Photo Credit: Ashley McCubbin/OnPitRoad.com
It’s no secret that things didn’t go as Samantha Shaw wanted last season with only posting a pair of feature top-10s. She is hoping this year doesn’t mark a repeat once again.
“I had such a bad year last year,” she told OnPitRoad.com. “I really just want to be competitive and get back to being half as fast.”
Returning to the front of the field won’t be easy, though, as the competition is expected to be strong as ever.
“I think the competition will be as good as ever,” she commented. “It’s not like Andy (Kamrath) and Warren (Paxton) are going away, or will slow down – Erik (Yorke) won’t slow down. None of those guys are going to get any slower. It’s more – competition isn’t going down. It’s giving the kids that were hidden under the Brandon McFerrans and Jordan Howses a chance to, ‘Look, I can drive to’.
“Those guys are good – not taking anything away from them – but they got a lot of attention last year when there are some other drivers that are just as good. It’ll be nice for the fans to see different names and faces in victory lane.”
Over the off-season, she and her father Randy Shaw went over to the No. 81 Lucas Oil/Spira Racing/Wurth Mustang.
“I don’t know if you’ve ever talked to my dad but he’s like this little book of knowledge and the brain never ever stops moving,” she said. “We didn’t change anything on the car, or replace anything, so we focused on getting the car to where it was. We went through everything – nothing is bent, nothing is ridiculously out of shape. We didn’t change much.”
During practice this past weekend, it seemed that she was getting up to speed so all hopes are that the issues are worked out, and a victory is in the future.
“I would like to get back to victory lane,” she said. “I spent last year struggling to even make top-10 so getting back to victory lane would be really nice. I just want to have fun. Last year was just not fun anymore – don’t know where it went, but it left. I need it back because dad and I have fun doing that. That’s what the sport is, especially mini stocks. It’s supposed to be fun, not a full-time job to keep up.”
