This entry, the sixth and final in a series, was submitted by AAA’s Christie Hyde who accompanied the winners on their job-shadowing trip. Read all posts here.

We awoke the day before the scheduled race to sunny skies and pleasant temperatures in Pocono Mountains. We traveled to the racetrack for a shortened day in the garage. The 2009 Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills national champs quickly went to work assisting the DeWALT team in preparing the No. 17 Ford Fusion for back-to-back practice sessions. During practice, the team seemed to struggle with finding the right set-up as Matt Kenseth’s lap times were off the pace.

Team owner... Read More

          This entry, the fifth in a series, was submitted by AAA’s Christie Hyde who accompanied the winners on their job-shadowing trip. Read all posts here.

Our first morning in Pocono was an early one, as we headed out to the racetrack at 6:30 a.m. After picking up our credentials from NASCAR, we headed into the garage where the DeWALT team was beginning the vehicle inspection process. Justin, Matt and Mark jumped in to help, pushing the race car, installing bodywork, hauling the inspection toolbox and carrying the car cover as the No. 17 Ford made its way through numerous inspection stations.

Following the inspection, the team... Read More

          This entry, the fourth in a series, was submitted by AAA’s Christie Hyde who accompanied the winners on their job-shadowing trip. Read all posts here.

The fourth day of our trip took a slightly slower pace and allowed us to catch our breath a bit before busy race weekend. In the morning, we drove slightly further north to Mooresville, North Carolina. Nicknamed ‘Race City USA,’ Mooresville is home to the NASCAR Technical Institute—a partnership school between Universal Technical Institute (UTI)  and NASCAR. As a sponsor of Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills, UTI awarded the 2009 national champions with full... Read More

     This entry, the third in a series, was submitted by AAA’s Christie Hyde who accompanied the winners on their job-shadowing trip. Read all posts here.

After a spending a day at the track with the DeWALT Racing team, day three of our trip took us to Roush Fenway Racing, where the Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills national champs spent the day alongside the team during final prep for this weekend’s race.

Roush Fenway Racing has an entire complex located in Concord, North Carolina, that houses its administrative offices, Sprint Cup Series race shop, fabrication and body hanging shop, paint shop, dyno, photo ... Read More

 
This entry, the second in a series, was submitted by AAA’s Christie Hyde who accompanied the winners on their job-shadowing trip. Read all posts here.

Tuesday was the first official day of 2009 Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills national champs’ job shadowing with Roush Fenway Racing’s DeWALT Racing team. But our morning didn’t start over at team’s headquarters in Concord. Instead, we loaded into our Hertz rental SUV for a daytrip with the team to Rockingham Speedway.

Our drive to ‘The Rock’ took about two hours from Concord, N.C.—most of which was through North Carolina backcountry and several small towns.  We made our way down... Read More

     This entry, the first in a series, was submitted by AAA’s Christie Hyde who accompanied the winners on their job-shadowing trip

BACKGROUND:  Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills is a nationwide automotive technology competition for high school juniors and seniors interested in pursuing careers as automotive service technicians. This year marks the 60th anniversary of the competition that tests students’ automotive knowledge, workmanship and problem-solving abilities with a written test as well as a race against the clock to diagnose and properly repair intentionally “bugged” vehicles. Each state sent its best two-person team to... Read More