Wrong Place, Wrong Time For Leonard In Kentucky

Sparta,  Kentucky  May 16, 2005; Johnny  Leonard had good reason to be looking forward 
to Sunday’s Harley Davidson  Cincinnati 150.  After posting the  tenth fastest 
time in Friday’s practice session, Leonard rallied during  qualifying to post 
his No. 13 Boca Bay Builders-Affordable Roofing Chevrolet  20th on the 
starting grid, their best start of the ’05  season. 
Knowing  he had a good racecar, Leonard buckled in his racecar just after 
3:00pm EST  Sunday looking to charge towards the front and vow to everyone their 
early  season struggles were going to be something of the past. 
With  crew chief Ted Kennedy on the pit box, spotter Eric Jones high above, 
and part  owner Rick Woodard overlooking the operation, Leonard began to 
accelerate  towards the green flag when the unthinkable happened.  The outside pole 
sitter, Stuart Kirby in  the No. 75 Ford Taurus spun his tires causing his 
machine to make a complete  360-degree spin and sending the rest of the 39 cars 
scrambling to avoid his  automobile. 
With  guidance from spotter Jones and Leonard’s quick thinking it appeared 
that the  team was non-the-worse-the-wear, but then T.J. Bell in the No. 48 
Chevrolet who  was also trying to avoid the wreck bounced right into Leonard 
sending both  machines hard into the outside wall just shy of crossing the 
start-finish line.   
Frustration  quickly could be seen all over the entire Boca Bay Racing team 
as a good car,  capable of winning the race was just practically destroyed. 
However, with the  guidance of crew chief Ted Kennedy, the team opted to bring 
the No. 13 down on  pit road and make the necessary changes to fix the machine 
as best as  possible. 
For  the remainder of the day, Leonard dealt with a very ill-handling 
machine.  Instead of aiming towards the team’s  first top-ten finish of the year, the 
day became about  survival. 
The  team did survive and avoided more potential disaster as a loose wheel 
became  evident on the Chevrolet Monte Carlo with 25 markers remaining.  Leonard 
came to pit road and the team  changed tires and set the driver on his way.  
Leonard finished 24th on  Sunday from Kentucky Speedway. 
“It’s  just so disappointing,�?? said the driver Johnny Leonard. “I don’t 
know what  happened on the start of the race, but it cost us really big.  We had 
a good racecar.  I hate it, I hate for not only the team  but our sponsors as 
well.  We’ve got  a huge monkey on our back.�??  
The  Cape Coral, Florida native continued, “We’ve been in four  races this 
year and even though we’ve finished three of them, our luck has been  crappy.  
We’re going to bounce back,  we have all the right pieces to do it, I promise 
everyone  that.�?? 
On  a brighter note, the Boca Bay Racing team did pick up the Gladiator  of 
the Race award from the ARCA RE/MAX Series for not giving up despite the  
circumstances. 
Leonard  and his team will once again try to get back on track as the series 
heads to the  “home track�?? of the ARCA RE/MAX Series, Toledo Speedway this 
Sunday. The race  will also be huge for Leonard as several members of his family 
and members of  his crew’s family will be in attendance.