If you were one of the race fans at the Davenport Speedway Friday night, and there were many of the them, you may have just witnessed another Dirt On Dirt Late Model "Race of the Year" as Tanner English came out of nowhere to steal his first Case World of Outlaws victory at the checkers. Plus, as a bonus for your attendance, the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets served up a thirty lap main event that saw seven lead changes across five drivers as Chase McDermand parked his #40 in victory lane here on night number two of the Quad Cities 150 presented by Hoker Trucking.
Let's start with the Late Models where Ashton Winger and Ryan Gustin would bring the field to green for forty laps on a track surface that would allow the drivers to search anywhere from low to high to find the groove that best suited their car at any given time. Winger would take the point in a four car breakaway as Gustin, Bobby Pierce and Dennis Erb Jr. went with him. With Winger riding the top, Pierce went away from his preferred line and used to bottom to first get past Gustin for second and then on lap eight he would ease ahead of Winger to take the lead.
As Bobby pulled away to nearly a two second advantage, eighth starting Devin Moran joined Winger, Gustin and Erb to make it a four car battle for second as the race went by the halfway mark. With lapped traffic spread out in front of him, Pierce had to start moving around and that would allow his challengers to close back in with now Moran becoming the primary threat, but things would really get interesting on lap twenty-five when the caution waved for Hall of Famer Billy Moyer who had slipped off the top of turns one and two.
On the restart Moran got a big run off the top of turn two and pulled even with Pierce in turns three and four as the big crowd went wild. With a good bite off the bottom exiting turn four, Pierce would maintain the lead and then drive back to the top entering turn one to thwart this challenge from Moran. Meanwhile, just behind them Tanner English was on the move after starting from deep in the pack. In Thursday's opener English had made his way from tenth to finish third and on this night he was mired in eighteenth for the initial green and on this restart he had lined up in ninth. But there he was, just two laps after taking the green once again racing to the inside of Erb and Winger looking for third.
Moran would drive to the inside of Pierce in one and two on lap twenty-eight to briefly take the lead only to have Bobby come charging back on the outside down the back stretch and at that point it looked like Pierce had survived the challenge as he started to put some space between himself and Moran with English another eight car lengths back in third.
With the laps winding down lapped traffic would again come into play though with young Trevor Gundaker running the low line and this would bring Moran back into the game. As Pierce crossed the stripe with two to go he would abandon the bottom and cut off a big run from Moran going to the top at the entry of turn one. This looked as though it might have been the move of the race, but there was English still working the bottom who would nose ahead of Moran for second exiting turn two.
As the white flag waved Pierce was up top with a half-car length advantage over English on the bottom while Moran was in the middle with his nose still underneath the rear end of the leader. Three wide for the lead with one lap to go at Davenport!
The move of the race would come down the back straightaway, and from an unlikely source as the lapped car of Gundaker was still working the bottom. As Pierce sailed around him on the outside, Trevor slowed and pulled to the infield leaving the bottom lane in turns three and four, the one that Pierce had been using for most of the race now open for English as Bobby slid the middle and drifted wide at the exit of turn four. Again the trio came out of turn four three wide and it would be English taking the win at the checkers in an amazing finish! Pierce would have to settle for second for the second night in a row while Moran was a close third.
Just behind them a similar scenario would play out as Max Blair used the bottom to slip past Winger and Erb to steal fourth at the checkers. Gustin would fade to seventh, Frank Heckenast Jr. was eighth, Shane Clanton would come home ninth and Justin Kay would fill out the top ten. If this one doesn't end up being Dirt On Dirt's Race of the Year for 2022, you can bet that it will one of the top three!
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| Ryan Gustin's #19R ready for action |
The Rest of the Story.....Thirty-four Late Models would sign in for action with Mike Spatola being the only new driver on the list from Thursday's opener.....The wide quarter-mile again held its speed well through qualifying as there was only a 0.068 second difference between the best time in Group A Devin Moran and Group B Ryan Gustin....With no morning rain to contend with promoter Ricky Kay and his team of dirt work experts had the track in excellent shape from the start tonight with only a little bit of farming needed after qualifying. And it was a good thing that they didn't need to do more as the full show was running up against the track's 10:30 curfew even though there were no noticeable delays other than the break prior to opening ceremonies. Let's face it, while Modifieds can be lined up in staging, come to the track and be ready for green the first time around, it takes much longer to get the Midgets all pushed off and then herded into position for a start.....Anyway, with the multi-grooved track from the start the Late Model heat race action was much better tonight than it was on Thursday.....In the opener Justin Kay sailed around both Jason Feger and Boom Briggs with a couple of laps remaining to take the fourth and final transfer after starting seventh. That would send Thursday's winner Feger to a B-Main......Jeff Larson would qualify the locally owned #99 for the second straight night with a late pass of Spatola in heat number two.....In the third heat the Gundaker brothers Trevor and Gordy would start from the third row with the younger brother Trevor racing his way up to third at the checkers and of course putting him in the position for his key supporting role in the night's thrilling finish. Gordy would end up using an emergency series provisional to start the main event.....Billy Moyer would edge out English for fourth sending Tanner to the second B-Main giving him some extra track time that perhaps helped him with his A-Main setup.....After making mistakes on both laps of qualifying Michigan's Chad Finley redeemed himself by making up positions in his heat race and then coming from fourth to second in his B-Main to make the show for the second night in a row......With his timely exit on the final lap Trevor Gundaker was the only one of the twenty-five starters that did not finish the feature.
I will admit that I had my concerns about how the Midgets would race here on this extremely wide quarter-mile. My fear was that the top would be just too far around to make up for the drivers that would be creeping the bottom, but those fears quickly evaporated after the green flag waved and the feature field fanned out across the entire width of the speedway. Pole-sitter Jade Avidisian, one of four young female speedsters in the field, would win the race back to the line to lead the opening lap before yielding to California's Jesse Love. His lead would last for just one lap as well though as Bryant Wiedeman sailed around the outside to take the point on lap three.
Love would keep the pressure on working the short way around and he would return to the lead on lap seven, Wiedeman would regain the advantage on lap eight only to have Love come back one lap later. And I was worried that the Midgets would play follow the leader around the bottom??
While all this was going on Jacob Denney was working his way up from eleventh and he would break up the party by going to the front on lap eleven with Chase McDermand following him into second. Caution would wave at the mid-race mark of the thirty lapper when provisional starter Emilio Hoover drove off the top of four.
With the field single-file for the restart, a slow pace by Denney would cause the third, fourth and fifth place cars of Love, Brenham Crouch and Zach Daum to stack up in turn four just as the green flag waved. Damage would end the night for Love while Crouch and Daum went to the rear after making repairs and once back to green it would be a two car breakaway for Denney and McDermand.
Chase would stalk Jacob for twelve laps before using a wider line in turns three and four to sweep to the lead with three laps remaining. Caution would wave just after the white flag came out when Hoover's car went up in smoke and on the restart as McDermand pulled away to score the win, Dominic Gordon would slip past Denney on the final lap to take second. Daison Pursley in his first night back in a midget after injuries suffered in this horrific crash in November of 2021 won his heat race and finished fourth in the main event while Gavin Miller came from twelfth to crack the top five. Former Oklahoma Sooners cheerleader Taylor Reimer made a late charge to finish sixth after starting fourteenth.
Twenty-seven of the Xtreme Outlaw Midgets signed in for competition and they will be back again tonight in support of the Late Models for the finale of what has been a fantastic Quad Cities 150 thus far. I want to thank Ricky and Brenda Kay for their hospitality now as due to some other possible commitments I will not likely make it back up to Davenport tonight, but I encourage you to go fill my seat for what I am confident will be another tremendous night of racing!
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