Stevenson Motorsports

It's Friday afternoon and the car is still on the lift getting ready for Miller.  The crew of Michael Hoffman, Chris Vallely and Grant Ford have been working non-stop to prepare the car for Miller.  We all understand what's on the line and it's easy to get wrapped up in the point spread, but we need to focus on making sure our car is 100% for 7 hours.  We are preparing the car the same as we would for a 24 hour race.

At Thunderbolt, we ran a cool suit and rear view camera for the first time, plus we completely redesigned our roll bar package so we have had to make modifiactions to those assemblies.  We are also running a brand new exhaust package which has required some modifications to the chassis.  Not necessarily what we wanted to do, but we can't afford to leave a few tenths on the table.  Our finishing position by one place up or down could make the difference between 1st, 2nd or 3rd.

As a team, we have to treat Miller just like any other race.  The way I look at it, if Banner wants to win the championship, all they have to do is finish on the podium.  If they do that, there is nothing we can do to beat them.  However, if they don't finish on the podium, our destiny will be in our hands.  Of course, the Mazda poses a huge threat as their car is so fast in a straight line but to be honest I don't care much about finishing 2nd or 3rd if we don't win.  My goal at the beginning of the year was to get John Stevenson on the Bellagio Championship podium and we would have to score no points and the 67 would have to win to push us to 4th, so that is not much of a concern.

A lot of people have asked me this year about the reason for the Stevenson turn around and what we did to make ourselves Championship Contenders almost overnight.  Some people still consider us underdogs, or the "little team" since we are the only one-car team in the top 8 in points.  I think the biggest difference from Stevenson Motorsports in years previous to now is direction.  Before, the team was without a plan and a bit unorganized.  Like most new teams, money was being spent in the wrong places and they were too busy trying to develop someone else's chassis.  At the end of last year I felt buying a Pontiac was the only real option because the car had been sorted.  All we had to do was keep it together and find some fast drivers to move it around the track.  The car rolls off the truck fast almost every weekend, and our drivers have gotten the job done on track.  We don't have the infrastructure, engineering or fabrication abbilities to develop a chassis.  We need someone else's sorted product and the ability to properly execute on race weekends.  And that is what we've done.  Execute.

If we win, it will be amazing, and if we don't, it will still be an amazing year.  We have proved to ourselves and others that we are a threat every weekend and we will only get better.  We can look at some crashes and some mechanical failures to find the missing points at the end of the year, but it won't matter.  We have learned, progressed and excelled this year as a team and that will only make us that much stronger in 2009.

Finally, I need to say a BIG thank you for everyone who has offered my sister support since her accident.  July 20, she was completely paralyzed and yesterday she had enough strength to move from her chair to her bed.  She is already planning on coming to the Rolex 24 in January on her own two feet.  I can't wait.  For those of you that want to check up on her progress, please visit www.caringbridge.org/visit/terrillestabrook.