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| JOHN WRIGHT WINS FIRST FOR
2001 AT VENTURA RACEWAY by Gary Jacob |
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Unwinged 360 Sprint Cars, IMCA Modifieds and Street Stocks |
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Ventura, CA -June 23, 2001--Driving a strong race
from his front row starting spot, John Wright posted his first 30 lap
feature win of the 2001 season in the VRA Unwinged 360 Sprint Cars
Saturday night at Ventura Raceway. The $1,000 victory moved him into
7th in points. Wright was actually passed by point leader Gary Howard
late in the action, but a yellow flag nullified that lap and placed
Wright back out front. Howard's later bid to retake the lead saw him
bobble and lose second place to Chris Wakim, who won $750. Howard
settled for the $500 third. Bob Moody stunned the crowd by driving
around USAC ace Rick Hendrix to win the Senior Division feature for
the unwinged 360 sprint cars. This class grew to 21 cars and it was
second win for Moody, who is 5th in points. Point leader Jim Porter
finished second ahead of dwarf car ace Ron Bach. Having earlier won
his heat race, Steve Greenland captured his second IMCA Modified 20
lap feature and climbed into fifth in points. Point leader Mike
Furlong ran second to increase his point lead to 10 points over Randy
McGraw, who placed fifth. In the street stock action, the top five in
points placed in the first five spots with 4th ranked Wayne Heurung
winning his first feature of the season to pull within 115 points of
point leader Bradley Prows, who was 4th.
The regular unwinged 360 class had 29 entries to go along with the 21 cars racing in the Senior Division. They were split into the usual four qualifying heats, each advancing four cars into the 30 lap A Main. Jimmy Crawford won the first heat over Wright. Richard McCormick was chased to his heat 2 win by Jim Thomson. Tony Dighera continued his strong season with a win in heat 3 over Jeff Heaton and point leader Howard. Wakim won heat 4 over usual SCRA racer Casey Shuman. The final four slots are determined in the B Main where Brett Butler beat Josh Ford, Rob Kershaw and Russell DeBlauw. The A Main inversion came up an 8 and that put Shuman and Wright on the front row. In a departure from norm, the race was run right after intermission and the teams struggled with the freshly watered surface at the start. Thomson, Bill Welch, Dighera, Butler and DeBlauw all spun on the first lap and Thomson won done for the night. Butler lost several laps making repairs. Wright dominated the race with Shuman second for a long ways. Howard came from 9th starting to climb into second and make the late race pass on leader Wright only to have a caution flag nullify that move. In the remaining laps, Howard continued to pressure Wright and his next bid to pass saw him bobble, allowing Wakim by for the second place finish. Howard was third over McCormick, Crawford, Dighera and point runnerup Greg Taylor, who started 13th. With 1,050 points available each race night, Howard now holds a 1080 point lead over Taylor and Taylor is 415 points ahead of McCormick. Crawford is 4th in points. With the 21 car turnout for the new Senior Sprint class, the track elected to go with a three heat format that advanced four cars each into their A Main, add four more from a B Main and limit the A Main grid to 16 cars. Moody won the first heat over Porter and John Jewett. Hendrix was driving a car from the Cory Kruseman Driving School and he won heat 2 over Dale Harwood and Bob Gibson. Bach won heat 3 with Dayle Henry second over Ron Butler. Mike Cook won the B Main with Jack Erickson second. Hendrix led much of the main event, but Moody made his winning pass and Hendrix fell back to an 11th place finish. Porter ran second over Bach, Henry, Bob Graham, Gibson, Harwood and Sam Vale. Porter holds a 895 point lead over Harwood. Both Jewett and Henry are just 10 points back of Harwood and Moody is just 55 points behind the second ranked driver. The 16 car IMCA Modified field included the return of defending state champion Bill Saltzman. Furlong won the first heat over McGraw and Mark Fullerton. Greenland took heat 2 with Ed Shelton second over Chris Tonoli. Greenland won the feature with Furlong second over Donald Houghton, Shelton, McGraw, Daman Redman, John Aitken, Tonoli and Fullerton. While Furlong leads McGraw by 10 points in the title fight, the third place duel finds Aitken just 2 points ahead of Houghton. Aitken is 32 points behind the point leader. The street stocks had a 16 car turnout, but Paul Jankovskis crashed hard in the heat action and was out for the night. John Romero won the first heat over Erick Karlsen and track title hopeful Paul Moore. Chris Tramel won heat 2 over Tracey Pallais and Ernie Malone. Heurung settled for a sixth in his heat race, but captured the feature race over Greg Raap, Steve Bulpitt, Prows, Moore, Tramel, Craig Germanetti and Stephen Suchowirsky. Prows holds a 95 point lead over Moore, who is just 5 points ahead of Raap. Heurung is 15 points back of Raap and 40 ahead of Bulpitt. Summary Street Stock Heat 1-John Romero, Erick Karlsen, Paul Moore, John Hard, Craig Germanetti. Heat 2-Chris Tramel, Tracey Pallais, Ernie Malone, Bradley Prows, Greg Raap. Main-Wayne Heurung, Raap, Steve Bulpitt, Prows, Moore, Tramel, Germanetti, Stephen Suchowirsky, Malone, Will Smith, Pallais, Rmero, Karlsen, Joe Porche, Hard. IMCA Modified Heat 1-Mike Furlong, Randy McGraw, Mark Fullerton, Wes Richardson, Daman Redman. Heat 2-Steve Greenland, Ed Shelton, Chris Tonoli, Donald Houghton, Scott Olsen. Main-Greenland, Furlong, Houghton, Shelton, McGraw, Redman, John Aitken, Tonoli, Fullerton, Bill Hiney, Al Adam, Bill Saltzman, Olsen, Richardson, Steve Smith, Bill Waltman. Senior Unwinged 360 Sprint Car Heat 1-Bob Moody, Jim Porter, John Jewett, Chuck Tyler, Mike Cook. Heat 2-Rick Hendrix, Dale Harwood, Bob Gibson, John Richards, Jack Erickson. Heat 3-Ron Bach, Dayle Henry, Ron Butler, Bob Graham, Tim Moon. B Main-Cook, Erickson, Sam Vale, Rick Lewis, Preiss Movius, Moon, Oren Prosser Sr, Art Justus. A Main-Moody, Porter, Bach, Henry, Graham, Gibson, Harwood, Vale, Jewett, Richards, Hendrix, Lewis, Cook, Tyler, Butler, Erickson. VRA Unwinged 360 Sprint Car Heat 1-Jimmy Crawford, John Wright, Clark Templeman III, Greg Taylor, Rob Kershaw. Heat 2-Richard McCormick, Jim Thomson, Ronnie Case, Gren Godepski, Josh Ford. Heat 3-Tony Dighera, Jeff Heaton, Gary Howard, Jeremy Ellertson, Russell DeBlauw. Heat 4-Chris Wakim, Casey Shuman, Bill Welch, Luis Espinoza, Brett Butler. B Main-Butler, Ford, Kershaw, DeBlauw, Bobby Graham, Steve Hess, Sean Buckley, Steve Chuhaloff, Oren Prosser Jr, Jim Gresham. A Main-Wright, Wakim, Howard, McCormick, Crawford, Dighera, Taylor, Shuman, Kershaw, Ford, Godepski, Welch, DeBlauw, Heaton, Templeman, Butler, Espinoza, Ellertson, Case, Thomson. |
