Weather Slows Shields in Mission

Duane Shields always looks forward to competing in Mission Canada. After all, the track is one of the best and quickest in the west and has a loyal following of fans. But the weather in Mission can hit racers with a curve ball overnight which is what happened this past weekend when the conditions changed dramatically on race day.

The weather did cooperate nicely during qualifying as Shields ran a 5.33 at 273 MPH in the first stanza, and then smoked the tires in the second session after experimenting with an aggressive tune up. In the final round of qualifying, Shields matched his first qualifying effort with a 5.33 and set the track’s speed record in the process by flying through the traps at 274 MPH.

Between qualifying and race day, some cold wet weather moved into the Fraiser Valley. As a result, the track was a very cool 56 degrees at the time Shields fired up his engine. “We were a bit nervous as we have never raced when it was that cold. We didn’t have a tune-up for those kind of conditions” Shields said. As a consequence, Shields smoked the tires at about five feet into the run and tried pedaling the car but lost a valuable second in the process while opponent Mark Hentges built up a good lead and sailed on through with a 5.52. After Shields realized that he was to far back to play catch up, he lifted and coasted through the finish line with a 6.53 as Hentges advanced to the second round.

“I love racing up here at Mission as it’s one of my favorite tracks. Unfortunately, we had to guess on the tune-up since it was cold. We didn’t de-tune the engine enough and the car ended up overpowering the track” Shields concluded. The good news for Northwest fans is that Shields will stick around and race at the Pacific Raceways Divisional, June 15-17.