Heat moving on to the Qualifying Feature each night. Out of the thirty drivers that qualify for the Feature each night, only the top eight drivers automatically lock-in for the Main event on Saturday. The Atwood Outlaw’s week got off on the right foot with second and fourth place finishes the first two days but bad pill draws coupled with mechanical problems later in the week resulted in a failure to qualify for the Main Event. In driver accumulated points, Herndon sat ranked 36th out of the 254 drivers in attendance after night one. After night two, he was still ranked 46th before falling to 93rd by week’s end.
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SUPER NATIONAL SHAKE-DOWN
SEPTEMBER 3, 2011 --- This past weekend, T.J. Herndon took his IMCA package to Clayhill Motorsports to get in a test run before leaving for Iowa on Monday. Herndon was quite pleased with the performance of the Shaw by Outlaw chassis although he was probably 150 horsepower down to most of the front runners. In the Main event, Herndon started eighth and immediately moved to the high line in efforts to stay out of trouble and see what he had. Herndon rode the rim to as high as the fifth position before some of the cars started making the race three wide. Knowing that he had no chance for a win, Herndon immediately backed it down and took measures to save his ride for the trip north. As the checkered flew over the field, Bart Richardson would secure his 7th Feature win of the season followed to the line by Matt Cooper, Ronnie Vernon, David Esch, Michael Turner, Brandon Poppenheimer, Jamie Mann, T.J. Herndon, Mike Gardner with James Cooper rounding out the top ten. The Atwood Outlaw left out Monday afternoon for a two week swing that starts Wednesday afternoon in Boone, Iowa as he is scheduled to compete in the 2011 IMCA Super Nationals. From Iowa, he will move on to Batesville, Arkansas to pilot the Dee Kelly owned Super Stock camaro in the 16th Annual Schoenfeld Headers Mid-America Street Stock Championship on September 16th & 17th. After Batesville, Herndon plans are to move on to West Plains, Missouri on the 18th to see if he can make the Versus televised, USMTS Hunt field with his IMCA package with the help of an 8” spoiler. For live audio of the 2011 IMCA Super Nationals each night, click onto the following link: www.DirtTour.com.
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MODIFIED MOTOR MADNESS
AUGUST 27, 2011 --- This past weekend, T.J. Herndon and crew took advantage of the opportunity to stay home and compete for $10,000 at Clayhill Motorsport’s 3rd Annual Open Wheel Modified Motor Madness. On Friday night, Herndon kicked the weekend off with a terrible pill draw at the first $5,000 to win event. With the top three transferring to the A-Main out of the qualifying heats, Herndon advanced to 5th after starting 9th in a twelve car qualifer. In the second round of qualifiers, Herndon managed to advance the #1 GRT by Phillips into the runner-up position to race his way into the Main event and lock up the 21st starting spot. With the track surface beginning to lock down to one lane on the bottom, T.J. decided to run the opening laps and determine if it was possible to advance toward the bigger money at the front of the field. After determining that an advance was futile, Herndon decided to pull to the infield and save his equipment for the following night. As the checkered flag flew at the conclusion of night one, the $5,000 check would be written to Hunter Rasdon as he was crowned the only two time winner of this annual event. Following Hunter to the stripe was Shane Akin, Robby Arnold, Steve Picou, Bart Hartman, Chad Kinder, Bart Richardson, Randy Todd, Shane Hebert with Michael Lee rounding out the top ten.
On Saturday night, Herndon decided to swing for a homerun with a major set-up change after being unhappy with the cars balance on the previous night. With a slightly better pill draw and a decent starting spot in his qualifier, Herndon quickly discovered that his experimental set-up was not what he had hoped for. Already frustrated with the cars handling, Herndon was door slammed by the #0x car as they entered turns three and four on the first lap. With the pent up frustration of his car being junk and the fact that the same car had beat and banged a couple of his friends the night before, the Atwood Outlaw determined that the time had came to hold him accountable. As they entered turn one, Herndon refused to lift as he jacked-up and turned the culprit around before calling it a night with a damaged radiator. As the second 40 lapper of the weekend came to an end, it would be the veteran Late Model pilot, Bart Hartman taking the win in the Larry Shaw house car. Following Bart to the line would be Shane Akin, Hunter Rasdon, Johnathan Rowan, Tyler Townsend, Bart Richardson, Chad Kinder, Peyton Taylor, Ronnie Vernon with Cade Dillard rounding out the top ten. For complete results along with the latest news associated with Clayhill Motorsports, log onto www.clayhillmotorsports.com. This weekend, Herndon plans to return to Clayhill to shake down his IMCA Shaw by Outlaw before leaving for Boone, Iowa the first of next week for the 2011 IMCA Super Nationals.
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