No Room For Error Night
The fans last night were treated to some old school racing at the Race Track By the River last night. If you gave someone an inch,they took the full mile.
The 125 micro main was the 1st class of the evening and for Sam Borger, the inch was a mile as his early lead would fall to John Maurer as the pair headed into turn 3 with Sam's 04 sliding a little out of the groove allowing Maurer to make the pass and go on to take the checker. With 2 laps remaining AJ Gerhart saw the same thing and cashed in for 2nd place money with Sam getting his best finish of the season at 3rd. Some solid runs for 4th through 6th with Dan Lane,Jr.,Blaire Schoenly and Shane Davis coming from 11th.
Barry Seaman would like a redo for lap 18 as he opened the door just enough for Chase Schott to scoot by. Slower traffic gave Barry another shot for the win but had to settle for 2nd just a scant .1 second behind the 10S. Aubrey Romig and Hailey Eroh were having a private battle for 3rd with the pair swapping that spot every 5 laps until lap 18 when Eroh made the 3rd place pass. Anthony Speece found some late race speed and slotted in for 4th with Romig getting 5th. Collin Carpenter just bested Gavin Wolfe to the line for 6th.
Having Richie Hartman on the pole for the 270's many thought it would be a cakewalk,but in the closing laps,things tightened up.The 1st 5 laps, the trio of Hartman,Matt Hoffman and Alex Reinsmith locked in for an under the blanket run. At the 1/2 way sign Louden Reimert entered the fray and 5 laps later,he was now challenging for the win.. As these 2 were mixing it up Adam Buchel found a high side line that got him past both Reinsmith and Jarrett Imler with the 10 just inches from Reimert. A Lap 17 caution set this 3 car battle in motion to the finish with Hartman getting the win by .1 seconds over Reimert and just .3 seconds over Buchel and Reinsmith. Imler notched 5th ahead of Matt McAnally with Hoffman getting 7th.
For a car smoking as badly as Luke McCloskey's 22M was, getting 20 laps completed seemed impossible,but he warded off all attempts from Brett Bieber, again aboard the Horvath 42H to take the All Star Slingshot victory. Staying within striking distance and even poking the nose of his 3L ahead of Bieber on lap 12,hard luck hit Nolen Layser as the chain of his car was strewn across turn 2 on the final lap of the race giving him a 9th place run.All eyes were attracted to the 3 car showdown between last week's winner Jason Dunkelberger, John Redner and Tess Horvath with the trio heading under the checker 3rd,4th and 5th from Layser's misfortune.
The top 3 in the 600 micro lineup stayed that way with Trent Warner finding late race track conditions to his liking to have a comfortable win advantage.The next 2 cars were a different story as Matt McAnally would be 2nd on lap 5 and 3rd on lap 10 with Dakota Barlet in 3rd on lap 5 and 2nd on lap 10.The duo wheeled it out to the 25 lap finish with McAnally getting 2nd by just .2 seconds over Barlet,who had the trio of Dan Lane,Jr.,Adam Buchel and Chris Kurtz all wanting the final podium spot. Kurtz shook off some major bad luck for his 6th place run. Brian Hughes was a steady 7th with Trevor Kobylarz getting the Driver of the Week Free Pit Pass for finishing 8th.
The final event of the night was the Stage 1 Mods and right from the start,it was evident that AJ Gerhart had the dominant hot rod. Again the battle behind him was between the same 2 drivers with Johnny Fugelo and Bryce Dodig swapping the 2nd position on a few occasions with Dodig steering clear of Fugelo with 3 laps to go.Mark Mohr was now a top 3 contender with 2 laps to go,but ran out of laps and slotted in for 4th.Colin Cox got 5th place money with last week's winner Brett Gilmore improving 12 spots to get 6th from his 18th starting slot. The flying females of Alexandra Allaico-Cushman and Riley Wanamaker rounded out the top 8.
Checkered was thrown at 10:08 with an overflowing crowd on hand.Tom Hiester's HO Raceway had their season awards get together at Shellhammer's last night and everyone enjoyed the night at the speedway.
Please keep driver Steve Keller in your thoughts and prayers. Steve suffered severe knee and ankle injuries after his All Star Slingshot veered hard into the wall. Great work by Jason and his EMT staff for tending to Steve's injuries.
Wingless Weds. will be back in action next week with the stars and cars taking to the well prepped track by Dave Cordier,Jr.
