For those of you who do not know me, my name is Jeff Bentancourt and I race the number 56 Mini Super Mini Truck (MST) with my brother David Bentancourt. The Mini Super Trucks are slightly modified mini trucks that run on a 1/4 mile paved oval. The main event is made up of 20 MST's. This is our first year in this class.

We learned a lot this season, truck set up, gears, and driving style. For our first year, we were really doing well. We had several top five finishes and I even won a feature event. Needless to say on the night of July 31, 1999 I was pretty confident that we were going to finish well.

That day started off rocky. Because of some prior commitments we could not make the first practice. I felt that this was a problem because we had done a lot to the set up during the week and now we would have only one practice to see what the truck was going to do. No second chances before qualifying.

I took the truck on the track and ran it for about fifteen minutes. The truck seemed to be handling all right, and I was starting to calm down, feeling a little more relaxed. When I went out to qualify I was anxious hoping to get a good time so I could start up front in the main. When I finished, I qualified with a time of 16.3 seconds. Not our best time. This put us 14^th in a field of 20.

I didn't let our qualifying get me down….much. We started the race and at around lap 10 we got our first caution. It seems that when you're running in the back you have to drive around all the accidents or become a victim yourself. At that time I was around 10^th.

The truck was running good. It felt like it was on rails. In turn 1 and 2 I could feel the left tires leave the ground. There was not going to be a spin out for the number 56 truck. At around lap 17 I was in 4^th place. I couldn't believe that I had made up 10 spots in such a tight race. I was feeling good and at this point I was hungry for a top 3 finish, but at the same time I knew the importance of finishing the race in one piece. I was being careful not get out of my line and to not take stupid chances. At the same time I was aggressive as hell because I could taste the victory of being there on the front stretch accepting my trophy.

I had the inside line, 4^th place. The number 9 truck of mike Sims was running about even with me on the outside. I went into turn one on the same line that I had been running all night. I was confident because this was my turn. I was fastest on this part of the track and nobody was going to take me on the outside. When I entered the turn, I felt the 9 truck pushing on me. Sims was not giving me any room even though I had the line. Next thing I know I had been pushed in the infield. The truck was out of shape and the front end must have caught in the dirt because it felt like I was going to roll the truck (I know this feeling because I rolled it early in the season). I tried to steer out of it and when the truck came down on all four wheels I found myself aimed straight for the wall. It felt like a slingshot and the truck rocketed for the wall. There was nothing I could do to change my destiny.

As I was heading for the wall I knew that it was going to hurt. When I made contact Things went black, but I was conscious. I remember sounds coming from my mouth, "oooooooohhhhhhh." I felt my body as a whole wanting to continue it's forward movement, but being restrained by my safety belts. I remember that it was a violent stop and when it was over I couldn’t breathe. There was a silence when it was over. The silence was then broken by people asking if I was O.K. As soon as I got enough breath back I got out a faint, "no."

When I fully got my breath back and did a self check seeing what hurt and what didn't I found that I was going to be alright. I got out of the truck waved to the crowd and got in the ambulance. I went and talked to some people in the pits and they were surprised to see me walking around. They told me that they felt the impact in the pits. I survived just fine, with exception of a lot of bruising, soreness and a little pain.

This year I really felt like I experienced a lot in racing. I got my first feature win, got several top five finishes, rolled the truck and drove it straight into the wall. Next year promises to be better with our new truck.

Jeff Bentancourt