Donald McIntosh
Donald McIntosh kicked off the 2015 season by winning the Hangover 40 at 411 Motor Speedway. The victory on the Seymour, Tenn. track provided a spark that resulted in a first half of the season that would produce six wins and a Spring Nationals championship before the calendar had even made its way through July.
The Blount Motorsports team will go into the 2016 version of the Hangover event on New Year’s Day hoping for a similar result and a similar spark.
“I hope so,” McIntosh responded in an interview with InsideDirtRacing.com. “We’re going to try hard at it. We need some practice so I guess we’ll get some practice on Thursday then get up Friday and see how we can do. We didn’t have the best end of the year but we’re pumped going into this race. This has been a good track for us.”
After that remarkable beginning to the 2015 season, the results for the No. 7 BMS team dropped off. Following a Southern Nationals win at 411 in July, McIntosh went winless throughout the remainder of the campaign.
“It tapered off at the end,” the Dawsonville, Georgia native admitted. “Our year didn’t end as good as we started, but we’re looking forward to this year. We’ve made some changes and we got a new car, but we’re not going to run it at 411.”
The 22-year-old driver just completed his first full season with BMS and he believes the relationships built with his crew during that time will benefit the team going forward.
McIntosh talking with BMS crew chief David Bryant.
“I think with us having a year under our belt and me getting to know (crew chief)David Bryant and B.J. Hillman and building that relationship, it will help us a lot throughout this year,” he explained. “You’ve got to have the ups and the downs. When everything is going right, it’s not hard as a team to get along and to make me happy inside the car. That’s not hard when you’re running well because everything is obviously meshing. But it’s the times when you’re not running real well and can still communicate that you get better as a team.”
McIntosh explained that the statistics from the second half of the 2015 season were not truly indicative of how his team performed.
“We had better runs than it showed at the end of the year, but we just made little mistakes that really hurt us and that’s just part of racing,” the driver said. “You’re not going to be real good all the time. But I think we’re going to be fine. The guys are behind me and I’ve got all the faith in the world in them and David’s ability to get the car happy for me.
“It was just a mixture of things at the end of the year,” McIntosh continued. “We didn’t have as bad of a stretch there as it showed we did, but at the end of the day, the record book is going to be what people look at. So in that way it was most definitely not a banner end to the year, but that’s racing.”
McIntosh on his way to victory in the 2015 Hangover at 411
The Maryville-based operation owned by Larry Garner has added a new machine to its fleet. A recent trip to Shinnston, WV produced a new Rocket XR1 chassis, the latest design to be produced by that company.
“Me and Dave went and picked that up last week,” McIntosh stated. “They’re trying really hard. They changed a lot on this new car and I’m really excited about it. The first time we run it will be at Brunswick.”
Look for the Blount Motorsports team to run a schedule much like that of 2015 in the coming year.
“That’s the plan. We’re going to run Ray Cook’s series, the Spring and Southern Nationals. And possibly, if the schedules work out, we might run some of the Southern All Stars stuff. So mostly we’ll do about the same as last year, hitting the stuff relatively close to home.”
