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Traditional Sprint Car FanSite |
See You At The Races!!! |
| CRAWFORD COLLECTS FIRST WIN
OF SEASON by Gary Jacob |
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Unwinged 360 Sprint Cars, IMCA Modifieds and Street Stocks |
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Ventura, CA -September 23, 2000--Running his third
car of the season after a couple hard crashes, Jim Crawford from
Ventura collected his first VRA unwinged 360 sprint car feature win of
the 2000 season Saturday night at Ventura Raceway. Crawford started
2nd, led all 30 laps and fought off the challenges of season point
leader Gary Howard for the win as Crawford stands fifth in the season
standings. Crawford's win was worth $1,000, Howard collected $750 and
rookie Richard Renken won $500 for his third place run. Racing for the
first time since early June, Steve Greenland won the 20 lap IMCA
Modified main event from 12th starting. Greenland has won the feature
in 3 of his 7 appearances in 2000 and his $300 win this week saw Ed
Shelton in second ahead of former track champion Randy McGraw. In the
20 lap street stock main event, defending champion Craig Germanetti
passed Greg Raap on lap 19 and won for the third time this season.
Midweek, it was announced that both winner Randy Miller and runnerup
Germanetti had been disqualified from their finishes on Sept 16 for
running illegal heads. That awarded the win to Tom Stephens, who did
not race tonight. J D Baier won the Speedway Midget main event.
The VRA sprint cars again had nearly 30 cars in action. The four qualifying heats were won by Howard, Clark Templeman III, Crawford and Ronnie Case. The top four finishers in each heat advanced to the 30 lap feature and they were joined by the top 4 from the B Main, were Jeremy Ellertson won ahead of Chris Wakim, Luis Espinoza and Russell DeBlauw. Point title hopeful Wakim had dropped out in his heat. The top four point collectors from the heat action are inverted at the front of the lineup for the 30 lap A Main and that put Case and teammate Crawford on the front row with Templeman and Howard in row 2. Crawford led all 30 laps for the win as both Case and Templeman had problems and dropped out. Howard finished 2nd ahead of 8th starter Renken, who had a long go-kart career before moving into the sprint cars this season. Wakim lined up 18th after transferring through the B Main, but ran fourth ahead of Richard McCormack, Tony Dighera, Jeff Heaton and Bill Welch. I-4 Modified competitor Steve Chuhaloff is now racing in the sprint cars and he finished 15th in the main event. Howard holds a 170 point lead over Wakim with feature dropout Greg Taylor just 5 points ahead of Heaton in their duel for third. Taylor is 315 points back of Howard. There were 19 IMCA Modifieds and they were split into three heat races. Greenland was also impressive in his heat race win as he battled from the rear. Other heat winners were Jamie Taylor and Ed Shelton. Defending track champion Donald Houghton's title hopes were shattered when he was blackflagged from the feature. Shelton and McGraw chased Greenland to the feature win. Greenland took the lead from Shelton on lap 16. Mike Furlong ran fourth and extended his point lead to 14 points over John Aitken with just the September 30th point race remaining. Aitken was fifth in the feature and moved past Rich Wolfe into second in points as Wolfe ran 8th behind Gary Curtis and Bill Saltzman. Wolfe stands 2 points back of Aitken and 5 ahead of Steve Smith, who started the night tied with Wolfe for 2nd in points. Saltzman has wrapped up the IMCA Modified California State Championship. In his second week of action, legendary pavement late model star Oren Prosser was 12th. The 19 street stocks also raced in three heat races with Michael Lee, Will Smith and Miller the heat winners. Germanetti came from 7th starting to post his 3rd win of the season and pull into a tie with John Uccellini for the track point lead. Stephens fell from point title contention when he was missing from the action. Raap continued his strong late season runs by pacing the first 18 laps of the 20 lapper and settling for 2nd after Germanetti's late pass for the win. Stephen Suchowirsky was third ahead of Wayne Heurung, Steve Bulpitt, Miller, Uccellini and Mike Riccardi. Riccardi has moved into fourth in points, just 10 points ahead of Heurung. Summary Street Stock Heat 1-Michael Lee, Stephen Suchowirsky, Craig Germanetti, Steve Bulpitt, John Romero. Heat 2-Will Smith, Dan Murphy, Greg Raap, Wayne Heurung, Bradley Prows. Heat 3-Randy Miller, Mike Riccardi, Frank Woodward, John Uccellini, Erick Karlsen. Main-Germanetti, Raap, Suchowirsky, Heurung, Bulpitt, Miller, Uccellini, Riccardi, Ernie Malone, Chris Tramel, Prows, Woodward, Tracey Pallais, Karlsen, Romero, Joe Blackmore, Murphy, Lee, Smith. IMCA Modified Heat 1-Jamie Taylor, Stephen Mitchell, Mike Furlong, John Aitken, Bill Waltman. Heat 2-Steve Greenland, Gary Curtis, Randy McGraw, Jimmy Bartttelt, Daman Redman. Heat 3-Ed Shelton, Donald Houghton, Bill Saltzman, Steve Smith, Chris Tonoli. Main-Greenland, Shelton, McGraw, Furlong, Aitken, Curtis, Saltzman, Rich Wolfe, Tonoli, Barttelt, Hobie Conway, Oren Prosser, Smith, Waltman, Taylor, Redman, Todd Barnes, Houghton, Mitchell. Unwinged 360 Sprint Car Heat 1-Gary Howard, Jeff Heaton, Richard McCormick, Kenny White, Russ DeBlauw. Heat 2-Clark Templeman III, Rob Kershaw, Jim Porter, Steve Chuhaloff, Jeremy Ellertson. Heat 3-Jimmy Crawford, Greg Taylor, Jim Gresham, Dale Harwood, Luis Espinoza. Heat 4-Ronnie Case, Richard Renken, Bill Welch, Tony Dighera, Jimmy May. B Main-Ellertson, Chris Wakim, Espinoza, DeBlauw, Jessie Denome, Jim Thomson, Dayle Henry, Kenny Brown, John Woodward. A Main-Crawford, Howard, Renken, Wakim, McCormick, Dighera, Heaton, Welch, Kershaw, Porter, Harwood, Espinoza, Gresham, DeBlauw, Chuhaloff, White, Ellertson, Taylor, Templeman, Case. |
