Originally Posted by
Skoontz
KT says " I gotta redo your mess? that sucks"
Dad says, if she did not hook her right sponson testing in the first place, the boat would look as it did at Parker....Be patient, there are Good things to follow....As far as the foot throttle before the kneeler goes, as the greats tell me and her, she needs to walk before running. I will dig out some 1/4 midget shots of her broadlsiding at Terre Haute Speedway when she was 7....
So, dad says to you KT, you will master kneelers, including J, AXS and A before I consider buying a 45. Since dad carries the wallet, these lessons will be learned. As said in Moses, it was so written and it shall so be done.....
Dad also says, he brought inconclusive decisions from Oroville back in his spinning road weary mind back with him....So, back to basics, and listening to those who know more.
For all reading, and particularly to those who are consdering entering this sport, that means what it says. This boat thing is a learning curve and a very fun and motivatiing one at that. So, I'm going to take our personal dissapointments out of the conversation here, and say the good stuff, the best first, the accomplishments in which I am most proud.
At the beggining of this year, KT had a hydro bug, after sitting in a B runabout with a MK20H on back at the AOMC event at Anza Cove (Mission Bay, San Diego)
So, Bill Curtis calls, and we get a boat, which is fraction of the battle. Kt's grades, danced at D's and F's, not because she was not smart enough to get them better, because she lacked the proper study skills and motivation that I could not teach her raising her as single dad. It's alot easier and fer better with a mom in the picture, and an incredible mom at that...
So, KT gets the boat, sanded it every weekend getting it ready for the big day at Parker... Bakersfield was sooner, but she did not want to run in a national first time out of the gate....At Bakersfield, we got a true taste of the people in this sport....To say the least, incredible......
The first time out, MissKTDoodle ran pretty well. Second time out, ran terrible. Much like grades, you take good and bad , think about what you do to get better...We are working on the boat and set up, and KT's grades ended the year with a high C, (C+), two B's, and an A. If you'll recall I held her out of Minden over mother's day because her grades fell in a 2 week period even though we both had really wanted to run there...
So, she wanted to go to Oroville, and she showed us she wanted to by doing what she needed to do to earn going there. Our commitment is that we will pull her from school for any road trip we need to go boat racing, AS LONG AS she maintains a 3.0 (B) average or better.
She now is looking for work, and she is going to pay her own entry fees to help own part of the costs of racing....
My advice, and I need to listen to myself this as much as others, is, don't ever let a few bad days turn you into a raging jerk (as I sounded like I was)....Be fast to listen, and slow to act and speak...Don't baske in your own glory when you win, be grateful you ran, win loose, or conk out. I have to fix an accounting mess after this so I have not got alot of time to write much more...I'll close by saying that there are some of the greatest people the world has ever known in the sport of boat racing, and, I only hope the we can be half as good as so many of them already are. Have a great day, stay tuned for more to follow..............................
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