Veteran driver Danny Smith slipped by Terry McCarl with just three laps remaining to take home the top prize as the Midwest Open Wheel Association (MOWA) 410 Sprint Cars returned to 34 Raceway near Burlington, Iowa, Saturday night.
Critter Malone and Terry McCarl earned the front row starting spots for the thirty-lap main event and on the first attempt at a start Matt Harms took a hard tumble in turn one. Harms would emerge from the wreckage uninjured and on the second try it was Malone that shot out to the early lead. McCarl kept pace though and when he found some bite on the inside line of turns one and two he moved in to challenge the leader. As Malone scored lap number ten and drove onto the cushion in turn one, McCarl dove low and then shut the door by sliding up in front of Malone in turn two.
After checking up Malone's #7 car lost power and he coasted down the back stretch to bring out the first caution of the event. McCarl assumed the lead on the restart with now Robbie Standridge giving chase and behind them the battle for third was heating up between Danny Smith and Jordan Goldesberry. Goldesberry had a run on Smith off the top side of turn two and as he pulled alongside Smith down the back stretch the two cars must have touched as Goldesberry slid sideways before entering turn three. The youngster out of Springfield, Illinois, somehow kept his #65 on all fours, but the tow truck was required to take him back to the pits.
The red flag waved again on lap sixteen when one of the provisional starters Caleb Wankel got upside down in turn three. Once back to racing Standridge tried to stay with McCarl, but after a few laps both Smith and Jerrod Hull moved passed Standridge and took up the chase of McCarl. The advantage was shrinking and with four laps to go lapped traffic loomed ahead causing McCarl to choose a different line and that was all that Smith needed as he raced into the lead. T-Mac tried to recover, but Smith was able to put a lapped car between the two as he clicked off the final three laps for the victory.
Hull made a late charge on McCarl for second, but came up just short, Robbie Standridge settled for the fourth spot while Tony Bruce Jr. made the charge of the night coming from nineteenth to fifth. Last night's MOWA winner in Jacksonville Joey Moughan finished in the sixth position and Australian driver Ian Madsen wheeled the #7K car from seventeenth to seventh at the checkers.
Smith had a pretty adventurous night as he started in the eighth and final position in the third heat race. With Wankel setting an extremely slow pace as the pole-sitter, when the green flag waved Danny flew around the top side and was up to second when the cars hit the back stretch for the first time. As the first lap was scored Smith thought that the red flag had waved as a red light from somewhere caught his eye. He slowed briefly and then got back into the throttle, but the pause had dropped him back to fourth and a couple of laps later McCarl shuffled him back to fifth. Shortly after that Jim Moughan and McCarl drifted up the track allowing Smith to get back up to third. Then, in the final two laps as leaders Matt Harms and Jeremy Standridge paused behind lapped traffic, Smith blew by them and went on for the heat race victory essentially "passing" ten cars in an eight-car field.
The MOWA Sprint Cars will close out their 2012 schedule on Friday October 12th at the Tri-City Speedway in Pontoon Beach, Illinois, near St. Louis.
It was season championship night for the Sport Mods and Mod Lites with the feature races in each lined straight up by points. Tony Dunker was challenged by Joe Bliven early, pulled away and then nearly lost it when a lapped car got sideways in from of him. Dunker recovered, but that same lapped car had a part in both Bliven and Levi Smith limping to the infield with damaged race cars after running in the top five. Dunker, who ranks third in the IMCA National points, secured the track championship at 34 Raceway with the win and he was followed by John Oliver Jr., Creston Williams, Sean Wyett and Phillip Cossel.
I am under the impression that Mike Morrill wins every Mod Lite feature race that I see and tonight was no exception as he went flag-to-flag. Evan Epperson chased him all the way in second, Greg Rossell finished third, Daniel Keltner took fourth and Joel Huggins was fifth.
The front two rows got bottled up as the green flag waved on the Four Cylinder feature so by the time they got to the flagstand Brandon Lambert had gone from sixth to first. As he raced off of turn two though both Billy Stanford and Austen Becerra pulled alongside him with Becerra emerging as the official leader of lap one. And Becerra would go on to lead the rest of them as well and take the feature win ahead of Stanford and Lambert. Dustin Ravelin finished in the fourth position.
By the time that the final checkered waved at 10:00 p.m. the temperature had dipped into the high forties and race fans hope that it will be a bit warmer for 34 Raceway's final two events of the season. Next Saturday, September 29th, will be the season championship for the Sprint Invaders and on October 6th will be the first annual Fall Challenge.
My plans have changed and I will be unable to go to Quincy on Sunday night, but hopefully I can get back down there next week as they close out their 2012 season at the "Bullring on Broadway".
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