|
It was another unseasonably cool night for racing at Port...it was 49 when we showed up around 5:30ish and 48 when we left.
Port ran another "luck of the draw" show in hopes to help the car count I believe...they ended up laying out the red carpet, or red velvet cake for "The Hammer" Doug Esh who made his 1st Port appearance. 20 410's showed up.
Guys who should be Port regulars that were not in attendence were TDub, still on the mend from last weeks injury. Former Outlaw, Kings Royal champion, and mutiple 2010 410 winner Daryn Pittman and his team chose to cherry pick the $2,000 to win URC show at Bridgeport. And most notably the point leader going into the event, Mark Smith, who ran a 358 at Selinsgrove.
The track appeared smooth & fast from a spectators point of view. Australian Lynton Jeffrey was once again at Port and won the 1st heat over Shaffer, Henderson, Kauffman, Bower & Erdley who all re-drew for their starting spots. The start of the 2nd heat saw a red for Lance tipping over in turn 1, they uprighted the car & pushed it back to the pit area. Layton easily won heat 2 over Esh, Buckwalter, Lafferty, Taylor & Hershey.
Somewhat new to Port, along with Management, was calling the initial start of the feature back. The yellow was out again on lap #2 for Hershey who stopped in turn 2. What looked to be the fastest car on the track was Layton, who appeared to lose a motor on lap 16 when he came to a stop. While running 3rd on the restart, the yellow came out again to penalize Esh who hit the cone. Last weeks winner Taylor stayed close, but couldn't pass Buckwalter. It was great to see Buckwalter finally get a win in a 410!
I'm still waiting for that Middleswarth #7 team to get the monkey off their back for 2011, he was fast, wasted no time passing cars, and would have been a contender at the finish. It was good to see Kauffman back in true race form again, and he even split 2 cars for a 3 wide pass in turn 4 that made you think 3 cars were going to be junk. I lost $5 on Lance, who I said would be in the top 5 by lap 10. Lance appeared to be having trouble passing a few cars & got help on the initial start with Henderson opting for the rear with motor problems. Happy Birthday Lauver, don't spend that $5 all in one place!
Congrats to Andy Haus who won the Late Model feature!
Port Royal – Steve Buckwalter of Royersford scored his first career Port Royal Speedway 410 sprint car win Saturday night at the Juniata County oval in a dominating performance, leading all 25 laps for the $3,000 payday.
Aboard the Clair and Jan Ritter No. 17B, Buckwalter began the 25-lapper for the sprint cars on the outside of the front row and immediately took the lead over last week’s winner Ryan Taylor at the drop of the green.
Only two laps of the races could be scored before the races first caution flag unfurled for a stopped Joey Hershey. Doug Esh lined up third for the restart.
The leaders entered lapped traffic on the seventh tour of the speedway, allowing Taylor to close in on Buckwalter as he tried to make it back-to-back victories while the duo of frontrunners pulled away from Esh.
But although Taylor was able to catch the leader at times in traffic, Buckwalter was able to hold his own at the front and when the races second and final yellow appeared for a stopped Chad Layton who had been running third, Buckwalter drove away to the win handily on the restart.
Taylor of Perkaise was second followed by Mike Erdley, Rick Lafferty and Lynton Jeffrey.
Heats for the 20-car field went to Jeffrey and Layton.
Layton was clocked just a few tenths of a second off of the one-lap track record during his heat race having broken into the 15-second bracket on the lightning fast and smooth surface.
410 sprints, 25 laps: 1. Steve Buckwalter (2), 2. Ryan Taylor(1), 3. Mike Erdley(4), 4. Rick Lafferty(8), 5. Lynton Jeffrey(6), 6. Todd Shaffer(5), 7. Keith Kauffman(7), 8. Lance Dewease(20), 9. Mike Wagner(15), 10. Davey Sammons(16), 11. Doug Esh(3), 12. Bill Jones Jr.(17), 13. Nicole Bower(9), 14. John Brennfleck(14), 15. Brian Ehrenzeller(18), 16. Cliff Brian(13) DNF, 17. Chad Layton (11)DNF, 18. Joey Hershey(12) DNF, 19. Jack Thornton (19) DNF, 20. Justin Henderson(10) DNS.
_
|
