Friday, September 07, 2007

Oberg Podiums, Douglas Crashes at Crandon

Team AMSOIL Super Team member Mike Oberg left the World Championship weekend with a podium while teammate Scott Douglas left with a few bruises and some twisted steel.
Oberg, who drives the AMSOIL/Kumho Chevy in the Pro 2wd class, followed up a fourth place finish in Saturday's World Championship race with a second in Sunday's class race. Oberg led the field for the first few laps before overall point's leader Scotty Taylor took over the top spot. In the cup race, Oberg again grabbed a hole shot, and was the second Pro-2wd to finish, but with a full field of Pro-4x4 chasing him down, he was credited with a fifth place finish.

"We had to change our gearing on Saturday night to get some more bite," said Oberg. "We had some great starts this weekend, but Taylor was unbelievably fast in all three races. We feel confident that we can make up the final 13 points at Wheatland to take home the Pro 2wd championship."

In the Pro 4x4 class, Douglas was the show on Saturday. Unfortunately, it was for a monstrous crash in the first turn of the race. Douglas, who was holding the leading heading off the start, was slammed by Adrian Cenni, pushing the AMSOIL/Kumho Ford F-150 into the bank and starting a spinning, free-wheeling flip that send the truck over the k-rail. Douglas was able to walk away from the crash buy was not allowed to use his back-up truck on the restart.

"Adrian didn't see me, is what I figure," said a bruised Douglas following the race. "I had the line and he just scooted up into me and sent me spinning. Luckily we are one of the few teams with a back up truck as there is no way we'll get this one ready to go for Sunday. I'm a little sore in the neck area and have a couple of bruised cheeks, but we'll be ready to go tomorrow."

Douglas put his back-up truck on the line for Sunday and found a great start come off the land-rush starting line. Douglas was poised to grab the hole shot, but he got side-ways on one of the jumps and broke his forward drive. The move made his truck drive like a 2wd, thus losing valuable seconds in each tight corner. Douglas did finish fourth in the class race and followed that up with a fourth place finish in the BorgWarner Cup race, the event he won in 2006.

AMSOIL did receive a World Championship effort over the weekend. Dave Waldvogal took home the honors in the Super Stock truck class. Super Stock truck driver Dan Baudoux also ran well at Crandon, being the top running Super Stock truck in the BorgWarner Cup race.

The WSORR will continue with the final two rounds of racing being held in Wheatland, Mo. on September 22-23.

Douglas and Dan Vanden Heuvel will be representing the AMSOIL/Kumho Super Team at the NBC-aired CORR race on September 13-14 in Antelope Valley, Calif.

Until then, we'll see you at the races,

Jeremy Meyer
AMSOIL Race Program Manager