A.J. Emms Scores First OSCAAR Podium Finish
LONDON, Ontario — On Friday night at Delaware Speedway, A.J. Emms kept the streak of solid finishes going for ADAMS Motorsports with his first career podium finish.
Following a fourth place finish at Full Throttle Motor Speedway, Emms entered confident that the team would have a good finish.
“Heading to Delaware after a strong run at Full Throttle, we were hoping to continue the momentum and looking for a solid top-five run,” he commented. “After running top-three there earlier in the year before getting spun, we knew that it wasn’t out of the question, so we were hopeful.”
Earlier this year, Emms was running third when he would be spun by a fellow competitor following a lap 12 restart. He was then unable to get the car restarted, requiring a toe off of the track and posting a DNF.
This time around, though, things went much really smooth, which Emms says was nice as most of the crew wasn’t able to make the event.
“(A) huge thanks goes out to Troy Potts who stepped up and took the afternoon off to come down and help Allen (Adams) and I crew the car,” Emms added. “Without him, I’m not sure if we would’ve got the results we wanted.”
Starting in the top-five for the feature, Emms would run up front all night long, battling some of the best drivers in OSCAAR en route to his best career finish with a third.
“It was pretty cool running with some top notch drivers up at the front including Cole Powell, who finished second,” Emms commented. “The last five-eight laps it felt like something broke in the car, almost like a tire going down, but we were able to bring it home to a solid third place finish, which the whole team is very proud of.”
For Emms, it marks his third top-five and sixth top-10 finish of the 2015 season.
“This year overall I’ve learned a ton, not only with driving, but mostly on the set up side,” he commented. “Learning what adjustments to make, and being more confident in certain set up calls as a team seems to be something we've really progressed on and its helped our program. Personally, I look at things as if you're not going forward you're falling back, so it’s nice that we've had some good runs and see our hard work paying off.”
With momentum on his side, Emms will now head to Sunset Speedway for this weekend’s Velocity 250 event. In his three previous appearances at the Innisfil, Ontario-based oval, he has posted a top-11 finish in each event, with his best run coming with a ninth in August.
“Sunset is a track that we've struggled at this year,” Emms admitted. “But with the momentum we have going in hopefully we can ride that wave and pull off a strong run. Either way, I’m really looking forward to getting back on the track with some of the best in the province and we're going to work as hard as we can this week to try and be ready to compete this weekend.”
Emms will qualify for the Velocity 250 on Saturday, followed by the 40-lap feature on Sunday. Details can be found, with the ability to purchase tickets, through the Sunset Speedway website at
http://www.sunsetspeedway.ca.
Keep up with ADAMS Motorsports all season long via their website at
http://www.adammotorsports99.com. You can also follow Emms on twitter viahttp://www.twitter.com/ajemms.
Thanks to Adams Home Comfort, Barrie Auto Flea Market, Dwinnels Family Movers, Wolseley Canada, TSS Top Shops, Duckworths Fish and Chips Orillia, Wix Filters, Klotz Canada, Heritage Heating Contractors Incorporated, Hastings Home Hardware, Whitechurch Towing, Accurate Industrial Liquid Waste Ltd, Kitchen Tire 2013, Morton Metals and Orillia Trim and Door for their continued support.
Race Report by Ashley McCubbin
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