MATTHEW HERRICK

through layers of fiberglass and paint to reach bare carbon.“ That took four hours just to get everything prepped,” he says. By 7 or 8 a. m., he had the two pieces bonded together with carbon fiber, still curing, flimsy but functional.“ It takes 10 hours to harden, but I had to put it on the car,” he says.

As the Mooresville sun rose and the rest of the Modern Racing staff began filing in for Friday morning work, Herrick’ s long night was catching up to him.“ I’ d been up all night long. I was wore out,” he admits. He called a coworker at six.“ I said,‘ Hey, I need help now.’ He was like,‘ I’ ll be right there.’ That was really cool that the team had my back.”

With reinforcements in place, they tackled the front tree, the structural tubing that supports the nose. Because the ProCharger inlet occupies the center of the front clip, they also fabricated aluminum plates to mount the massive intake correctly.

By 3 p. m. Friday, less than 14 hours after the crash, the car was buttoned up and loaded back into a trailer for the return trip to Rockingham. Despite being awake for more than a day, Herrick drove back to the track that afternoon.“ I had been up for well past 24 hours at this point,” he says.“ But I had to see it run down the track.”

Eliminations didn’ t begin until after 11 p. m., which stretched Herrick’ s waking hours close to 40 straight by the time he finally returned home. But the repaired Mustang made multiple runs without issue.“ If it blew off the car the first run, I probably wouldn’ t have been very surprised,” he admits.“ But it held on. So for me, that was kind of a big enough win.”

Herrick notes that the thrash he described is just an extreme example of what he and the team at Modern Racing do on a weekly basis. The Mooresville shop handles chassis work, fabrication, wiring, and more for customers across Pro Mod, Pro Stock, drag radial, and no-time classes.“ We like to take a situation that seems impossible and go the next step further,” Herrick said.“ It’ s really cool, all the support we get from our customers to do these things.”

He’ s quick to credit his coworkers as much as himself.“ It’ s not just me. It is a team effort,” he says, specifically shouting out Kate Seward and Jachob Egelston.“ As soon as everyone got there, they were like,‘ Where can I help? What can I do?’ They really saved the day.” DI

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