(Special from Jon Beach Racing)
Watervliet, Michigan (Wednesday, October 21, 2015): When the schedule says Winchester, IN there are a few things you can guarantee. The first is that there is going to be a great race weekend and the second is that Jon Beach has had the date on his calendar circled for months. Beach being a racer on a tight budget always does whatever is in his power to make the most of a trip to the track; at Winchester that happens to include racing in three different divisions with his template bodied late model.
The Winchester 400 weekend was kicked off on Friday with the JEGS/CRA All-Stars Tour headlining the opening night festivities. Beach would start the 100 lap feature from a solid 13th position out of 25 cars on the high banks that night. By lap 10 Jon had worked his way up to the eighth spot when he found himself on the outside of a three wide situation with Trevor Berry in the middle and Scott Tomasik on the bottom after Tomasik jumped the start and dove under Berry forcing the trio to be three wide. Beach was able to avoid catastrophic damage as he bounced around the infield in turns three and four. Unfortunately his night would end just eight laps later as the driver determined something was compromised in the steering of his Extreme Indoor Kart Racing machine.
One to never back away from hard work Beach and team started making changes and repairs to get his car ready to roll for racing on Saturday as they would enter the Vore’s Welding CRA Late Model Sportsman 50 lap event. Jon was able to get his car straightened out and qualified 9th for the longest race of the sportsman’s season. This evening would see Beach complete all 50 laps as he brought home a very respectable 5th place finish. Running on a different tire from the other two classes Jon was not able to spend nearly as much time adjusting his car for this race as the other drivers had. Also on Saturday was qualifying for the main event, the 44th running of the Winchester 400, for the ARCA/CRA Super Series.
Being over 150 horse power under the competition which were Beach was able to qualify in on time without taking a provisional for the prestigious 400 lap event. Using a crate engine is a huge disadvantage on a track with so much speed such as Winchester. Despite the massive power difference and not having a professional pit crew for the live action pit stops Beach never gave up and clawed his way to a very impressive 13th place finish. All in all Jon turned 440 laps, by far the most by any driver on the high banks of Winchester Speedway, earning him the title of Iron Man of the 400.
Jon Beach would like to thank all of his sponsors who helped make his weekend possible:
Extreme Indoor Kart Racing
Stearn’s M-15 Garage
American R.V.
Soloshot Cameras from dealer Matt Boman
All-Star Performance
Lane Automotive
