ALTAMAHAW, N.C. – There’s nothing like home cooking to close out a racing season, and Bobby Komisarski is hoping to convert that local familiarity into a strong performance at Ace Speedway.
Komisarski, who has traveled many hours from North Carolina to compete this season with the Must See Racing Sprint Car Series presented by Engine Pro, will close his first full-time season on tour with this weekend’s two-day event held as part of the sixth annual Rodney Cook Classic.
With full features on tap both Friday, Oct. 18 and Saturday, Oct. 19, Komisarski knows that every opportunity to collect points is critical, considering he’s just inside the top 15 in points coming into the event and would like to end up even higher in the final standings.
But perhaps equally as important is racing close to home in front of family and friends. Komisarski hails from Charlotte, N.C., just two hours from Ace Speedway and the closest haul he’ll have all year long.
“Man, it sure feels nice to be able to finish off our year on the pavement with a ‘home race,’” Komisarski said. “We don’t get to race on asphalt down south very often, so in times like this our team wants to take advantage of that and come out with the best performance we possibly can.
“We’ve got a little added motivation with some of the extra supporters who will be able to come out and watch our No. 17 this weekend that don’t normally get to see us in action, so hopefully we can give them something to smile about when it’s all said and done.”
Komisarski was actually looking forward to the recent Must See event at Rockford (Ill.) Speedway last month, but that race on the Illinois quarter-mile oval was lost to Mother Nature via a rainy weekend.
“That was a bummer,” noted Komisarski. “I was really hoping for a good day there, because I felt like some of the dirt skills and it being a short track and possibly being a little bit loose setup-wise there would kind of help us out. I love the short tracks and I’ve always been a big fan of beating and banging on them, and I feel like we’ll have some of that at Ace too.
“We’ll just have to see how it all shakes out.”
Though he likely won’t be in reach to steal away the MSR Rookie of the Year Award from Rick Holley or Todd McQuillen – the two drivers ahead of Komisarski in points in that category – the driver nicknamed Kamikaze is pleased with how his first full season has gone overall in a winged asphalt 410ci sprint car.
“It has been crazy, but it has been so much fun, too,” explained Komisarski. “We had no idea how anything was going to turn out this year. We got the car; we got the motor last minute … which is why unfortunately we missed Anderson at the start of the year, but my dad’s background is mainly big-block modifieds. He ran a little bit of asphalt; I’ve run very limited asphalt, so we kind of just tried to learn as much as we could with the car while basically flying blind. We had Bronzie (Lawson IV, former MSR winner) helping us. We had Tony Grams helping us. But all that advice has really paid off.
“I’m really looking forward to the 2020 season now,” he added. “We really just were using 2019 as a learning curve, to try to get where we need to be for 2020. I’m really ecstatic with the way we’ve been going, so I’m really looking forward to next year and getting back at it, while also finishing strong.”
Open practice for all divisions at Ace takes place on Thursday from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., with Friday’s pit gates opening at 9 a.m. Practice for the opening day show begins at 11 a.m., with qualifying following at 6 p.m. and racing firing off at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday’s schedule sees the pit gates again swinging open at 9 a.m. and practice kicking off at 11 a.m., with qualifying beginning at 4 p.m. and feature racing to follow.
The Saturday program will be co-headlined by a 140-lap late model stock car feature, in addition to the championship race for the Must See Racing sprint cars.