KXV Mid-Season Championship & HoF Night

This week at the Knoxville Raceway was Hall of Fame night as five new members were added to the Hall. Congratulations to Craig Agan, Randy Brisel, Tony Moro, Grant Rankin, and Jeff Tuttle. All of them were very deserving people who have helped make Knoxville Raceway what it has become today. The weather was gorgeous on this Saturday night with 84 degrees, sunshine, 51% humidity, and no wind as the night began. The Dunkin’s prepared a perfect racing surface this week, and the weather cooperated. The 360 and 410 features were amazing, probably the best races of the season in both classes.

Mark Dobmeier stayed in North Dakota to race with the World of Outlaws, as was 82 BWW car of Roger Crockett, who would go on to win on Saturday night against the Outlaws. Congrats to Crockett and the LaHaise 82 team! Josh Schneiderman was racing in both the 410 and 360 classes on this night.

Car count was lower on this night, season low 27 410’s, 20 360’s, and a season high 26 305’s. With twin features for the 360’s this coming week and for the 410’s the week after, I would expect car counts to start increasing as we get closer to the Knoxville Nationals in August. Who has Nationals fever?  I do.    

410 Report
Top 10 Qualifying:  Clint Garner set quick time for the first time this season with a lap of 15.808, followed by Henderson, Brown, Jeffrey, Lasoski, Ian Madsen, Maeschen, Dollansky, McCarl, and Droud. 15.808 is the slowest quick time of the season.        Garner went out ninth in the order. It was a big step up for Garner who had a time trial average finish of 14.7 before this week. With Henderson qualifying second it was a Parker Engines 1-2 finish.  

Heat winners were Lynton Jeffrey (started 5th), Dusty Zomer (3rd), and McCarl (4th). There was some great heat racing action with no winners coming from the front row. Terry McCarl and Brian Brown had a great race in heat three.

Cole Wood finished second in the B-Main, but sat out the A-Main giving AJ Moeller the spot.

The A-Main was 25 laps for Mid-Season Championship. Tasker Phillips went upside down in turn three on the initial start, he was OK.  On the restart the race went 25 laps non-stop. Dollansky and Jeffrey had a great battle early with Dollansky leading lap one, Jeffrey leading laps 2-6, and the Dollansky passed Jeffrey on lap 7 and pulled away winning by a margin of 3 seconds. The race from second through ninth was unbelievable. The track had 3 grooves with a bottom, middle, and top. It was pure artwork. Henderson showed some muscle climbing to second and was gaining on Dollansky at the end shaving a full second off of the lead in the closing two laps. This story won’t do the race justice, you absolutely must check out the race highlights on the Knoxville Raceway YouTube channel.

410 A-Main Finish (started): 1. Craig Dollansky (1); 2. Justin Henderson (7); 3. Brian Brown (6); 4. Danny Lasoski (4); 5. Bronson Maeschen (2); 6. Dusty Zomer (11); 7. Lynton Jeffrey (5); 8. Davey Heskin (13); 9. Terry McCarl (9); 10. Clint Garner (8); 11. Don Droud Jr. (10); 12. Dustin Selvage (12); 13. Ian Madsen (3); 14. Josh Schneiderman (17); 15. Brooke Tatnell (16); 16. Larry Ball Jr. (19); 17. Ryan Bunton (14); 18. Mike Moore (18); 19. AJ Moeller (21); 20. Glen Saville (23); 21. Chris Martin (22); 22. Dakota Hendrickson (20); 23. RJ Johnson (24); 24. Tasker Phillips (15) DNS – Cole Wood. Lap Leaders: C. Dollansky 1, Jeffrey 2-6, C. Dollansky 7-25. Hard-charger: Henderson.

You will notice in this weeks stats the Time Trial (TT) points I have removed show up points from this number to get a better idea of actual performance. Only the top 8 in time trials are awarded points (Breakdown is 1st-40, 2nd-35, 3rd-30, 4th-25, 5th-20, 6th-15, 7th-10, 8th-5) everyone gets 100 points per night to show up, and the WoO event was 150 to show up.

360 Report
Nate Van Haaften set quick time for the first time this season at 16.495 followed by Henderson, Beaver, Agan, Alley, Dylan Peterson, Russ Hall, Jamie Ball, Moro, and Josh Schneiderman. 

With only 20 cars entered there were only two heat races. Heat winners were Calvin Landis (started 1st), and Jamie Ball (3rd). With only two heat races it made for some stacked heat race lineups, but the top six in each heat were locked into the top 12 spots with the invert being 8 putting Ball and Hall on the front row.

Billy Alley would pull in before this race started, showing smoke as the went pit side, and giving up the fourth starting spot. This was an entertaining race, and although it shows Jamie Ball starting on the pole, he earned this win. The race was 18 laps, an additional 3 laps for Mid-Season championship. Ball would lead early while Henderson was up to third in a matter of a few laps from his eighth starting spot. Russ grabbed the lead momentarily on lap six, but Ball fought back to regain the position as Henderson went by Hall to take second. Henderson would use the lapped traffic to his advantage and get the lead on lap 14, but Jamie Ball was not to be denied and drove to the outside of Henderson on the next lap and regained the point and went on to win his first career 360 feature at Knoxville Raceway. Ball proclaimed in victory lane it was “the best day of my life” and seeing the smile on his face after the races, I wouldn’t disagree.

360 A Main Finish (started): 1. Jamie Ball (1); 2. Justin Henderson (7); 3. Nate Van Haaften (6); 4. Russ Hall (2); 5. Joe Beaver (4); 6. Jon Agan (5); 7. Dylan Peterson (3); 8. Jarrod Schneiderman (10); 9. Josh Schneiderman (8); 10. Calvin Landis (11); 11. Tony Shilling (13); 12. Matt Moro (9); 13. Tom Lenz (15); 14. Matt Juhl (12); 15. Mike Houseman Jr. (14); 16. Trevor Reynolds (18); 17. Cody Ledger (19); 18. Mike Van Haaften (16); 19. Sawyer Phillips (17) DNS – Billy Alley. Lap Leader: Ball 1-13, Henderson 14, Ball 15-18. Hard-charger: Henderson.

 

305 Report
Matthew Stelzer set quick time for the second time this season with a lap of 17.559. Heat winners were Jeff Wilke (started 2nd), Tanner Edwards (2nd), and Mitchell Alexander (4th). It was the third heat win of the season for Higday and Stelzer.

Unfortunately this race became an endurance race, lasting a total of 41 minutes from push off to finish with four yellows, and two red flags. Kevin Hetrick set a good pace early but J Kinder was able to use the cautions to his advantage and take the lead on lap six and get the win. Keoni Texeira had to give up the third starting position with a broken rocker arm. McKenna Haase was involved in an accident early when Steve Breazeale slowed a bit in front of her and McKenna couldn’t slow down to avoid him and went up and over, then was hit by Steve Palmer in a scary crash. McKenna was treated for a concussion but is OK. Chris Walraven rallied from 18th to seventh after having fuel crystallization problems and missing time trials.

305 A Main (started): 1. J Kinder (5); 2. Kevin Hetrick (2); 3. Mitchell Alexander (1); 4. Mike Mayberry (3); 5. Matthew Stelzer (8); 6. Devin Kline (7); 7. Chris Walraven (18); 8. Jeff Wilke (12); 9. Stacey Alexander (20); 10. Steve Breazeale (6); 11. Mike Philben (4); 12. Christopher Scank (22); 13. Joe Simbro (15); 14. Tanner Edwards (11); 15. Kade Higday (10); 16. Kevin Hiemstra (16); 17. Corey Kautz (13); 18. Lee Patterson (21); 19. Josh Jones (17); 20. McKenna Haase (9); 21. Steve Palmer (14); 22. Andee Beierle (19); 23. Laney Feight (23) DNS - Keoni Texeira, Don Dawson III. Lap Leaders: Hetrick 1-5, Kinder 6-15. Hard-charger: Walraven.

Notes
I hope everyone took time to congratulate the Hall of Fame inductees this past week, but if you didn’t please take a minute to do it when you see them this season.

Henderson still has the Sundby #1 in the point lead in the 360 car owner standings. Agan has a slim lead over Beaver in driver points. Twin features is always a tough night, and what I call “Separation Saturday” as the title contenders need a good night to win the title.

I saw Jon Agan win the Sprint Invaders race at Bloomfield on Friday night. He is leading the Invaders points as well, what a season so far.

Terry McCarl had a ninth place finish this week, and I think it was a new car as they had to run in through tech at the beginning of the night. T-Mac still has a nice 193 point lead.

Henderson has jumped from fifth, to fourth, to now second in 410 points this week. Keep your eye on this car. I look for Henderson and McCarl both to win a feature soon.

Ian Madsen and Craig Dollansky are lurking in third and fourth in the point standings.

Clint Garner has cracked the top ten in points this week. He is steadily improving in the 410 class and I think he could be a sleeper pick to make the Nationals A-Main.

Brooke Tatnell and the Vermeer 55 team have to be disappointed being eleventh in points. Is it horsepower, still adjusting to the new tires, or something else? Keep your heads up team 55.

Larry Ball Jr. had his best finish of the season with a 16th. It might not sound like much, but they are making gains and Larry seems to be getting better each week.

I’ll be back next week with more tidbits.