Sprint Week
Night at Kokomo Full of Excitement
By: Kenny
Clark
Kokomo, IN (July 11, 2010) - A
near capacity crowd entered the gates of Kokomo Speedway to see
41 Usac Sprint Cars on the third night of Indiana Sprint Week.
The track was in excellent shape once again by the Oconners'
as the track record was shattered in qualifying by Daron Clayton
with a time of 12.620. Following him for the top 6 spots were
Fitzpatrick,Gardner,Coons,Hendrick and Shurenburg. This setup
the heats with #1 having Armstrong and Short on the front row.
Short stormed to the front and led from green to checkered with
East, Stockton and quick qualifier Clayton transferring. Heat
2 had Stanbrough and Ballou up front and usually when you put
the #53 on the pole its hard to not bet on him winning. Stanbrough
led all the way with Bland, Hines and Ballou transferring. Ballou
and Fitzpatrick had a tight battle for the last spot as they
went side by side the whole last lap with Robert just edging
Blake at the line. Heat 3 had Gullick and Clauson in the front
row. This heat had the most passing as Damion Gardner came from
6th to 1st by the 6th lap and went on to the checkers. Transferring
behind him was Clauson, Kaeding and Hagen. The final heat had
Gross and Darland on the front. Hometown hero Dave Darland led
all the way with Windom, Grant and Gross transferring to the
A Main.
This setup the consy that was full of stars with Fitzpatrick,
Coons, Jones, and hometown favorite Cottle. With only 6 transferring
the crowd knew that this would be a wild 12 laps. With 6 to go
Fitzpatrick was leading but the red came out when Hunter Shurenburg
flipped in turn 2 and collected the #14 of Gullick while he was
coming down. This was a scary wreck but thank goodness both drivers
were ok. On the restart the Tony Stewart owned #20 came to life
and passed Coons and Fitzpatrick to take the win in the consy.
The Kokomo crowd was excited on the final laps as the #10E stormed
from 10th place to finish 3rd, which brought the Cottle fans
to their feet. Following Jones at the stripe was Coons, Cottle,
Fitzpatrick, Mitchell, Hendrick and Spencer.
This setup the 30 lap A Main with Windom and Hines earning the
front row. The first half of the race went green and the low
and high was fast. Windom led the first 11 laps but 8th place
starting Coons stormed on the high side and took the lead on
Lap 12. The first caution came out for Kaeding spinning in turn
4 on lap 16. With 14 to go Coons led Windom, Jones, East and
Hines. On the next restart just 2 laps later 4th place runner
East was on the high side and smacked the turn 4 wall and while
he was flipping down the track in front of the turn 4 crowd he
got collected by Garder which sent him into a flip. A very scary
wreck in front ot the crowd but thankfully both drivers were
ok but their nights were done. East got an ovation from the frontstretch
crowd as he was a very strong contender on the high side. This
was just the start of many red flags as 4 laps later Stanbrough
who had came from 20th to 4th on the cushion got to high and
ended his night flipping in turn 4 above the cushion. The crowd
once again gave him an ovation as many of us thought he was going
to win it. During this red the top side must have glazed over
because on the restart the leader Coons went backwards giving
the lead up to Levi Jones. With just 3 to go Darland and Ballou
tangled in the backstretch and Bland got caught up into it and
went into 3 and 4 with a broken front end and flipped into the
turn 4 fence. While the track crew was fixing the fence during
the red, Ballou got out of his car and went over to Darland in
turn 2 and told him what he thought of their incident. The Kokomo
crowd wasn't to pleased with Ballou letting the Kokomo native
here his opinion. Ballou got a not so nice round of boos as he
walked off the backstretch to go to the pits. With just 3 to
go everybody was on the bottom and with just 2 to go Hagen was
trying the top and caught the turn 2 wall bringing out another
red. With just a green, white and checker to go Jones held on
for the Sprint Week victory. Following him was Short, Windom,
Cottle(From 22nd to 4th), Coons, Darland(From 19th to 6th), Clauson,
Fitzpatrick and Hines. This would be a huge points night for
Jones as he padded his lead in defending his title. Sprint Week
fires up again Wednesday on the 1/2 mile at Terre Haute. Thanks
to all the fans for packing the famous 1/4 mile.
In the thunder car feature DJ Holt held off points leader Armfield
for the victory with Shrout coming in third. In the stock car
feature once again it was the points leader Lee Hobbs taking
the checkers and padding his lead coming from the 8th starting
spot. Following him was Miller, Gamblin, Roundtree and Walker.
Another great night at the speedway as racing was over at 10:30.
Don't forget Wednesday night at Kokomo is the UMP Sumernationals
race with Ken Schraeder and Kenny Wallace racing also. Should
be a great night as it is the return of the late models for the
first time since the Klash last year. Once again thanks to all
the Sprint Week fans for a great turnout. |
