Camping World 200 Report

OVERVIEW

posted on September 06, 2008

MADISON, Ill. (September 6, 2008) – A potential top-10 finish for the Ergon Racing team got cut short when a blown tire and ruptured brake line put Marc Mitchell behind the eight ball in the early goings of the Camping World 200 at Gateway International Raceway. The damage forced the No. 15 team to make unscheduled repairs and created a deficit too large for Mitchell to overcome. The team ended the day with a 26th-place finish.

The event started out promising for Mitchell and company. The Ergon Tundra continually ran lap times consistent with the top-10 trucks. Unfortunately on lap 18, Mitchell radioed to his crew that he felt the left-rear tire going down. Before he had a chance to bring his truck into the pits, the tire blew and spun the Ergon Tundra around. The incident brought out the caution and allowed Mitchell to take his truck down pit lane to the attention of his crew.

While changing the tires, the crew discovered the brake line was ruptured. The team had to take the Ergon Tundra behind the wall to fix the blown line. The repair took 10 laps for the team to complete, which put Mitchell in 32nd-place when he returned to the track. When he rejoined the field, Mitchell continued to run as fast as the leaders, but was too many laps down to be competitive. Mitchell remained on the track to finish 26th. After further inspection, the team determined that Mitchell ran over debris on the speedway which caused his tire to blow.

“It was a disappointing day,” said Mitchell. “We had a top-10 truck for sure. I don’t know what I ran over, but it caused our tire to go down. When the tire shredded, it cut our brake line and we had to repair it behind the wall. Even after the incident, we were as fast as the leaders. I was proud of my team; they never gave up today. We could have called it a day, but we picked up six positions after the incident.”