Brown wins
“I’ve never
won a race where all I only led for two turns”, said Brown in the chilly 47
degree
At Noel
Dawson’s green flag Hansen took off with the lead. He opened up a
half-straightaway advantage over Chris Rahe by lap five. USAC National Champion,
Josh Wise made his way into third position by the fifth tour on the 1/3-mile high-banked
clay oval. There was a great battle for fourth as the race approached lap nine.
Matt Mitchell, Brown, Robby Flock, and Johnny Rodriguez – the 2004 USAC Western
Midget Champion were dicing to the delight of the good sized crowd.
Flock
nailed the front chute wall trying to gain fourth outright on lap 14. He kept
going but lost several positions. Two laps later the red flag appeared for
Ernie Bartley who flipped his machine in turn three. Uninjured, Bartley was
done for the event. Rodriguez stopped in turn two on lap 18 with an unknown
problem.
Brown was
in fifth place on lap 20 but he kept working his low groove line and he picked
off Mitchell, Wise, and then Rahe to put himself in position to win. Brown, a
20 year-old from
27 midgets
and 20 Ford Focus midgets were on the grounds. Quick qualifier Brad Galedrige
suffered a wicked spiraling flip in turn two during his heat race. His TGIC #29
had the lower left side frame rail ripped off and thus was too badly damaged
for Galedrige to return to action. “It seemed like I was in the air for along
time”, said Galedrige, who climbed out of his wrecked racer under his own
power.
Alex Pruett
was also a heat flip victim; nailing the wall at the start of the first heat.
He too was okay. Heats were won by Jimmy Christian, Michael Lewis, and Cameron
Beard. Flock won the Last Chance “B” Main.
The
companion Ford Focus feature event was won in wire-to-wire fashion by Bobby
Michnowicz. Chris Veach challenged Michnowicz the duration of the 20-lap event
but had to settle for second place. The podium was completed by Jet Davison.
Cameron Veach flipped on lap 12 of the Focus feature. He walked away.
USAC WESTERN MIDGET CAR SERIES RACE
RESULTS:
QUALIFICATIONS:
1. Bradley Galedrige, 29, Galedrige-12.618; 2. Ryan Kaplan, 21, Kaplan-12.755;
3. Josh Wise, 88, McKenney-12.756; 4. Robby Flock, 19, Sala-12.886; 5. Matt
Mitchell, 37, Mitchell-12.887; 6. Scott Pierovich, 35, Pierovich-12.961; 7.
Chris Rahe, 3, Rahe-12.983; 8. Danny Stratton, 21az, Burkhart-12.984; 9.
Garrett Hansen, 70, Hansen-13.009; 10. Alex Pruett, 60, Western Speed-13.032;
11. Michael Lewis, 40, Western Speed-13.034; 12. Johnny Rodriguez, 7R,
Priestley-13.042; 13. Chase Barber, 91, Barber-13.146; 14. Tyler Brown, 34,
Brown-13.162; 15. Rick Hendrix, 12, Hendrix-13.204; 16. Brad Kuhn, 79,
Sala-13.210; 17.
FIRST HEAT: (6 laps) 1. Christian, 2.
Bartley, 3. Boyden, 4. Kuhn, 5. Rahe, 6. Barber, 7. Pruett, 8. Flock, 9.
Galedrige. NT
SECOND HEAT: (5 laps) 1. Lewis, 2. Brown,
3. Gard, 4. D’Arcy, 5. Pankratz, 6. Kaplan, 7. Dennett, 8. Mitchell, 9.
Stratton. NT
THIRD HEAT: (8 laps) 1. Beard, 2. Bragg,
3. Wise, 4. Rodriguez, 5. Voitel, 6. Hansen, 7. McQueen, 8. Pierovich, 9.
Hendrix. 1:50.67
SEMI: (10 laps) 1. Flock, 2. Hansen, 3.
Mitchell, 4. Pierovich, 5. Hendrix, 6. Pruett, 7. McQueen, 8. Barber, 9.
Dennett. NT
FEATURE: (28 laps#) 1. Tyler Brown, 2.
Chris Rahe, 3. Josh Wise, 4. Matt Mitchell, 5. Brad Kuhn, 6. Michael Lewis, 7.
Rick Hendrix, 8. Garrett Boyden, 9. Shannon McQueen, 10. Scott Pierovich, 11.
Robby Flock, 12. Greg Bragg, 13. Cameron Beard, 14. Jimmy Christian, 15.
Garrett Hansen, 16. Chris D’Arcy, 17. Johnny Rodriguez, 18. Ernie Bartley, 19.
Jimmy Voitel, 20.
**Pruett
and Galedrige flipped during the first heat. Kaplan flipped during the second
heat.
FEATURE
LAP LEADERS: Laps 1-27 Hansen, Lap 28 Brown.
NEW WESTERN MIDGET CAR STANDINGS: 1-Lewis-114;
2-Kuhn-82; 3-Mitchell-72; 4-Brown-67; 5-Steele-66; 6-Wise-64; 7-Rahe-61; 8-Jay
Drake-54; 9-Cole Carter-53; 10-Ron Gregory-48.
Pit Notes: