WOODHAM CAPS OFF 2006 SEASON WITH A FOURTH PLACE FINISH AT THE TULSA SHOOTOUT

By Rising Star Driver Development/ Kevin Ramsell

Wednesday, January 03, 2007 (Chicago, IL)

Austin Woodham ended his 2006 racing season on a high note with a fourth place finish in the Restricted A Class Mini Sprint division at the Tulsa, OK Shootout. The Tulsa Shootout is known as the Super Bowl of the Mini Sprint Series.

Woodham, who lives in La Porte, IN, was one of 76 entries for the weekend long event. He hit the quarter-mile clay oval located inside the Tulsa (OK) Expo Center for the first time on Thursday, December 28th where he quickly found out how fast his Mini Sprint was.

“ We were really good our first time on the track,” Woodham stated. “The Mini Sprint was working great and I was able to settle in on hitting my marks and finding the fast way around the track.”
Woodham would lay down one of the fastest laps in the first practice session and improved his lap times in the second and final practice sessions in preparation for the Friday heat races.

On Friday, Woodham would start 7th in his 8-car heat race. He competed in the second of 10 heat races. It was imperative that Woodham pass as many cars as he could as the top 16 in passing points would be locked into the A-Main feature on Saturday night. Woodham would come up a lap short of passing the leader and finish second in the heat. The finish along with the number of cars he passed made him the point leader after all of the ten heat races were completed. This gave him the pole for the A-Main on Saturday night.

“ We really did have a good draw, we just needed to get to the front as quickly as possible to gain those passing points to get us locked into the show,” Woodham recalled. “We were able to run the leader down by lap 7 but just didn’t have the time to make a really good run on him coming to the line.”
Woodham started on the pole for the A-Main on Saturday night. But, he found that the track conditions had changed and he knew in the first few laps that it would not be an easy race. “We were able to hold off those guys for a few laps, but I knew we were in trouble,” Woodham stated. “The track really threw us for a loop, and we just made the wrong adjustments before going out.”

With the changing track conditions, Woodham was able to hang on to a strong fourth place finish and make it a positive weekend. “I just couldn’t find the bite I needed coming off the corners, the car was just wanting to slide up the race track despite even trying to open up in the corners,” Woodham explained. “We were still able to bring home a well earned fourth place finish and more important, is that we learned a lot.”

For more information on Austin Woodham, please visit his website at www.austinwoodham.com.

About RSDD
Rising Star Driver Development™ was formed to create the most highly trained, marketable and successful race car drivers in the USA and around the world. Their innovative program offers amateur and professional drivers the sort of one-stop comprehensive training and marketing resource that is sure to increase their likelihood of winning on the track. The drivers are hand selected and provided dedicated resources to elevate their status among sponsors, fans and teams – ultimately enabling their transition to the highest ranks of professional racing. The founders have over 40 years of experience in motorsports and sports marketing. You can visit the RSDD web site at – www.risingstardd.com

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