Coe Ready to Compete for a CRA Championship
Special from Team Coe Motorsports
“The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather in a lack of will.” Vince Lombardi
The heart of a champion does beat differently than others.
Team Coe Motorsports driver Austin Coe is convinced that qualifying will play a key role in determining which driver wins the Vores Welding CRA Late Model Sportsman Series Championship at Winchester Speedway. The reason: with the chase competitors as close in performance as any group since the inception of the chase format, all four title contenders are capable of winning the 40-lap race. “I think this championship very well could be decided in qualifying,” Coe said, “Starting on the outside in the first 2 rows will be an advantage so that the car is free, and you can conserve the right-side tires. If you get stuck on the bottom and have to work hard to pass, then you’ll use up your tires and running the leaders down could be pretty difficult. It’s no secret that we’re expecting it to be a challenging race to pass. It’s going to be a critical qualifying session and you’re going to have to be perfect to not miss the inversion,” Coe said. “The guy that’s on pole, if he’s one of the guys that are in the championship fight, it’s going to make their job to win the thing a whole lot easier. Things happen so quickly at Winchester that your spotter can’t always help you to avoid a problem. Just finishing the race and rolling the car onto the trailer seemed like a win at the Labor Day event but that’s not acceptable this time.”
“At the beginning of the year we decided to concentrate on winning the championship and so we didn’t chase weekly points and paid more attention to having quality finishes. We had very fast cars at all the Anderson events and Mt. Lawn, but the finishes don’t show that. It put pressure on us to do better with fewer events left on the schedule so the win at Baer Field was very important for the chase standings.” But finishing well in these circumstances is a difficult task and right now, nobody is giving in to the pressure. “Billy (Hutson) is a former series champion and he races hard every single lap. I know we can race door to door and not take each other out. Of course, on the last lap that might be different. Corey (Setser) has gotten faster all year and he will be very had to pass.”
“We’ll show up at Winchester ready and do everything we can to win. There’s no point getting nervous. You have to go into it trying to win like you would every race, and if we can do that, then the rest is out of our control.”
This is serious drama. Anything can happen. Anything will happen.
“I don’t think anyone has an advantage,” Coe said. “It’s Winchester and the track itself puts everyone on equal footing. You just have to be very close on the set up right off the trailer and not spend practice time fixing major problems. We have made some changes to the car that should help us.”
Mario Andretti said, “If you feel comfortable then you’re probably not going fast enough.” And at Winchester Speedway the fast way around the track is not the most comfortable line. “You have to find the balance between being on the verge of crashing and keeping the car underneath you in order to be fast. I’m absolutely confident that Lyle Johnson and the crew will give me a set up that allows me to drive the car to its full potential. It should be a great show for the fans.”
Ignoring pressure is the way Coe is approaching the event. Don’t pay attention to points, concentrate on your performance, let the chips fall where they may.
“The only control over my destiny is to do the best I can,” Coe said. “It doesn’t really matter what the other chase guys do. It really is about my own performance. I’m really focused on that — focused on being in the moment as much as possible.”
And what a moment it will be.
Team Coe Motorsports thanks these companies for their support: Coe Heating & Air Conditioning, Gary Crossgove Painting, Strebig Construction, Jason Dietsch Trailer Sales, Panacea Powder Coating and Steve Hammond/Cromwell Tools.
Contact Scott Coe at scott@coeheating.com for more information about Team Coe Motorsports.
