“Last year we learned a lot, good and bad,” Boat said. “She was going to have 17 races, so we scheduled them sporadically throughout the season and now I think we did her a little disservice doing it that way. It was just the budget and sponsorship they had. We didn‘t want to run them all at once because you can do 17 midget races in a hurry. So we spaced them out and I think the disservice is that she wasn‘t consistently in the car. When we were able to go out west at the end of the year, she was able to run several races in a row. She had the fourth at Merced and that paid off going into Bubbas this year. I‘m excited to see how she progresses as she gets more races under her belt. I think by the time she has done 50 races, she will be one to beat night in and night out.”
As a part of the overall blueprint and vision for the growth of CB Industries, Boat recruited Grant Penn from Keith Kunz Motorsports to serve as a crew chief.
“I want to build CB Industries to where we are a program that people want to come to,” Boat said. “Not just for one person, but for all people that are a part of the group. I am pleased with what Grant has done for our program. He has come in with some good ideas. He brings some things he learned with Keith to go along with things we do well here. We are trying to build as great a program as possible.”
Penn is not only tasked with working with Avedisian but an entire crew of very young racers. Yet, this is his opportunity as well, and like his drivers he‘s also working to elevate his game.
“I was a car chief at Keith‘s,” he said. “But I always felt I could do more and here everything is right in front of me and I just have to execute.”
As he thinks about his work with Jade Avedisian, he says, “Her lack of experience in a midget puts us in a bit of a tough spot because she doesn‘t know what she wants to feel. But for her lack of experience, she has really good feedback and she is getting an idea of what she wants in a car now. She can feel the car really well and that definitely helps. One thing really good about her is that she doesn‘t tell you what to do, it is more I feel like this, and she leaves it in my hands to figure it out. I would rather have that than have somebody who wants to tell you what bars and what shocks to put on the thing.”
It is clear Avedisian is a quick study. When asked about the key differences she has found between racing a micro and a midget, she can quickly point to a few key items. She thinks improving her ability to react to track changes is an area for growth, and when the surface gets slick, she is learning the art of managing wheel spin.
When it comes to the jousting with her peers, she realizes one can‘t be timid. Looking back on her near miss in Florida she says, “If it had been a micro race, I would have been totally fine, but in a midget, I am still new. Maybe I took a step back in lapped traffic and you can‘t do that when you are racing the best.”
While Penn won‘t deny there was a bit of a letdown that the first win slipped away, he sees improvement with every lap.
“I can get really aggressive with her with tightening the car up,” he said. “She likes a tight race car and she will drive through it and with a lot of people you can‘t go past that edge. The second night at Ocala was really good. You can see how she could set the pace. What I thought was interesting is how she handled the start with Justin Grant. Justin is so smart and he was kind of playing games, and on the initial start I was worried if she could keep her head in it and she did.”
The good news for Avedisian is that with Penn doing a lot of the heavy lifting in the garage and at the track it allows Boat to spend more time with his young drivers.
“I really like working with Chad,” Jade said. “Because he used to race. I can basically ask him what I need and he has the answer to it. You hear about teams that have a lot of cars and they‘re late to staging and things like that, but Chad has awesome guys and they do a great job. You always feel like you are a one car team.”