It was a hot, sultry evening at the Knoxville Raceway Sunday as thirty-three USAC non-wing Sprints and twenty-nine 305’s prepared to do battle and I was very fortunate to get a late call from Bill Wright asking me to join him for the live webcast on Hosehead’s Radio. Being asked to describe the racing action to internet listeners worldwide is always an honor, but on this night I think that I was even more excited about the fact that Morgan and I were now going to be in an air conditioned booth rather than in the sun drenched grandstand! While doing the webcast I was unable to take my usual notes so following are some general thoughts from the evening.
The four heat races for the USAC cars were very entertaining featuring three and four-wide racing around the big half-mile. Former track announcer and current editor of Flat Out magazine Justin Zoch joined us in the booth following the heats and he reported that the big crowd was buzzing with excitement following the four qualifiers and that he had heard several people say “let’s take the wings off of ‘em this week as well” in reference to the 50th running of the Knoxville Nationals. The twenty-five-lap feature saw plenty of action early as Scotty Weir and Brady Bacon set the pace, but it didn’t take long for the fifth-starting Bud Kaeding to charge into the lead. The race went non-stop and with the high-line becoming dominant after the first few laps, the field started to string out just a bit. Bacon was able to keep Kaeding within striking distance throughout, but whenever he tried the lower line through the turns he would lose several car-lengths and then need a few laps just to catch back up. Lapped traffic behaved well and Kaeding cruised in for the win with Bacon about ten car-lengths back in second. Daron Clayton passed Weir late to finish third while Damion Gardner came from 11th to finish fifth. Bryan Clauson, Robert Ballou, Chris Windom, Casey Shuman and Dave Darland completed the top ten while Levi Jones had a fifth-place finish fade away when his right rear tire went flat on the final lap. Jones limped his STP colored #20 in for 11th.
The USAC Sprints will be back in action on Tuesday night for the $15,000-to-win Ultimate Challenge at the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa.
Two drivers who have done their fair share of 410 racing here at Knoxville, Rager Phillips and Travis Cram started from the front row in the 305 main event and that is how they ran the entire race with Phillips winning and Cram taking second. Behind them though there was some interesting racing going on as Marty Stephenson finished third and Chad Huston took fourth. Matt Stephenson started 11th and finished fifth while central Missouri visitor J Kinder came from row nine to finish sixth. Nick Ross, Casey Friedrichsen and Matthew Stelzer finished seventh, eighth and ninth while Mark Widmar, who only made the field as an alternate when Dustin Clark did not report to staging, came from 20th to finish tenth.
NASCAR’s Ray Evernham started the race on the inside of turn two and did a great job of saving his car, and likely many others, when contact put him sideways in turn one at the start. Evernham collected himself nicely and went on to finish the race in the 11th position.
A big thanks to Bill Wright for the invite! Remember race fans for those of you who cannot make it out to Knoxville this week for the Nationals, and keeping in mind that the event will not be televised live this year, you can always catch the live webcast on Hosehead’s Radio with “Hot Rod” Pattison, Bill W. and a long list of drivers and celebrities who will join them in the booth this week.
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