Patrick Sheltra Rebounds Nicely At Pocono Raceway

LONG POND, Pennsylvania (August 4, 2008) – - Not even a flat tire, two speeding penalties, being a lap down and a faulty brake line could stop ARCA RE/MAX Series sophomore driver Patrick Sheltra from garnishing a 12th place finish in last Saturday’s Pennsylvania 200 at Pocono Raceway.

Returning to the 2.5-mile triangle, 22-year old Patrick Sheltra was looking for a rebound for his Sheltra Motorsports team after encountering some tough finishes in the last three ARCA RE/MAX Series events.

To aid their driver with a shot of a rebound, crew chief John Hayden elected to bring back the same piece that Sheltra soared into the top-five in the spring before falling victim to a mechanical failure. Back with rejuvenated confidence, Sheltra was ready a good weekend.

In the only practice session of the weekend, Sheltra negotiated the 19th fastest lap after mounting a time of 55.883 seconds at 161.051 MPH. “The car is good but there was so much traffic out there, I really could never get a clean lap. We’re not having the pickup issue we did here in the spring, so that’s a relief and allows us to focus on our qualifying setup.”

Hayden showed his magic by adjusting the Ferguson Pipe-FloraGanics Dodge Charger to Sheltra’s liking allowing the Indiantown, Florida native to post a lap of 55.071 seconds at 163.425 MPH, which was 0.812 (slightly over eight-tenths) seconds quicker that Sheltra’s best lap in practice earlier in the day.

“I’m pretty happy with that,” noted Sheltra, who made his fifth career start at Pocono Raceway on Saturday. “John made some great changes to the car and I think we’ll go right to the front in the race.”

Mother Nature decided to cool off the Pocono Mountains early Saturday morning with monstrous soaking thunderstorms which eventually would delay the start of the 13th race of the season by one hour.

Despite the delay, Sheltra remained focused and content with getting his Grace Sheltra-owned automobile up to the front.

At the start of the Pennsylvania 200, Sheltra wasted no time hauling to the front as by the completion of lap one, Sheltra had maneuvered into the top-10. Despite announcing a tight racecar Sheltra continued to climb up the ladder board when the first caution flag waived holding down the eighth position.

Making the trip down pit road with the rest of the leaders, Sheltra’s team went to work changing four tires, adding Sunoco fuel while making an air pressure adjustment to try and ease the tight condition. Sheltra returned to the track in the seventh position.

On the restart, Sheltra quickly went to work on the No. 01 of Chrissy Wallace, passing the rookie cleanly entering in turn one before finding himself into the top-five by the tunnel turn.

Continuing to inch forward Sheltra’s machine blasted into the top-three shortly pass the first quarter of the event and remained there for a good portion heading into the halfway mark when Sheltra radioed his crew that he believed to have a tire going down.

Sheltra’s lap times begun to slow down significantly while also losing positions on the track with Hayden informing his driver to bring his machine down pit road. Four tires and fuel were the order of the stop with Sheltra gunning his machine off pit road. Unfortunately, Sheltra’s exit off pit lane was too fast forcing a drive-by penalty. Ducking back down pit road to serve the penalty, the avid dirt late model competitor would be caught speeding again forcing another drive-by penalty. After passing through twice, Sheltra emerged back on the circuit one lap off the pace.

The caution flag flew two laps later allowing Sheltra to catch-up. Staying out on the track during the round of pit stops allowed Sheltra to find himself on the tail end of the lead lap. Giving a gallant fight, Sheltra was unable to fend off the leaders on the restart forcing the No. 60 to race with series points leader Ricky Stenhouse, Jr for the Aaron’s Lucky Dog, which allows the first driver one lap down to receive their lap back when the caution flag flies.

A steady side-by-side battle with the Roush-Fenway Racing team would see the tightness condition return on the former Penske Racing machine allowing Stenhouse to overtake Sheltra exiting two turn. With Sheltra trying to reel Stenhouse back in, the caution waived putting Sheltra the lone car one lap down.

Playing conservative on the restart, Sheltra raced hard and found himself the recipient of the Aaron’s Lucky Dog when the caution flew with 12 laps remaining for a three car incident. With their lap back, Hayden took the opportunity to bring his driver back down pit lane for four tires, fuel and a chassis adjustment to correct the tight condition.

Restarting 21st, Sheltra picked off a few positions only to be sidelined with another yellow flag. Now locking down the 16th position, Sheltra knew he would have two laps to make a top-10 finish happen. On the restart, Sheltra wasted zero time moving through the field and on the last lap running 13th, Sheltra radioed to his team that he had no brakes. With coaching from spotter Kevin Huffines to let the car roll, Sheltra would use the horsepower from RC Consultants to overtake A.J. Henriksen to cross the line 12th.

“We had an up and down day for sure,” said Sheltra after the race. “Nothing we could do about the flat tire other than it destroyed a top-five finish for sure. I’m proud of my guys for bouncing back the way we did. We never gave up and we came home with a solid finish. Hopefully this is the start to rebounding from a couple tough weeks. It looks like the brake line was resting up against the header and that’s what caused the brake failure on the last lap, so I’m extremely thankful it happened on the last lap and not early in the race. We’ll take this run and move to Nashville with high hopes.”

Sheltra’s finish on Saturday moved him up in the ARCA RE/MAX Series championship standings from 10th to ninth.

Exiting Pocono, Sheltra has 38 ARCA RE/MAX Series starts to his credit with a career best finish of second at Toledo Speedway (May 2008) with two additional top-five finishes (third) at Illinois State Fairgrounds (August 2007), (fourth) at Berlin Raceway (July 2007) while holding additional top-10s at Michigan International Speedway (June 2008), Kentucky Speedway (May 2008), Kansas Speedway (April 2008), Iowa Speedway (April 2008), Kentucky Speedway (June 2007), DuQuoin State Fairgrounds (September 2007) and Toledo Speedway (October 2007). An eighth place qualifying effort at Kansas Speedway (April 2008) is Sheltra’s best time trials efforts to date. He has controlled the ARCA field twice for 15 laps.

Next up for the ARCA RE/MAX Series is their annual trip to Nashville Superspeedway for the running of the TOYOTA ARCA 150 on Saturday, August 9th. The ARCA event will air live on SPEED and serve as the prelude to the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series TOYOTA Tundra 200 which will run shortly after the conclusion of the 14th race of the season.

For more on Patrick Sheltra, please visit the newly re-launched PatrickSheltra.com.

About Sheltra Motorsports:
Sheltra Motorsports (sheltramotorsports.com) is a three-tier Motorsports operation consisting of dirt and asphalt competition. Patrick Sheltra, a 22-year old native of Indiantown, Florida competes in the UMP and WoO (Dirt) Series; while also running a full schedule in the ARCA RE/MAX Series (No. 60) and a limited schedule in NASCAR. Sheltra Motorsports ownership is combined of Richard, Grace and Patrick Sheltra. The team is headquartered in Indiantown, Florida with additional operations in Richmond, Indiana and Whitesville, Kentucky.

Sheltra Motorsports Quick Facts:
Team Name: Sheltra Motorsports, No. 60 Dodge Charger

Driver: Patrick Sheltra, Indiantown, Florida

Car Owner: Grace Sheltra, Indiantown, Florida

Marketing Partners: Groupe Beton Brunet, Ferguson Pipe Enterprises, Inc, FloraGanics, American Concrete Industries, Inc, The Casite Company, J&S Bulk Transportation, Inc., US Construction Supply Corp., CP Concrete Products of the Palm Beaches, Martin County Petroleum, Sheltra & Son Construction, Sheltra Cattle Company, Recycling Services, Aaron’s Outdoors, Boatwerks Waterfront Restaurant, Indiantown Marina, All About Flowers, Speed Media, Klotz Synthetic Lubricants, DMC Graphics and Purcell Tire & Rubber.

Crew Chief: John Hayden

Team Manager: Keith Strunk

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TEAM COMMUNICATIONS CONTACT:
NAME: Chris Knight, Sheltra Motorsports
PHONE: 239.834.9797 or 830.261.1215
EMAIL: knight849@aol.com