|
Traditional Sprint Car FanSite |
See You At The Races!!! |
|
LABOR DAY 2006 IS A GRAND SLAM by Norm Bogan |
|
|
|
For the second year, three California non-wing
360-sprint car groups (VRA, Bandits & SCRA) have set aside
several races at different venues to provide for these racers to
challenge their counterparts from the other clubs.
Having already completed round one at Bakersfield earlier in
the year with Michael Trimble claiming victory, followed a few weeks
ago at Santa Maria, where Davey Pombo collecting the spoils.
Now round three, a two-day Labor Day weekend event was
planned for Seaside Park in Ventura. Forty-nine sprinters signed in for the Friday
night preliminaries, along with about the same number of Pro and
Senior Dwarf Cars for a regional show.
Early afternoon found the racecars going through technical
inspection, with the sprints then doing the pill drawer for
qualifying position. The
Dwarf Cars just did a pill draw to establish their race lineups. Tom Hendricks set the standard at 12.390 for
sprint car qualifying. The
top two in points for each of the three clubs were given a berth in
the Friday night main event. Luis
Espinoza and Jimmy Crawford represented VRA, while Jeff Fiscus and
Jessie Mack went to bat for the Bandits and Davey Pombo and Michael
Trimble served as standard bearers for SCRA.
Fiscus experienced engine problems early and withdrew from
the Friday feature, allowing Steve Conrad to be added to the
starting grid. The Dwarf Cars ran their dashes and heats, then
a Main Event each for the Seniors and Pros.
Feature winners were Ed Niedzwiecki and Ryan Cottrell. Now it was time for the Grand Slam feature of
the evening. There was
a nasty double flip about midway involving Bill Camarillo and Jim
Thomson. Camarillo was
able to climb out of his car, but Thomson was removed by the track
safety crew and placed into the ambulance for observation.
Camarillo’s car was repaired overnight and able to return
for the Saturday show, however Thomson’s car was being assembled
well enough to be able to load it in the trailer.
While the frame and cage appeared to do their job, much of
the drive train was severely damaged. Jim said that he was stiff and sore, but okay on Saturday. Kevin Kierce got to the front and held it for
the win in this preliminary event.
Jessie Mack came from 22nd starting position to
finish second. Blake
Miller returned to the seat of the car that carried him the last
year’s VRA championship and placed third.
Miller would not return on Saturday, as he planned to run at
Perris with the USAC/CRA sprints. Bruce Douglass joined this event from the VRA Senior class
and finished fourth. Chris
Wakim came back from last week’s crash to gain a top five
position. As Saturday dawned, several of the warriors
were wounded and could not make it to the starting grid for
tonight’s program. With
the addition of a few cars unable to be here on the previous day,
the Saturday field stood at forty-three cars. Heat races were conducted with lineups being
decided by yesterday’s qualifying.
Those cars that hadn’t garnered a time would tag the rear
of the heat races. Saturday
started earlier to accommodate running the Kid’s classes of Junior
Midgets and Mini Dwarfs. These
classes are growing in numbers as more racecars are come out to
compete. The Kid’s
ran their heats early in the day and their features before the
evening program started. The
Dwarf cars also completed their heat races, followed by the Sprint
heats. The Dwarf
features were fitted in between the Sprint semis and feature. Steve Conrad, Luis Espinoza, Jimmy Crawford,
Jeff Fiscus and Davey Pombo captured the Sprint car heats.
The top two from each of the semis that transferred were Tom
Hendricks, Jeff Oliver, Troy Rutherford and Joe Henderson. The top four finishers from Friday’s feature were locked in
for the Saturday finale. That
would be Kevin Kierce, Jesse Mack, Bruce Douglass and Chris Wakim,
added to replace Blake Miller. Bill Van Praag won the Senior Dwarf feature,
while Neil Stinson was victorious in the Pro Main.
There were several altercations during the Sprint feature;
probably the most serious was contact and a hard flip by Zak
Hawthorne. It took a
while to remove him from the racecar using a precautionary
backboard. He was
loaded into the ambulance and taken for observation with a complaint
of neck pain. Derek Buckley assumed the early lead and seemed
to be on a mission towards his first feature victory.
Buckley and Wakim made a number of circuits running
side-by-side with Jimmy Crawford in close pursuit, while Kierce was
digging in along the infield berm.
Kevin eventually got the drive on the bottom and slipped past
Buckley and went off to challenge Wakim.
Chris held off Kierce followed by Buckley and Crawford for
the victory. Jesse Mack
did another outstanding job of advancing from 20th on the
starting grid to seventh, while Jeff Fiscus came from 18th
to sixth. Bill Camarillo continues to be a giving person.
His Agromin Corporation posted the purse for the Friday night
event, in addition to sponsoring cars in several of the classes that
ran this weekend. We
salute the whole Agromin organization for their participation and
support of Ventura Raceway. While some of these drivers race during the season with all three of the clubs, the VRA participants were the greatest in number followed by the Bandits and only a few SCRA regulars. It is always interesting for the fans to see their hero’s race against representatives of other groups. This occurred both with the Sprints and Dwarfs, since these events were both regionally based. |
