Wow, it is 2010 already!! Happy New Year to all, we here at Thunderstruck hope all your Christmas’, Holidays and New Year’s were spectacular!
Just received an e-mail from Clark Dyess, Taylor Dyess’ and Team Thunderstruck’s resident Sno-Crosser’s Dad. I thought I would share a little bit of Taylor’s recent racing for his many fans out there!
Hello Everyone!
Man! Has it been busy the last few weeks! I am sorry that it has taken me a little while to fill all of you in on the latest news.
Well, to pick up where we left off in Duluth. Taylor flew home after Duluth to catch a few days of school before the race in Milwaukee which left me in Minnesota by myself for a few days. The days were full with repairing and preparing Taylor’s race sled for Milwaukee. Between Taylor and the National tracks, it is a full time job keeping the equipment in tip top shape. Taylor literally caved in the front nose of his sled from pounding the holes so hard in Duluth! So a skid plate was installed while I waited for Taylor’s return. Also I spent a day in Aurora, MN on Steve Scheuring’s track at Planet X checking the jetting on Taylor’s racer. I always have a new found respect and appreciation for what Taylor does on the track after I spend some time on his sled. Wow, I just don’t know how he does it! I was just racing the sled back and forth through very little bumps, no high flying acts, but the sled is so fast that it even scares me! It just amazes me what Taylor does for “fun” and makes it look so easy.
After spending the day in Aurora, it was time to head on down to Minneapolis to pickup Taylor from the airport. This posed a bit of a challenge since I was pulling a 50 foot trailer behind me. They just don’t make airport parking garages to handle such a vehicle! So I unhooked from the trailer at a Home Depot nearby and zoomed into the airport to pick up Taylor. After safely gathering up Taylor, we headed down the road once again.
That night travelling from Minnesota to Wisconsin is a night that I am sure that Taylor won’t soon forget, but probably wishes he could. Taylor was so sick! He was unlucky enough to bring back the stomach flu that everyone back at home had. He couldn’t even keep down water, poor kid. Thankfully, it was only during the night and the next day was better for Taylor. We stopped somewhere in Wisconsin that night. I can’t even tell you where, but later that morning we found ourselves at the famous Milwaukee Mile!
Taylor didn’t have to race till Saturday so we spent Friday watching the other races and did final adjustments and preparations on Taylor’s sled.
Guess what happened to me that night? You guessed it, I got sick! I wouldn’t wish this on anyone. I just prayed all night that I would be well by morning so I could be able to help Taylor race. I don’t know what we would of done if I hadn’t gotten well.
Saturday found Taylor taking a 2nd and a 4th in his heats in the 14-15 class and a 7th in the final. The 16-17 class didn’t look as good. Taylor had problems over the summer with left shoulder bothering him and we had seen the doctor and the doctor had determined that it was just stress and strain on his shoulder from training for snocross, but the pain returned while racing on Saturday and it was almost more than he could bear. So we made the decision after his first heat in the 16-17 class that Taylor would just roll the starts for the rest of the day in that class and try to make it through the rest of the day in the 14-15. In my mind, Taylor has a drive that can’t be described for him to continue to race that day. He was in an incredible amount of pain, but he wouldn’t allow that to stop him even though it wasn’t the best he could do, he still gave 110% of what he was capable of, considering the circumstances. Once again, I just don’t know how he does it! At the end of the day, Taylor remained 5th in points in the 14-15 class and unfortunately he fell to 11th in the 16-17.
As soon as we were done racing, we loaded up and headed home, but once again the trip home was going to be just as interesting as the trip out. Just 20 miles outside of Milwaukee we had a blow out on the right rear tire of my truck. Not fun to say the least. Changing a tire with an extremely large trailer in tow, on the interstate, in the dark and cold can present quite a challenge. Thank God for Taylor. I don’t know if it is just his age or just his nature, but he kept me calm and cool instead of being the other way around. We worked as a team and after sometime we were back driving for home!
We stayed somewhere in Illinois later that night and the next day we drove for only a few hours to just find that Des Moines, Iowa was going to be a challenge again to drive through. From about 20 miles outside of Des Moines to 20 miles to the other side of Des Moines was sheer black ice. This is the clearest ice I have ever seen on any road. I swear that the interstate was dry! I was in 4 wheel drive on level ground and the truck still wanted to go sideways. We were very fortunate to safely make it through that part of our trip. I pray that those that were in the huge car crash in the eastbound lane came out okay. Taylor said he counted at least 10 cars and semis that were involved in the crash and the traffic was backed up for miles and they did close that side of the interstate.
I am very thankful that remainder of the trip was 23 hours of uneventful windshield time and that Taylor and myself made it home safely to my wife and daughter to spend Christmas together. I have never been so glad to be home!
Well that should pretty much do it for now, wow, what a trip! Thank you again to each of you and I hope to have an update on this past weekend from Grand Lake, Colorado later this week. Also check out the pictures with this email from our truck stop tuning session in Iowa. Till next time…
Clark Dyess
Rumor has it Taylor did VERY well in Colorado this weekend!!
Best of luck Taylor as your season continues!!
– January 5, 2010