Traditional Sprint Car FanSite

See You At The Races!!!

STANSBERRY TAKES VRA ACTION AT BAKERSFIELD
by Gary Jacob & Don Low

Unwinged 360 Sprint Cars, TQ Midgets, Dwarf Cars and Mini Stocks

Oildale, CA..Sept 18...VRA unwinged 360 sprint car point leader Tom Stansberry, a Bakersfield resident, battled from 10th starting to take the lead on lap 12 and win their 30 lap main event at Bakersfield Speedway Park on Saturday night. Clark Templeman III also put on a show as he lined up 14th and wheeled to a 2nd, gaining that spot on lap 18. The final 24 laps were run without a caution and Kevin Kierce ran third behind the $1000 winner. Shaun Kautz was fourth ahead of Bill Welch. A J Felker got his first ride in one of the potent Greg Edenholm TQ Midgets and put on a show. He won his heat race from 7th starting and then charged into the lead on lap 7 of their 25 lap feature. That event was run without a single yellow flag and Felker's teammate Scott Hansen came from the back row to second on lap 21. Behind Felker and Hansen at the checkered flag were Chuck West and Walt Johnson. The VRA dwarf cars combined their pro and senior divisions for their 20 lap feature. Senior heat winner Bill VanPraag led the first 10 laps before CDCRA regular Brian Saxton drove by him on the outside to win. Again, a clean race with just three yellow flags and Saxton got the Pro win with feature runnerup VanPraag taking the senior honors. Seniors Ed Niedzwiecki and Mike Sweeney ran 3-4 with Ryan Blade's fifth the second best Pro run. The final mini stock point race for the track in 2004 found Santa Maria regular Mike Weigel leading the final 13 laps to win the 20 lapper ahead of Kenny Farris, Kyle Calloway and Tina McGowan. Jimmy Mason finished off his track championship season with a fifth and Van Nuys long tow Lulu Strub achieved her goal of finishing 2nd in points, 24 ahead of McGowan.

            With the Bandit unwinged 360 sprint cars in action just an hour away in Hanford, the VRA group brought 16 cars to the 1/3 mile clay oval. Ron Wade won heat 1 from an outside front row start with pole starter Steve Conrad second ahead of Bakersfield's own Rick Gifford. Ryan Devitt also turned an outside front row start into a win in heat 2 with pole starter Mike Knopf second. Former dwarf car star Stansberry lined up 7th and finished fifth in the second heat. The 30 lap feature had three cautions early in the race, then went for the long green flag period at the end. Outside front row starter Kautz led the first 11 laps. Bill Welch settled into second ahead of Kierce and Conrad. Stansberry got to fifth to on lap 5 and Chris Wakim stalled for a yellow flag. Devitt suffered his second right rear flat tire and Stansberry passed Conrad for fourth and Kierce for third. Stansberry took second from Welch on lap 10 and grabbed the lead from Kautz on lap 12. Gifford raced into fifth on lap 7. On lap 14, Kierce and 18th starter Templeman shuffled Welch back to fifth. Templeman took third from Kierce on lap 17 and both he and Kierce drove around Kautz for the 2-3 slots on lap 18. They could only chase Stansberry to the checkered flag as Stansberry won ahead of Templeman, Kierce, Kautz, Welch, Gifford, Knopf and Wade, the final lead lap finisher.

            There were 14 TQ Midgets and Felker won heat 1 from 7th starting ahead of West Evans and point leader Steve Lambert. Chuck West won heat 2 from third starting with pole starter Steve Parke. Long tow Ken Bonnema pitted on the start of their 25 lap feature and Walt Johnson led the first 5 laps. Felker was third on lap 2 and he passed Evans for second on lap 3. Felker got inside Johnson for the top spot on lap 7 and teammate Hansen had worked his way from last to fifth. Hansen grabbed fourth from Lambert on lap 9 and he took third from Evans on lap 14. Parke fell out and Hansen drove around Johnson for second on lap 21. Felker won ahead of Hansen, a late move forward by West, Johnson, Evans and Lambert, the final lead lap car. Kenny Wiley was 7th over Bruce Hiroshima.

        The 7 Senior and 6 Pro Dwarf cars ran separate heat races. VanPraag won the senior heat from the pole with Niedzwiecki second over Gary Conditt. Saxton came from sixth to win the pro heat over point leader Jeff Shelton and rookie Ryan Blade. The classes were combined for the 20 lap feature and VanPraag took a quick lead from his outside front row start. Mike Bradley spun for a lap 2 yellow and pole starter John Lynch dropped out. Niedzwiecki spun out of second on lap 4 with Blade gaining the spot over Shelton. Saxton had lined up 7th and he broke inot the top five on lap 4. Saxton passed both Shelton and Conditt for third on lap 5 and he took second from Blade on lap 8. Saxton then drove around VanPraag on the outside fro the lead on lap 11. Shelton and Blade traded third and Mike Sweeney worked his way to fifth. Conditt hit the wall for a lap 18 yellow flag and Jerry Doolittle pitted. On the restart, Blade spun and Shelton stalled to shuffle  the standings. Niedzwiecki found himself back in third and he chased Saxton and VanPraag to the checkered flag. Sweeney ran fourth ahead of Blade, Rick Denny, Bradley and Doolittle.

           There were 16 mini stocks, but Eric Farris, Tulare's Johnny Wood and David Escobedo were racing for no points or money when they were found with illegal parts before the racing started. Weigel won heat 1 from third starting with fellow Santa Maria racer Jessica Rust second over Kevin Herring. Strub also came from third to win heat 2 over pole starter McGowan and Calloway. Weigel had a perfect night as he won the dash from third with McGowan second. Herring led the first five laps of the 20 lap feature from the pole as McGowan took third on lap 3 and passed Rust for second on lap 5. Both McGowan and Rust drove around Herring for the top two spots on lap 6, but Weigel had worked his way to fourth from 12th starting. Weigel raced into second on lap 7 and took the lead from McGowan on lap 8. Rust and McGowan traded second on laps 12 and 13 before Rust got spun by Mason. The yellow fell on lap 16 to penalize Mason to the rear of the field. K Farris was now third and he took second from McGowan on lap 17. Weigel won ahead of K Farris, Calloway, McGowan and Mason, the final lead lap car. E Farris was a lap down in sixth ahead of Delbert Hill and Richard Graves. The winner of four features, Mason easily won the track championship with a 247 point lead on Strub. Strub was only 24 points up on McGowan and 30 ahead of Graves.

Summary 

Mini Stock
Dash-Mike Weigel, Tina McGowan, Lulu Strub. 
Heat 1-Weigel, Jessica Rust, Kevin Herring, Jimmy Mason, Kenny Farris. 
Heat 2-Strub, McGowan, Kyle Calloway, Richard Graves, Chris McKellar. 
Main-Weigel, K Farris, Calloway, McGowan, Mason, Eric Farris, Delbert Hill, Graves, Darren Akins, Strub, Rust, Herring, Anthony Miller, McKellar, Johnny Wood, David Escobedo. 

Senior Dwarf 
Heat-Bill Van Praag, Ed Niedzwiecki, Gary Conditt, Mike Sweeney, Rick Denny. 

Pro Dwarf 
Heat-Brian Saxton, Jeff Shelton, Ryan Blade, John Lynch, Mike Bradley. 

Combined Feature-Saxton, VanPraag, Niedzwiecki, Sweeney, Blade, Denny, Bradley, Jerry Doolittle, Shelton, Wes Harris, Cindy Addison, Conditt, Lynch. 

T Q Midget Heat 1-A J Felker, West Evans, Steve Lambert, Walt Johnson, Ron Ahrendt. Heat 2-Chuck West, Steve Parke, Kenny Wiley, Nick Carlson, Michael Bliffen. Main-Felker, Scott Hansen, West, Johnson, Evans, Lambert, Wiley, Bruce Hiroshima, Carlson, Bliffen, Ahrendt, Linda Taylor, Parke, Ken Bonnema. 

Unwinged 360 Sprint Car 
Heat 1-Ron Wade, Steve Conrad, Rick Gifford, Shaun Kautz, Mike Broome. 
Heat 2-Ryan Devitt, Mike Knopf, Kevin Kierce, Bil Welch, Tom Stansberry.
Main-Stansberry, Clark Templeman III, Kierce, Kautz, Welch, Gifford, Knopf, Wade, Broome, Rob Kershaw, Brandon Thomson, Hobie Conway, Devitt, Conrad, Chris Wakim, Blake Miller.

SITE SEARCH

WEBSITE
 HOME PAGE
 LATEST UPDATES
 MESSAGE BOARD
 CHAT ROOMS
 CLASSIFIEDS
 BUSINESS CARDS
 ADVERTISING
 SPONSORS
 MULTIMEDIA
 ACTION GALLERY
 GIFT IDEAS
 ONLINE STORE
 LINKS

SANCTIONS
 SPRINT CARS
 OTHERS

RACING
 RACE RESULTS
 RACE SCHEDULES
 PRESS RELEASES
 RACE COLUMNS
 NEWS & NOTES
 TEAM NOTES
 DRIVER ROSTERS
 DRIVER PROFILES
 RACE TRACKS
 RACING INFO

MISC
 VOTING BOOTH
 BULLETIN BOARD
 DTRSC SKINS
 FUN PAGE
 RACE FANS
 TRIBUTES
 SPECIAL THANKS

Get your own FREE Guestbook from htmlGEAR
 SIGN GUESTBOOK
 VIEW GUESTBOOK

EMAIL US

T-SHIRTS
& MORE