By MIKE MALLETT
Erick Rudolph, winner of eight TQ indoor events, didn’t add to that total this weekend at the PPL Center in Allentown, Pa., but he had a solid weekend scoring back-to-back podium finishes. The Ransomville, N.Y., driver backed up his third place finish on Friday night with a second on Saturday night.
Rudolph debuted a new Lafler Chassis this weekend. He admitted that it wasn’t perfect, but he’s got a good base going forward as he looks ahead to Atlantic City in a few weeks.
“We got third yesterday, second today,” stated Rudolph. “I guess we are moving in the right direction. Atlantic City is the one that everyone wants to win. We are coming into there with good momentum. We are still trying to figure out this new car. It’s really promising. It responds to changes really nice. We missed it a little bit tonight, but we know exactly what we would need to do. We still had a car we could have won with. Third and second with 53 cars here this weekend, you can complain about it but you have to keep it in perspective too.”
Rudolph chased eventual winner Scott Kreutter for much of the event. He restarted alongside of him on multiple occasions only to fall back in line. At one point he slid all the way back to fifth before rebounding late to get second.
“He (Kreutter) got the lead and he did a good job keeping his line and not making any mistakes,” mentioned Rudolph. “We got bounced back a few spots and had to come back a bit. The restarts you try to give it a shot. You are fighting a losing battle on the outside. I was able to hold my own and drop into second on most of the restarts.”
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