Houston Report
By
Joe Sherk
April 1, 2007

Learning Process Continues for Yates in First Round Finish at Houston

BAYTOWN, Texas, April 1, 2007- After waiting out a three-hour rain delay before the start of Sunday's O'Reilly Spring Nationals at Houston Raceway Park, Jim Yates was looking forward to competing.

"I knew I had to be ready," said Yates of his first-round Pro Stock match with Richie Stevens. "Richie is a tough competitor."

As it turned out, Yates left the starting line 16-thousandths of a second too soon and Stevens was the winner with a 6.709-second, 205.54-mph effort to a 6.728 at 205.63.

There was, however, a positive feeling circulating in the Wiley-X/Sea Ray Boats Pontiac GTO camp afterward.

"We are making progress," said Yates, of Occoquan, Va. "We made a good run. Bill (Jenkins, team engine builder) has been working hard on making more horsepower. Our problem is we need to work on getting the power to the ground in first and second gears. We've been rattling the tires at the top of first gear. That's something we'll be working on between now and our next race at Las Vegas."

Yates resumes POWERade Series competition in the Summitracing.com Nationals at Las Vegas, April 13-15.