SPRINGFIELD LAKES Glenn Wright opened his 19/20 race season in style picking up a main event victory in the American Tire and Racing Services Midget Series with his APC/DRE Breka Esslinger 41W at Archerfield Speedway.
It was Kaidon Brown the young gun from Sydney who showed the nights promise bagging the GSA Fastman with a 13.289 and was then revealed the highest point’s scorer after the heat rounds just ahead of Rusty Whittaker.
Brown and his TFH/United Truck Parts King Hawk 97V took out the night’s first 10 lap heat race with a blistering pace clocking a best lap speed of 105.279 KPH, Cal Whatmore JNR in the Rodney Singleton Racing 3Q Spike Esslinger crossed in 2nd with Scotty Doyle running the family owned John William Auto Sales BOSS Esslinger 80Q.
Glenn Wright ran home in 4th while compact Speedcar recruit Matt O’Neil in the 16Q Porsche Breka finished just ahead of Tom Clauss in 5th while another compact Speedcar hopper Barry Gibbes running the 66Q Spike Hawk ran the duration in7th as Brad Dawson rounded out the field.
It wasn’t a great start to the night for Darren Vine finding himself laying over in turn 2 after a small wall lick in the King Mopar 6Q and Gavin McDowell who DNF’d with one run on the board in his 95Q.
Heat two saw a smaller field by a couple after a hot lap session bingle that eliminated some cars while they were repaired however Rusty Whittaker in the Steelmart/RAW Metal Corp BOSS Esslinger 89Q set sail at the green he was hunted down by the 99Q of Brock Dean along with Zac McDonald in the 23Q, Mitchell Rooke’s new look 34Q Spike Esslinger as Lachy Paulger crossed in 5th at the flag while Bodie Smith was the only DNF recorded.
It was back on for the young guns in heat three with some “super fly” laps by Brown and Whittaker, Rusty crossing the eventual victor over Brown, Dawson, Rooke, Whatmore, O’Neil, McDonald and Audie Malt in the Shane Malt 5Q as the 3rd Compact Speedcar Recruit Graeme Flynn rounded out the field in his King Gaerte 82Q.
Glenn Wright began his run to the chequers with a win in the final heat of the evening ahead of Darren Vine’s 6Q, Tom Clauss put in another text book skid to run 3rd, Scotty Doyle ran in 4th while Bodie Smith, Barry Gibbes and Lachy Paulger rounded out the 7 car field as Gavin McDowell retired after 3 revolutions and Brock Dean didn’t start with a minor brake concern that needed rectifying for the feature.
The Bob Baker Challenge was up for grabs with 18 starters by far the strongest field we have had in over a decade on opening night for the newly crowned American Tire and Racing Services Archerfield Midget Series and it was an all young gun front row with Brown from P1 AND Whittaker in 2, Wright and Doyle filled the second row in front of Whatmore JNR and Dean.
Darren Vine and Zac MacDonald slotted into 7 and 8 while Lachy Paulger and Brad Dawson filled the 5th row, Mitchell Rooke and Matt O’Neil were allocated P11 and 12, Bodie Smith and Tom Clauss banked heat race points for grids 13 and 14 while Graeme Flynn and Audie Malt found themselves buried well in the field in 15th and 16th as Gavin McDowell rounded out the field.
On the formation lap the night dream run came to an end for Brown as the 97V headed infield with a suspected battery voltage drop concern with made the Hawk power plant sound like its wings had been clipped this giving the inside row a chance to move forward and promote Glenn Wright to the P1 spot.
At the drop of the green the 41W bolted while Rusty Whittaker had his handful of some major steering lock compliments of a tap from behind as the field jostled for track supremacy the 77Q of Bodie Smith looped off turn four which eliminated the cars of O’Neil, Gibbes and Flynn as well as the Smith car .
On the restart Vine passed Whittaker in turn 2 as the rest of the pack had their own battles McDonald was on a flyer in the 23Q Spike as well as Dean was coming on strong around the top in the 99Q, Vine and Whittaker both went to the top in the Colebard Street end finding a ton of pace as Wright ticked the laps away both Vine and Whittaker applied the torch only to both come unstuck on a yellow as a car park formed at the same end where the speed was found.
Dawson, Paulger and Clauss were all parked on track the race drama unfolded on the back straight as Vine rode the right rear of the leader and headed to the pit wall at pace sustaining front end damage while Whittaker parked the 89 to avoid making it a 4 car wreck both requiring restarts so both sent to the back of the bus for the restart with 4 to run.
Wright led the field off again this time he had Whatmore JNR in pursuit and Brock Dean was up there ensuring the 41W worked hard for the win finally crossing and parking the APC/DRE Breka Esslinger in victory lane flanked by Whatmore JNR and Dean.
Mitchell Rooke crossed in 4th, Zac McDonald in 5th, Rusty Whittaker in 6th, Darren Vine 7th and Audie Malt crossed in 8th on track and as mentioned the winner of the Bob Baker Challenge!
Darren Vine crossed in 7th unfortunately unable to collect the American Tire and Racing Services “Lucky 7th” $100 voucher after not having racers on all four corners.
Well done to the top 3 on the night getting the job done it was a bitter sweet victory for Wright after showing pace in the 18/19 season only to have an engine failure cut his season short along with Cal Whatmore JNR also switching to Esslinger power this season.
Darren Vine showed some super pace in the new King SR11 package along with Zac MacDonald in the Warren Walker owned 23Q Hawk Spike.
This weekend we head to Toowoomba for the opening round of the Ultimate Speedway Challenge and then again on the 26th of October for the Nexgen/NuPave Highbank Hussle with round two in the American Tire and Racing Services Archerfield Midget Series back at Archerfield November the 2nd
See you trackside !
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