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Traditional Sprint Car FanSite |
See You At The Races!!! |
| TWO STRAIGHT FOR TAYLOR,
STEPHENS WINS FOURTH by Gary Jacob |
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Unwinged 360 Sprints, IMCA Modifieds, Street Stocks and Pony Stocks |
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Ventura, CA -June 3, 2000--Taking full advantage of
his pole position, Greg Taylor made it two straight $1,000 wins in the
30 lap VRA unwinged 360 sprint car feature at Ventura Raceway Saturday
night. Taylor is now third in points, just 95 behind point leader Gary
Howard who finished sixth. Jimmy Crawford shared the front row with
Taylor and finished a $750 second with fifth starter Chris Wakim a
$500 third. Wakim is second in points, 15 ahead of Taylor. Outside
front row starter Steve Greenland won his second 20 lap IMCA Modified
main event and the division point duel tightened as point leader Mike
Furlong finished 8th. Tom Stephens continues to control the winner's
circle in the street stock class as he won from 8th starting for his
4th feature win. He also has slowly climbed back into the point race,
standing 4th, 150 points behind point leader John Uccellini who
finished 2nd. The pony stocks continue to have a different winner each
week as Bryan Rungaitis came from 8th starting to beat B Main transfer
James Brown. Rookie Wes Richardson ran third as none of the point
title contenders finished in the top five.
The VRA sprint car count fell back to the 30 car level with heat wins going to point leader Gary Howard, Jeff Heaton, Crawford and Taylor. It took a top four finish in the heats or a top two in the B Main to advance into the A feature this week. Randy Moody ran second to Howard in his heat, rookie Russ DeBlauw was second behind Heaton and Will Perkins chased Crawford to his heat win. Wakim ran second to Taylor in heat 4. Tom Stansberry had problems in his heat, but won the B Main ahead of rookie Richard Reinken and Dale Harwood. The four heat winners are inverted in the front of the 18 car feature lineup depending on how deep they came from in their wins. This put Taylor and Crawford in the front row with Howard and Heaton in row 2. In just his third sprint car season, Taylor joined Clark Templeman III as a two time winner in 2000 as he won ahead of Crawford, Wakim, 10th starter Tony Dighera, Heaton, Howard, sixth starter Randy Moody and John Wright. While Howard holds an 80 point leasd over Wakim and a 95 point margin over Taylor, Crawford in now fourth with a five point margin over Heaton. Crawford is 185 points out of the point lead. There were 16 IMCA Modifieds in action as Greenland won his heat in front of defending track champion Donald Houghton and Furlong. Rookie Daman Redmon won heat 2 with Steve Smith second in front of early season point leader Rich Wolfe. Redmon and Greenland shared the front row for the 20 lap main with Houghton starting 4th. Greenland gained the win with Houghton also getting by Redmon to finish second. Redmon had a season best third in front of Wolfe, Smith, Aitken, Saltzman and Furlong. Furlong saw his point lead shrink to five points ahead of Wolfe with Aitken now third, 16 points back. Houghton's recent success has climbed him back to 4th, 20 points out of the point lead and just 2 points ahead of Saltzman. The street stock field was 17 cars and Greg Raap won the opening heat ahead of Will Smith and Tracey Pallais. Mike Riccardi won heat 2 with Steve Bulpitt second ahead of defending champion Craig Germanetti. In the 20 lap feature, Stephens came from 8th starting for his win with fellow fourth row starter Uccellini running second. Bulpitt started in the front row and finished third as Danny Murphy filled in for Dan Murphy and ran fourth ahead of Pallais. The combination of Uccellini's 2nd and Germanetti's 7th left Uccellini with a 60 points lead and Wayne Heurung ran 8th to fall 100 points out of the point lead. Stephens has slowly climbed to 4th in points with his success run. The pony stock count fell just short of the 30 mark this week with 29 racing in the heat action. Chris Tramel beat Matt Tramel in heat 1 with Jack Fullerton on top of Rick Rodarte in heat 2. Julie Masters and Ray Martinez were 1-2 in heat 3 and Rungaitis preceeded his feature win with a fourth heat victory ahead of Mark Gillimore. Brad Long got a third in his heat, but was hurting with injured ribs and gave up his feature slot as he turned his car over to James Brown, who ran third in the B Main behind Wes Richardson and Darren Gunnell. Two B Main transfers finished in the top 3 of the A Main as Rungaitis won with Brown second ahead of rookie Richardson. Gillimore ran fourth ahead of Tim Frazier. Martinez, Daniel Shrubb and Gunnell rounded out the top 8. In the point standings, Cliff Ashlock maintained his point lead despite running 10th as his closest challenger Bryan Weaver failed to get out of the B Main. Gunnell moved past Weaver into second in points, 100 behind Ashlock. Weaver is 40 behind Gunnell and 25 ahead of Martinez. Summary Pony Stock Heat 1-Chris Tramel, Matt Tramel, Daniel Shrubb, Bruce Blackman, Wes Richardson. Heat 2-Jack Fullerton, Rick Rodarte, Tom Burroughs, Dave Revard, Darren Gunnell. Heat 3-Julie Masters, Ray Martinez, Brad Long, Eric Chambers, John Burroughs. Heat 4-Bryan Rungaitis, Mark Gillimore, Gary Yeates, Tim Frazier, Cliff Ashlock. B Main-Richardson, D Gunnell, James Brown, Ashlock, Josh Ford, Danny Tramel, Paul Jankovskis, Tom Fish, Jimmy Clegg, Tim Martin. A Main-Rungaitis, Brown, Richardson, Gillimore, Frazier, Martinez, Shrubb, D Gunnell, Yeates, Ashlock, T Burroughs, Revard, Masters, Blackman, J Burroughs, Fullerton, Chambers, M Tramel, C Tramel, Rodarte. Street Stock Heat 1-Greg Raap, Will Smith, Tracey Pallais, Tom Stephens, John Romero. Heat 2-Mike Riccardi, Steve Bulpitt, Craig Germanetti, John Uccellini, Stephen Suchowirsky. Main-Stephens, Uccellini, Bulpitt, Danny Murphy, Pallais, Riccardi, Germanetti, Wayne Heurung, Smith, Richard Johnston, Walter Van Wingerden, Romero, Erick Karlsen, Bradley Prows, Suchowirsky, Raap, Michael Lee. IMCA Modified Heat 1-Steve Greenland, Donald Houghton, Mike Furlong, Bill Saltzman, John Aitken. Heat 2-Daman Redmon, Steve Smith, Rich Wolfe, Gary Curtis, Stephen Mitchell. Main-Greenland, Houghton, Redmon, Wolfe, Smith, Aitken, Saltzman, Furlong, Jamie Taylor, Hobie Conway, Mitchell, James Stowe, Al Adam, Curtis, Randy Gens, Ed Shelton. Unwinged 360 Sprint Car Heat 1-Gary Howard, Randy Moody, Ronnie Case, Bob Moody, Richard Reinken. Heat 2-Jeff Heaton, Russell DeBlauw, Dave Lowenstein, John Woodward, Bill Welch. Heat 3-Jimmy Crawford, Will Perkins, Jim Gresham, John Wright, Luis Espinosa. Heat 4-Greg Taylor, Chris Wakim, Tony Dighera, Mike Davis, Dale Harwood. B Main-Tom Stansberry, Reinken, Harwood, Jessie Denome, Jim Porter, Kenny Brown, Jeremy Ellertson, Chuck Tyler, Espinosa. A Main-Taylor, Crawford, Wakim, Dighera, Heaton, Howard, R Moody, Wright, Case, Stansberry, Gresham, Perkins, Reinken, Bob Moody, Davis, Woodward, DeBlauw, Lowenstein. |
