Every year, it’s the same, the anticipation of the first race of the season is unlike anything else.
All winter long, it’s what drives you: working late nights in the shop, lying on cold concrete, staring at a to-do list that somehow gets longer instead of shorter.
The first race isn’t just another race. It’s a statement. A reset. A chance to roll through those gates and show the world exactly what you’ve built.
This year, we weren’t there. And yeah, that one stings.
But let’s be straight about something: not being there is not the same as giving up.
The truth is, getting to the track is never as simple as it looks from the outside. We take preparation seriously, methodically, deliberately. And sometimes it only takes one weak link to bring the whole chain crashing down. For us, it was a combination: critical parts that didn’t arrive on time, family commitments that rightfully take priority over everything, and a few setbacks in the build that cost us more time than we had to spare.
These are not excuses. It’s just reality. The same reality every racer faces at some point.
A long-time mentor once told me: “You can only control the controllables — the rest will play themselves out.” Racing has a way of hammering that lesson home. You can plan every detail, triple-check your work, put in every hour you’ve got and there will still be factors outside your hands. Parts get delayed. Schedules clash. Things don’t come together the way they should.
It’s frustrating. It’s maddening. But it’s also the deal you signed up for.
And here’s what we know about setbacks: they don’t break us. They strengthen us.
Look at the last two years. It hasn’t been smooth. It hasn’t always gone our way. But we’ve kept showing up. Kept building. Kept pushing forward when it would’ve been easier to walk away. That’s not just something we say, it’s the record we’ve built. That doesn’t change now. It won’t change now.
Missing the first race hurts. There’s no sugarcoating that. But one missed race does not write the story of a season. 2026 is not slipping away. We’ll regroup. We’ll set a new target. And when the right day comes, we’ll be more ready than we’ve ever been because we used this time.
Every setback we’ve weathered has added something to who we are. Every delay, every late night, every moment of frustration is fuel. And when we finally roll through those gates, fire the car up, and hit the track, all our work will be on full display every late night, every setback, every ounce of determination that fueled us forward.
We are not out. We are not done. We will show up ready to battle.
See ya at the track. Soon.
