Dryden, MI (June 2, 2011) - When the 2011 schedule was announced for the Inaugural season within the JEGS/CRA All-Stars Tour Presented by GM Performance Parts, 18-year-old Jimmy Novak knew he had his work cut out for him if he was going to run the entire tour. After all, of the 10 tracks on the 2011 schedule, Novak had only seen three of them in his brief career.

One of those facilities he had never raced on before was the fast 1/3 (0.333) mile semi-banked paved oval of Columbus Motor Speedway in Columbus, Ohio for the CoughlinCars.com 100 Presented by JEGS.com on Saturday, May 28^th. Going into the event, Novak was sitting in second place in the chase for the Howe Racing Enterprises Howie Lettow Memorial Rookie of the Year title chase given to the series’ top freshman at the end of the season.

"We unloaded at Columbus with a good handling car that I was pleased with. I’m not too big of a fan of flat tracks but I adapted to Columbus pretty well." Explained the Dryden, Michigan rookie, who scored an unheard of three Rookie of the Year titles at three different race tracks in 2010. After Qualifying 13^th, he would start the 100-lap main on the inside of the seventh row.

"In the feature the car was decent we managed to stay out of all the big wrecks and went from starting 13^th to 4^th with five laps to go." He continued. "I had to start on the outside in the last double file restart, which was not the place you wanted to be at Columbus all night. I didn’t get cleared in time to get down behind Chad Finley and ended up getting shuffled back to 8^th where I ended up finishing." 

"I would have liked to of had a top five finish which was my goal for Columbus, but it’s in the past and I’m looking forward to going to Anderson this weekend where we should run good once again." The 18-year-old added. "I want to thank my crew for all there help that they were and hope that I can keep improving and run up front like I did at Columbus." He ended.

The Novak Motorsports crew has little time to get the #53 Novak’s Supply & Equipment Chevrolet prepared for the next race on the calendar on Saturday, June 4^th at the fast ¼ (0.250) mile high-banked paved oval of Anderson Speedway in Anderson, Indiana for the Anderson 100 Presented by JEGS.com.

With his first career Top 10 finish in JEGS/CRA/GM competition at Columbus, Novak takes over the Howe Racing Enterprises Howie Lettow Memorial Rookie of the Year points lead by eight points over fellow freshman, Tom Woodin and he also jumped from 24^th to 13^th in the overall points standings, just two points out of the overall top 10.