08/24/07

First night back out!!!!  Maple Grove Test & Tune

A NOTE FROM ANN

I crashed our 1970 AMC AMX just about three weeks ago at Cecil County Dragway in Rising Sun, MD.  It is hard to explain the emotion that goes along with crashing a car that took my husband and me hundreds of hours to complete.  Not to mention the mentally draining aspect of wondering what I could have done differently, to avoid the crash.   I don’t know what we would have done with the car if it was totally left up to us.  Would we have fixed it right away, fixed it over the winter, pulled the mill and put it in another car, who knows what we would have done.  The fact is we didn’t have to decide.  As we pushed the wrecked AMX down the rest of the quarter mile to get it off the track, one of the people helping us push the car turned to my husband and said “I will fix this”.  Dave Coleman, fellow racer and owner of Purnell’s Body Shop in Elkton, Maryland got the ball rolling for us.  We got the car back to the pits and we started to figure out how to load it on the trailer when Dave came over and said, “I can just call my rollback”.  We were apprehensive at first because we didn’t get a chance to think about or discuss what we wanted to do.  Dave pursued it and we said ok.  At that point Dave requested that we get the front clip off of the car.  In about two hours, me, Steve, and friends, Tim Horney, and Fuzz Scheid got the front end apart.  Tim and Fuzz jumped right in and took charge of getting it apart.  We needed that because Steve and I were kind of all over the place.  As we were taking it apart, many people came over and expressed their concern for me and offered help to us.  The rollback came and the car was loaded and off it went to Purnell’s.  In less than two weeks, Dave checked the frame, fixed the hood, painted the hood and fenders and blended the doors and had the car aligned for us.   We still can’t believe their generosity and we are extremely grateful to both Dave, Erica and all the people at Purnell’s who did the work and got the car back to us so quickly.  There is really no way for us to express our appreciation and thanks to them.   
When we got home the kindness continued.   Many of our friends sent us parts and offered us assistance in everyway imaginable.  One of the hardest to replace parts that got destroyed on the car was the grille.  It is a one year only part and it is not reproduced.  Robert McCorkle out of North Carolina sent us a repairable one for nothing, and Brad Brunner from Indiana sent us headlight doors.  All of them, along with many other people offered more help and parts then we could use.  Our friend Tory Shellehamer was at our garage several nights helping us to fabricate the hood mounts, align the fenders, weld brackets on the new radiator, and anything else that needed done.  Our friend Jeff Horst spent 10 plus hours fixing and painting the grille, align body panels, and offered support in many other ways.  Tim Horney fixed and painted the bumper for us.  Donnie Horst put the stripes on the car for us. We received many emails, phone calls and messages expressing concern for me and offering assistance to us in more ways conceivable.  We received well wishes from people that we knew and didn’t know.  Getting the car back together was a team effort, thank you everyone.  
It is less than three weeks since the crash and the car has been fired, looks better than ever and was raced at a test and tune last night.

08/26/07

RAM Racing, Mason Dixon

 

 

 

 

09/01/07

Cecil's Street Car Shootout - Time to face the snake that bit us one month ago.

Our nerves were definitely on edge pulling into the track, but it ended up being a GREAT day!!

 

 

 

 

09/22/07

RAM Racing - US13 Delmar