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Mountain Madness from Friday, June 24th

For those who missed Friday’s action, it was intense in all divisions. The car counts may have not been there for full fields, but when the checkers flew for each feature, at least four or five drivers had a shot at the win.

Let’s start things off with the Balliet’s Country Corners modifieds…many strong cars made for some great racing. Donny Hartzell’s team told me Friday was their night. Well, by the looks of it, with a few more laps, Donny very well could have picked up his first win of the season! Tough break for Mike Adams! While running third, Adams spun on the final lap and had to settle for eighth. Defebo and Pecko put on a great show up front as usual, and Don Wagner looked impressive as well. After coming off his RoC win at MVS last week, Wagner won his heat Friday. Starting from the pole, Wagner held off charges from Pecko, Defebo, Adams and Hartzell. Although his gremlins look like they left the building, it became evident they were still there by mid-race when Don’s car began smoking. He had to settle for a fourth place finish. Here’s to turning from DNF’s to top 5’s. Welcome to the fast track Don!

On to the street stocks… Mr. Meckes does it again, taking the checkers in style after a few rough weeks. Point leader, Jim Yamelski tacked a few more on to his lead over Brad Kline, and Paul Frantz looks like his luck is finally turning around. Mark Deysher also had a strong run, but the driver on the fast track knows it very well. Brad Kline hasn’t had the same dominating season as last year, but Friday Kline exited the track during a lap one caution. The crew got him back out on the speedway for the restart in a hurry, and Kline battled back to finish sixth! On the cool-down lap, a ball joint let go on the #23, but no worries for Brad….the race was already finished. I call that a good break.

It looked like Bill Price Jr. picked up thriller win #5 of the season, but after post-race tech inspection, both he and Steve Shultz were found to be bending the rules. That gave the win to Steve Hoffman. Hoffman has had stellar runs in the past, and has finally hit victory lane. Tough break for Pat Verwys. When he was leading the feature, Pat had to surrender the lead when he was black flagged on lap seven for smoking. Now, we all know Pat doesn’t smoke, but his car sure was! Right to the chase…Kevin Makarewicz has really turned things around since his late start to the season. His first top five of ’05, along with being the thriller hard charger of the week (gained six positions from the start to finish in the feature), puts him on the thriller fast track at Mountain!

Fans who stuck around for the 4 cyl. thrillers saw what was probably the closest, most competitive racing of the night! They also witnessed a young Travis Fisher pick up his first career feature win…It was great to see the congratulations from many of his competitors. Holding off names like Bill Verwys Sr, Joe Heintzelman and Chris Walk isn’t an easy to do by any means, especially when you’re hounded for 20 laps!! We have to give a call to Chris Walk, who picked up his first heat win in ’05, and rebounded well from last weeks DNF. Chris remains second in the standings, but has ‘walk’ed his way on to the fast track.

Congrats to all the drivers who are ‘on the fast track’ to success at Mountain Speedway! You can pick up your awards at the photo booth after the drivers meeting. See you soon at Mountain Speedway for more Friday night thunder. Tune in next week for more ‘Mountain Madness’, brought to you by Valley Service Equipment Repair, J&J Contractors and CAD Visers, Inc.

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