Matthew Hicks Racing News

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Matthew would like to thank his sponsors and crew:

His friend, engine builder and tax man, Lyle Hunter. Lyle stepped up with his own engine when ours broke at the 1st practice session of the season. Lyle has been there all year for us. Lyle's engine technology and power was right up there with all the big guys that have been building engines for competitors at Toyota Speedway of Irwindale for many years.

Dean Kuhn of Oceanside Transmission and Dalenzie Torque Converters.

Darren Moore, Matthew's longtime friend who's been an integral part of our crew all year.

Matthew's Mom, Sister and Dad for all their help.

Mike Hagerman racecars.

Tim Marrs of Ocean Instruments.

Dean Kuhn of Oceanside Transmission and Dalenzie Torque Converters.

Steve Teets of STR.

Toyota Speedway of Irwindale. Its officials are top notch and the facility is second to none.

And lastly, to our fans. Many of you have been watching Matthew progress from the Legends cars at Cajon Speedway to the King Taco Super Trucks and now the AC Delco Super Late Models. We thank all of you for the emails and calls on Matthew's accomplishments.

See you in January of 2009. Hopefully we can run a full season next year. We'll be searching for those sponsors that can make that happen.

September 13th,

Well, after a long week of fixing a wrecked racecar, we rolled out for the first practice. Matthew got exactly one half lap and found that he had a bad vibration. He came off the track, we checked many things but couldn't locate any glaring problems. We bolted on four new race tires and sent him back out. Unfortunately he still had the vibration. At this point practice was over and we went through the car with a fine tooth comb. We found the problem, fixed it and got Matthew ready to qualify.

We had no idea what the car was capable of because he got no practice and we were coming back after fixing a wrecked car from the week before. That was just what Matthew needed. He let it all hang out and ran his fastest lap of the season. He ran a 18:38 and he was only 6th fastest. Rip Michels, the 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2007 points champion came out with a new car and ran a 18:050. No one was even close to Rip. 2nd fast was 18:298, 3rd was 18:359, 4th was 18:378, 5th was 18:383 and Matthew was 18:388. As you can see, Matthew was much better qualifying for this race day.

Both twin races for this night were only going to be 25 laps with no invert. In the first race, as expected, Rip got out to a short lead and stayed about 6 car lengths ahead of 2nd place. Rip lead the entire 25 lap race. Matthew passed one car and finished 5th. He was the only car in the top 6 to make a pass.

For the 2nd 25 laps race, Rip again pulled out to a short lead but was challenged early by Andy Allen who made the pass on Rip but Rip took the lead back after a few laps and pulled away. Matthew had a scary moment in turn one of the 1st lap. Dan Moore must have thought he was clear of Matthew going into turn one because he pulled to the inside from the outside 3rd row and ran into Matthew, causing him to get sideways and lose two spot. Matthew never could recapture those spots and ended up 7th because the car just wouldn't turn on the bottom of the track.

Matthew finished his season with five top 5's and one win in the very competitive Super Later Model Division. He's looking forward to the Toyota Showdown in January to showcase his talent on National TV on the Speed Channel.

September 6th,

We went back to our regular way of practicing and qualifying because the weekend before didn't work for us. This worked well for Matthew. He was the fastest car in practice. Once again though, he would find himself only the 7th fastest qualifier. Even though he was only 7th, he was but a few hundredths of a second from 3rd fast and only two tenths off the fast qualifier and point leader, Nick Joanides.

Matthew would start 7th for both main events. In the first main event, Matthew moved his way forward until he got to one of the Camping World West drivers who was in one of the three Speed Wong cars entered in the race. This proved to be a bit of a struggle as the Camping World West driver put Matthew into the wall coming out of turn four twice as he was passing him on the outside. Matthew wasn't going to let this driver ruin his race day so he set the Camping World West driver up and finally made the pass cleanly. Matthew then moved his way up into the 4th spot where he would finish the race. Another good race and another top five for Matthew.

The second race ended quickly as that same Camping World West driver thought he could win the race from 3rd place on the first lap coming out of turn two. The Camping World West driver took out the leader causing a couple cars to spin and sent the 2nd place driver in the championship points, Travis Thirkettle right into Matthew ending Matthew's second race without even making one lap. Matthew's car went up and over Travis, costing Travis a chance at the point’s championship and leaving us with a badly wrecked car.

August 23rd,

We tried something a little different this race weekend. We practiced on old race tires and kept the new tire for qualifying. This didn't work at all for us. Matthew was 9th fastest in practice after saving his new tires for qualifying. This is something we needed to try because we haven't been able to get into the top 5 for qualifying. Again we qualified slow, 10th. Now we would have to start the first main event in 10th and try to work our way forward. Matthew worked hard to get around one car for almost 30 laps before he was able to move forward. Unfortunately he had been passed by a car so he was still in 10 when he passed his first car of the race. Now it only took him a few laps to make up a few more positions. Matthew finished 8th but was moved to 7th when the 35 car was disqualified from both races after a technical inspection of the carburetor and restrictor plate found non-conforming parts.

Matthew would start the second race in the 6th position. At the start of the race, Matthew's outside line didn't go and he ended up falling back to 8th before the car came in and he drove up to 4th place. That's as far as he could go. He caught the 3rd place car but was unable to make a pass because the car got way too tight in the middle of the corners. Matthew wound up in 4th place. No a bad night for the rookie Super Late Model driver. We have to find a way to help him improve his qualifying so he doesn't have to start so deep in the field each race.

We'll be back to Toyota Speedway of Irwindale on September 6th for another twin race night. Hope to see you there.

August 9th,

After winning our first race in the Super Late Models, now we had to show it was no fluke. It was time to back it up with another good finish. We did. The car was fast right out of the trailer. We posted the 2nd fastest time in practice. Qualifying was another story, again. For some reason we can't seem to get that other 10th of a second to put us up front. 4th through 9th in qualifying was separated by less than a tenth of a second. Unfortunately we were on the slower side of that group. Matthew qualified 9th out of 25 cars.

Matthew would start 9th in the first race. He made his way to 6th but could not get past the 5th place car for many, many laps. Matthew pulled up high midway through the race to let Travis Thirkettle by and see if he could make the pass then Matthew would try to follow him. That didn't work either. Matthew finished 7th in the first race. The second race would start straight up which meant he started the second race in the position he finished the first race.

Matthew got a great start in the second race. He wasted no time passing that same car he couldn't pass in the first race and continued moving forward. Matthew kept picking cars off one at a time until he was in 2nd place by about lap 30. He was now trying to take the lead from point leader Nick Joanides. Matthew ran side by side with Nick until a crash mid pack brought out the yellow flag. This hurt Matthew because on the restart the motor sounded like it was coming apart so Matthew backed off. When he realized the motor wasn't losing power he had already fallen to 3rd place behind David Beat and Nick. Matthew finished 3rd. He wasn't sure what had caused the motor to go south but it turned out to be just a broken header. Matthew was excited to beat his friend and former Nationwide Series Driver and Southwest Tour Champion, Auggie Vidovich who won the first race of the night.

It was another good race night for the Matthew Hicks Racing Team. We'll be back to try for another win on August 23rd at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale. Hope to see you there.

July 26th,

This would be a race weekend the Matthew Hicks Racing Team won't soon forget. A real David versus Goliath story. Matthew's all volunteer team is made up of his mom, dad, sister, friend Darren, and family friend, engine builder, and tax man, Lyle Hunter. No paid crew members or crew chief here. Just a family run team with a fifteen year old car and a lot of determination. The entire team has been working hard to help Matthew achieve the status of top competitor in the AC Delco Super Late Models at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale. We realized from the start we had our work cut out for us. Most teams in the top series at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale have sponsors, a much larger budget, newer cars and have been racing much longer than Matthew. This has never been a deterrent to the Matthew Hicks Racing Team. This is another challenge just like when we started in the King Taco Super Trucks series and the Legends cars before that.

The entire race weekend went well. Matthew said the car was good right out of the trailer, just a bit loose to start but we were on old race tires. We made one shock change with the old tires and that gave us more bite off the corners. We then bolted on four new Hoosiers and he picked up a bunch. Next came qualifying for the twenty one cars that showed up to race the twin races.

Matthew had his best qualifying effort so far in the Super Late Models. He was ninth for the first race and seventh for the second race. The difference from the second place qualifier and Matthew was only twelve hundredths of a second. The invert was six for the first race so Matthew would start ninth. The invert for the second race was seven, putting Matthew on the pole for race two.

In the first race, Matthew would make a pass early on to move into eighth place. He tried to pass the second fast qualifier, Bear Rzesnowiecky from Las Vegas for seventh place lap after lap but could not complete the pass. Matthew was passed by Travis Thirkettle, the driver sitting second in points who crashed in qualifying. That put Matthew back to ninth. Matthew passed the car of David Ross for eighth place but that was as far as he got. The race went forty straight laps with no cautions. Matthew would finish only four seconds behind eight-time winner and points leader Nick Joanides. We were happy for Matthew who got his first top ten in the series.

Matthew started on the pole for the second race. He took advantage of his starting position and raced side by side on lap one with Andy Allen who started outside the front row with Matthew. Matthew would get the lead on lap two. He pulled out to a seven car lead and ran there until a caution came out on lap ten when two mid-pack cars crashed. Dan Moore and Nick Joanides were battling for second place allowing Matthew to get his lead.

On the restart, Matthew got a great jump and by turn one he was back to a two car lead. As the third place car of Nick Joanides worked on passing Dan Moore for second, Matthew extended his lead. Matthew would have about an eight car lead when Nick got around Dan and set his sites on Matthew. Matthew kept his cool. The car was running great and Matthew pulled out to about a fifteen car length lead. The race went caution free from then on and Matthew would end up taking the win by 2.99 seconds ahead of Nick. Matthew got his first Super Late Model win in just his third race he completed.

The excitement was overwhelming. A number of friends, drivers, crew members and fans congratulated Matthew as he pulled off the track and into the tech bay for the 1st time this year. Nick Joanides' spotter and car builder Tony Jackson told us after the race he had told Nick over the radio that he was never going to catch Matthew so he needed to make sure he held on to second place. Rip Michels, the 2007 champion and driver with the most wins Toyota Speedway at Irwindale congratulated us right after the race. Rip is currently the crew chief and spotter for Dan Moore. Several former drivers from Cajon Speedway were there to watch Matthew get his first victory

Thanks to all of you who came by after the race, called and emailed us. It's friends like you that makes racing fun. If you were at Irwindale, liked what you saw and are looking for a car to sponsor, send us an email at matt@matthewhicksracing.com. It takes a big budget to keep up with the big teams.

A special thank you goes out to Lyle Hunter for building us an awesome engine, Mike Hagerman for his shocks and setup help and to Jim Horne from HP Engines for the use of his dyno to get the motor running its best.

Hope to see you at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale next race.

June 28th,

We it appeared we got all the little bugs worked out. No oil leaks. The car was handling pretty well. Matthew was 6th fastest after practice. Unfortunately, the carburetor acted up on Matthew as he qualified and he fell to 16th. Turns out the float got stuck and it flooded the engine with fuel each time he tried to come out of the corners. We fixed the carburetor and got the car ready for the trophy dash. They picked the slower cars for the dash. Matthew would start 5th in the 6 car dash. He held back on the start to make sure the car would run. After three laps, knowing the car was running alright he started to move forward. Matthew made his way to 2nd place but ran out of laps.

For the main event Matthew would start 16th. He moved his way to 12th but the car got very loose on him. He fell back to 13th where he finished. Not a great night but he got more laps in the car which is a blessing considering all the issues we've had so far this year. We'll be back out the next race on July 12th as long as Matthew is feeling up to it. He's having his wisdom teeth pulled on Wednesday so we'll see.

June 14th,

Not much has gone our way so far this year. We started the year off with a broken motor from a failed engine part. Then the new motor ran great but had a bad oil leak. Fixed that, then the transmission had a failure. We finally thought we had all the bugs worked out until the main event Saturday night.

In the first twin race, Matthew started 13th and moved up to 11th in a couple laps. He was closing in on the 10th place car when suddenly the car shot straight to the turn 3 wall. Matthew backed it into the wall and thought he had been hit in the rear by another car. Turned out the right rear trailing arm mount broke off the rear end. This caused the rear end to shift backwards about 6 inches on just the right side. This made the rear of the car want to spin. After hitting the wall, Matthew pulled into the infield and waited for a yellow flag to come off the track.

We worked on the car and got everything back in order except we couldn't find a replacement trailing arm mount so we were unable to go out for the second race. The car isn't in too bad of shape and we plan to get it back together for the next race on the 28th. Hope to see you there.

April 4th,

Because many changes were to be made to Matthew's car over the last two weeks including his new 2008 Dodge Charger body being mounted and Matthew's dad injuring his left arm, Matthew's car was not able to be completed before the April 5th race. We will be taking this race off to be more prepared for the April 19th twin races. Hope to see you there.

March 22nd,

Because it was opening day at what was once called Irwindale Speedway, now Toyota Speedway at Irwindale it was hectic.

We got in the pits ready to go. We made the changes we thought would help the car and let Matthew feel a little more comfortable. Unfortunately we developed a bad oil leak at the rear of the motor and a horrible vibration somewhere in the drive train. We only ended up with two practices and Matthew said the car still wouldn't turn in the middle. He ended up qualifying 19th out of 27 cars. Disappointing to say the least.

Matthew would start the main event in 19th. He was able to pass a few cars but early on he stated the vibration was getting worse. By lap 15 the vibration was so bad he had to pull into the middle of the track. Not what we all hoped for his first Super Late Model race. A disappointing day all around. We would like to thank our friends Dean Kuhn and Lyle Hunter for their "Never Say Die" attitudes. Dean and Lyle were there both Friday and Saturday trying to make Matthews debut a success. They worked their butts off on the car but the vibration ended all hopes. Matthew would finish his first race of 2008 in 23rd place.

March 2

After breaking the new motor only 18 laps into the 1st open practice of 2008 season because of a part failure, we missed the 2nd open practice. This put us way behind. Our engine builder put together another great motor and we made it out to the Friday night practice before the 1st race of the season. We worked all day trying to get Matthew laps and trying to get the car to turn in the middle of the corner. He stated the car just wouldn't turn in the middle of the corner which caused him to be loose off the corners. We made many changes only to fight the same problem. We finished the practice day flustered but with a plan to make the car better for race day.

January 14th, 2008,

The off season has been a little busy. After selling Matthew's Super Truck, we took the proceeds and used it to buy a Victory Circle Super Late Model. We've taken the car down to the frame and started a complete frame up rebuild.. We're having a new engine built buy a sponsor and hope to have it on the dyno by next week. The car is getting closer as the setup geometry has been completed and the car is currently having new sheet metal installed. It's up in the air right now if we're going to run the old Dodge body or if we're going to change it out to a Monte Carlo.

Check back often as we hope to have some pictures up prior to the first practice session.