[JessicaJ]

Walker Fairly Happy With First Race at Daugherty
By Jessica Jenkins

In USAC Midget racing a great quality to have is flexibility. Several teams that showed up to last Saturday's race at Daugherty Speedway got to experience that firsthand with a last minute change of plans. For most of the drivers, including Gage Walker, that flexibility played out in going to a brand new track they had never even seen before.

Driving into the middle of cornfields in rural Indiana, Walker and his team were greeted by a sign welcoming them to the Speedway. Pulling into the pit area they got their first look at the 3/8ths-mile track that is as unique as it is remote. Taking a track walk beforehand revealed a rocky, sandy dirt surface and by the time he drove down the banking into the bowl for hot laps, Walker was ready to give it a shot.

With a few laps now under his belt, Walker rolled off fifth for the first heat race in his red #7. He settled into fifth place by the backstretch on lap one then took off after fourth place, sticking to the bottom line as he and the driver ahead of him raced side-by-side for the final seven laps. He didn't have quite enough space to slide up ahead of fourth place in the last two corners and settled for fifth. It was a valiant effort considering the limited visibility with the dust clouds off the cars obscuring much of his view. When he got back to the trailer, Walker told his father/crew chief and team that it was hard to go anywhere because everyone was so equal.

With passing points determining the feature lineup, the 18 year old started fourteenth. With a track that was now better watered down, he passed two cars on lap one by running the bottom lane before moving to the high side on lap eight. Between lap two and two to go there was a long green flag run before the second red flag waved for an incident in turn four. He was now up to the seventh place and was ready to make a final charge for a couple more spots. But first, an incident with a push truck seemed like it might de-rail all of that. He wasn't ready to get a push yet, but the driver of the van didn't seem to notice Walker's attempts to warn him. Instead, it pushed the Indianapolis-based driver sideways before going over the back bumper and onto the fuel tank. During the several laps of trying to separate the vehicles, track workers told him his tire was flat. But once the weight of the push truck was finally off the car, it was fine and USAC allowed him to line up in his original spot. In the two-lap dash to the finish, Walker maintained his position and pulled back up the tall banking to the pits with a seventh place result. All in all it was a respectable night with the USAC Indiana Midget series.

Speaking about the incident with the push truck, Walker elaborated, "We had a red with 2 to go and we're sitting there and you have to rock the cars to get them into gear. You can't just put them into gear; you kind of have to rock them. And nobody came over to help me rock the car to get it into gear. So I'm sitting there, this truck comes up to push me and I've waving my hand out the window to try to get him to stop, but he just keeps pushing me, hits me sideways and runs over the back of the car, dents the tail tank in and we thought we had a flat left rear. But luckily we got the tow truck, lifted that truck up and over off of my car. We finished and I think I would have been able to get at least one car on the restart, but I was so focused on trying to get air in my left rear, to build pressure up, that I really wasn't even thinking about the race. I was just trying to maintain."

About his first time at the Speedway, the recent high school grad commented, "It's definitely a different track. I've never really been on a track this wide, like a really big circle. Everyone I've talked to that's been to Belleville says it's kind of like a miniature version of that. I mean, for how big and wide the corners are, the straightaways are pretty short, so it's kind of like you never really stop turning. It was definitely a lot of fun, just really dusty. It was hard to see. For the heat race it was kind of one lane, everyone was about the same. There's really not a lot of passing going on at all in the heat races, more follow the leader. Everyone was real equal. But feature time [the line] was all on top. I started 14th and I went to the bottom and got by a few cars down there, but after that I went right back to the top and was just basically on the cushion the whole race.

In conclusion, he shared, "I'm feeling pretty good; I would have liked to get a better finish. I expect to get a better finish, but starting 14th and then making my way up to 7th isn't too bad, considering all the luck we've had in the last seven or eight races. We've had a bunch of DNFs, just some goofy things happening. So it's just nice to finally get a decent finish, at least passing some cars and making ground. But yeah, I was just happy, it could have been worse. We could have just not finished and it would have been like the other races."

Walker made it clear that the dented fuel tank would not be hard to fix, which is good considering there is another USAC Indiana midget race this Saturday on September 17th. This time it will take place at the Montpelier Motor Speedway, a track Walker has found a lot of success at--including becoming track champion last season. He is looking forward to returning to his "home track" and earning a better finish with his sights set on the win.

To keep up with this rising star or to see more pictures from last weekend, visit Walker's fan page at Facebook.com/GageWalkerRacing. Live updates on his races are always posted there. You can also follow him on Twitter @GageWalker7 and get to know him better via his website at GageWalkerRacing.com.