Enough With Running Second, Kevin Swindell Conquers Knoxville's "Capitani Classic"

Friday night was the first time this season that Kevin Swindell had driven a winged sprint car on dirt. He finished second to Justin Henderson. On Saturday night Swindell fought off Kyle Larson to finish second in the 360 Knoxville Nationals and if not for that battle he may have been able to make a run at the champion Shane Stewart. Most drivers would be thrilled with two runner-up finishes in a major event at the Knoxville Raceway, especially in their first weekend out for the season while the others had been doing it all year. Not Kevin Swindell though as he is not known as “The Bulldog” for nothing.

On Sunday night, despite being the last of 81 entries to take to the track for qualifying, Swindell did what he needed to do to earn his way into the invert for the heat races. He survived a close call along with his father Sammy at the start of his heat race, and then outfoxed one of the craftiest drivers ever to race at Knoxville to take the lead and eventually the win in the second annual Capitani Classic.

That close call came at the start of heat race number four as Kevin lined up in the second row on the outside of Jason Johnson and with Sammy starting just behind his son in sixth. With the top four cars moving on to the A-Main in each of the heat races getting a good start is necessary especially for the two fastest qualifiers who start fifth and sixth as making the top four is the difference between starting in the first four rows of the A-Main, or having to transfer from the B and start the feature in row eleven or twelve. When the green flag waved, the field scrambled up front and Kevin wound up nearly sideways in front of Sammy who had to stomp the brakes and steer to avoid. The six cars starting behind them did the same and somehow everybody kept moving and the race stayed green. Kevin was able to recover and was scored fifth on the opening lap, while Sammy was now well back in seventh and pushing to make up ground. Kevin would get by both Dustin Selvage and Austin McCarl to finish in the third spot while Sammy would run out of laps and finish fifth having to go on and later win the second B-Main to make the show. After the checkers waved both Swindell’s stayed on the gas to catch up with Jason Johnson and they both expressed their displeasure with him on the cool down lap.

Kevin would lineup to the outside of Terry McCarl on the front row for the 25-lap main event and, with his years of experience, you will not find many drivers who are better at gaining the advantage when they are setting the pace here at Knoxville than McCarl. As the green flag waved it was “T-Mac” who would take the lead heading down the back straightaway, but before he could come around to put the opening lap on the scoreboard Ian Madsen would spin in turn two to bring out the caution.

The field was reset and after Wally Price brought the Pella Motors pace truck to the infield off of turn two McCarl slowed to a snail’s pace as he eased the anxious field of twenty-four down the back straightaway. It seemed like it took two or three minutes before the front row hit the chalk line in turn four and McCarl was the first on the trigger moving up in front of Swindell down the front stretch. “The Bulldog” did not lift and steered to the left to enter turn one on the low line where the Indy Race Parts #71 stuck like glue to take the lead down the back stretch. As McCarl had to deal with the challenges of Justin Henderson and Brian Brown, Swindell quickly opened up a big lead only to have it wiped away when Jon Agan spun in turn four on lap number six.

On the restart Swindell again opened a big lead as first Brown and then Henderson were able to get around McCarl and then it was Henderson who raised some eyebrows when he again powered past the driver that many figure will be the chief challenger to Donny Schatz later this week as he dropped Brown back to third. The caution waved again at the mid-race mark when Kyle Larson looped his #1K in turn four and the restart would now give Henderson the opportunity to see if he could keep pace with, and possibly challenge the leader.

He found that he could not though as once again Swindell pulled away and despite having to work lapped traffic through the closing laps there was no catching Kevin as he posted his fourth career win in the 410 division here at Knoxville and collected the $5,000 top prize. Henderson was impressive in running second ahead of Brown who is definitely still a driver to watch at this week’s 410 Nationals. Shane Stewart started eighth and finished fourth while Craig Dollansky was the only World of Outlaws regular to crack the top five after starting fifteenth.

Cappy Classic Notes……Schatz, Steve Kinser and Kraig Kinser were the only Outlaw regulars who did not compete this evening…..Jason Sides was scheduled to start in the fourth row of the second heat, but did not come to staging for the event…..Logan Forler took a nasty ride down the frontstretch at the start of that second heat and after he climbed from his car unscathed some extra time was spent to repair some fencing just below Doug Clark’s flagstand….The fifth heat had three noteworthy items. Joey Saldana pushed off and then pulled back to the infield with steering issues. Local driver Jon Agan, who just recently started running the 410 division as well as his usual 360 ride, scored an impressive win going away from the field. And Terry McCarl made a late pass of Davey Heskin for the fourth and final transfer position, a pass that landed him on the pole position of the main event…..Johnny Herrera and Rico Abreu swapped the lead back and forth in the C-Main where the top four cars would transfer on to the back of the two B-Mains. Herrera would re-take the lead on the final lap to take the win……Lynton Jeffrey won the first B-Main and, just as he did the night before, Randy Hannagan made a big run to complete a pass on the final lap for the final transfer position to the feature. His victim tonight was Joey Saldana…..Sammy Swindell and Cody Darrah waged a back and forth battle for the lead in the second B-Main while Tim Kaeding and Tim Shaffer tried to keep pace. Swindell would take the win followed by Darrah with Kaeding closing, but too late in third……Abreu started 21^st in the second B-Main and charged all the way up to 8^th  in the 12-lap event.

After four straight nights I am going to take the next couple off from Sprint Car racing and hopefully take in either the World of Outlaw Late Models, Hawkeye Dirt Tour Modified doubleheader at Independence tonight (Monday), or the Open Late Model Shootout at the West Liberty Raceway on Tuesday night. Mother Nature may end up playing a part in that decision. Then on Wednesday night it is back up to Knoxville for the 53^rd Annual FVP Knoxville Nationals.