In spite of brake issues, Zachary Tinkle 2nd in feature & qualifying; fastest race lap; champ lead

PARK RIDGE, Ill. - Aug. 6, 2017 - PRLog -- Upon rolling the car off the trailer, it was discovered that one of the tires had a mysterious slash. Tinkle Family Racing took swift action and switched out the tire for a fresh one.  The night would have been fantastic if the troubles ended there. Tinkle went out for practice to test the handling of the car and found that it felt great and was one of the fastest on the track.

Some practice laps on video: https://youtu.be/Aq66obzs8EY

Unfortunately, when he came off the track and headed for his pit, he put the brake pedal to the floor to find that the brakes had gone out. He did some quick thinking and went up onto the ramp of the trailer to get the car to stop. The team found the parts that had fallen off the front brake and fixed the issue… or so they had thought.  Tinkle went out for qualifying and came off the track to the same issue.  He went through some gravel and away from any teams or people in the pits to get the car to come to a rolling stop. At that point, his crew chief decided a complete overhaul of the brakes was in order. To do that, Tinkle had to miss the heat race, but safety was of utmost importance.

Qualifying video:  https://youtu.be/IcWY6REJu7E



The super cup feature was before the intermission so there was no time to spare in putting the car back together.  With just enough time to get his safety gear on and hop into the car, Tinkle lined up for the feature race.

Starting in fifth because of the invert, Tinkle quickly took 4^th on the first lap.  He took the field three-wide and moved up to third within a few laps.  Several laps later, he was able to make another pass and take second place. Tinkle had the fastest lap time of the race at 19.097 and was gaining on the leader, but just ran out of laps to catch up and make the pass.

Feature race video:  https://youtu.be/VoD5eoi5O_I

About Zachary Tinkle
Zachary Tinkle (http://zacharytinkle.com/) is a 14-year-old driving sensation based in Park Ridge, IL who currently races the #53 ½ size stock car minicup car (also known as super cups). He is the 2016 Rockford Speedway Wild Wednesday Super Cup Champion. Tinkle is the 2015 Illinois Super Cup State Champion for the Short Track Auto Racing Series (STARS) and 2015 Rockford Speedway National Short Track Champion for Super Cups. Rockford Speedway awarded him the "Lead, Follow, or Get Out Of My Way" award for his 2015 season. He's been named 2015 Most Improved Driver and 2014 Rookie of the Year for Central States Region (CSR) Super Cups. Website: www.ZacharyTinkle.com. (http://zacharytinkle.com/)