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Photo by Graph X Designs
Jonathan Allard has night of 2nd's at Ocean Speedway to maintain GSC point lead
By Gary Thomas
Watsonville, CA – April 12, 2008…Consistency has been the name of the game for Chico’s Jonathan Allard this year and he continued the trend this weekend with a pair of top five finishes at a couple different tracks. Allard put himself near the front of the field both nights, but unfortunately racing conditions didn’t lend very well to passing either evening as the bottom groove was the place be.
The 31 year-old competed Friday night during the inaugural Bill Brownell Memorial at Chico’s Silver Dollar Speedway and after qualifying second fastest out of 34 cars, he lined up on the inside of the third row in the feature.
The usual racy surface at Silver Dollar Speedway had become dry on the high side, which made for a tough 25 laps of action as drivers hugged the bottom where the moisture was left. Allard was able to put himself into third early on and around the midway point he slipped underneath brother Stephen to move into second. At this time he then gave chase to leader Mason Moore and just as he had caught up to the youngster in traffic, a caution flag waved on lap 19.
On the restart “JA” tried to make something happen with Moore a groove up on the track, but the surface wouldn’t handle it and he lost the second spot back to Stephen, as well as the third spot to Brent Kaeding a short time later. At the checkered flag he brought the Williams Motorsports, Platinum Powder Coating No. 0 home in the fourth spot. “I had to try something with Mason because I knew he wasn’t going to get off the bottom,” Allard said. “I drove her in their hard in the first turns after the restart hoping to get a hold of something, but the track just couldn’t hold it.”
On Saturday the team made the haul down to the Ocean Speedway in Watsonville for the seventh event of the Golden State Challenge Series season. Allard came into the evening as the GSC point leader and was once again strong as he tallied his sixth top five finish in the first seven races. A rather low car count of 20 cars greeted competitors and fans and the Chico driver began the night by timing in second fastest with a lap of 12.006 aboard the K & N Filters, Red Line Oil Maxim.
Allard then finished second in his heat race and once again second in the dash to put him on the outside of the front row for the 30 lap main event. He settled into line second and tried hard to catch young Shane Golobic who jumped out into the top spot. During lap five “JA” had moved in on Golobic’s rear as traffic came into play, but at the same time a caution and then a red flag appeared on the speedway. The rest of the race saw Golobic pull away and Allard drove on to finish in the runner-up spot to earn his best finish of the GSC season.
For Allard and Williams Motorsports it was a very consistent weekend and kept up the trend for the year. The ’06 King of California wants a win badly though and he’ll look to put the No. 0 machine into victory lane this coming weekend. On Friday night he will be in competition at Silver Dollar Speedway for the third Feather Falls Casino point race of the season.
Then on Saturday Allard will lead the Golden State Challenge Series sprint cars into the Petaluma Speedway 3/8 mile clay oval. He has had much success at the track the last few years as he’s won three of the last four GSC events held in Petaluma. In fact he hasn't finished worse than fourth at the track since joining Williams Motorsports and it's also the speedway where he made his debut with the team in April of 2005.
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Jonathan Allard in victory lane at Petaluma Speedway last June. Photo by Johns Racing Photos
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