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Justin Lloyd ends hot summer
Justin
Lloyd Ends Hot Summer Shootout With A Top-five Finish
MOORESVILLE, N.C. –
August 8th, 2007
Justin Lloyd
has had an up and down season this year at the Summer Shootout
in his No. 43 Legends Semi-pro car.
The 15 year-old’s luck wasn’t much better Tuesday
night for the last race of the summer series held at Lowe’s
Motor Speedway, but Lloyd would overcome and bounce back with a
fifth place finish.
In the middle
of one of the hottest weeks this year with track temps reaching
130 degrees, Justin would brave the
heat and start in the 10th spot for the steamy
night’s race. As
the green flag flew, hot tempers were stirred up early as the
caution flags began to fly on the first lap. But Lloyd hung on
and, “I was lucky enough to avoid that mess [at the beginning]
and make it up to sixth.”
Justin was running a great race, passing cars and making
it up to second, “I was able to drop down a line behind the
leader and kept up with him for awhile.
We definitely had a good car.”
The caution
flags were ruling the night and after yet another restart, the
Mooresville, NC teen decided to “choose the low line because I
thought the battery was dying.”
But that would be the least of his worries as he was
struck from behind and spun through the grass, losing several
positions. Lloyd put the car back in gear and fought his way back up to
a fifth place finish. “I
wasn’t the fastest car out there, but we were definitely a top
five. I tried to
make the best of what happened [there at the end].”
Suffering
from a little bit of heat exhaustion after the race was over,
Justin was still anticipating future races.
“Hopefully we learned something here and we can use
that to help us in some other series we plan on racing later
this season.” Despite
the bad luck this year at the Lowe's Motor Speedway Summer
Shootout, Justin earned four top-10 finishes; two of those were
back to back top five’s.
Calculations
show, if Justin had made the Shootout "Sizzler"
where the top 10 drivers via for the championship after the
first seven races (which he missed by 41 points), Justin would
have ended up in third place at the 2007 Summer Shootout. But a
blown engine during race number six hurt his chances even though
he pulled off a sixth place during race seven.
Justin Lloyd is being helped in
his career by training from Future Stars in Racing Academy. The
Academy helps prepare young drivers for success outside the car
in public speaking; sponsor presentations; working with the
media and behavior on and off the track. Future Stars in Racing
is the exclusive driver development partner with the ASA Late
Model Series. Marketing partners include Safety-Kleen, Awesome
Racewear and Sunbelt Web Solutions. The Academy features a staff
with decades of experience in all aspects of motorsports.
To learn more about Justin and
the Academy, go to www.futurestarsinracing.com.
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