By Greg Soukup
Saturday at Eagle Raceway was Dirt Track Star Salute Night, presented by Pepsi Cola of Lincoln. 141 teams pulled into the pits, ready to put on a great show for the big crowd in the grandstands; and they did that as is the usual at America’s Home Track.
There were no serious incidents in the preliminary racing action.
The Nebraska Septic IMCA Racesaver Sprint also had its first start called back when Cameron Thompson’s 2T bounced several times in turns 3 and 4 before flipping and landing on top of the 2A of Alex Salzman collecting Mike Boston’s 45C. Neither driver was seriously injured but their race cars were too badly damaged to continue. Gene Ackland was out front of lap 1 in the 14G with Tyler Hendrickson’s 14T second, Justin Bolte’s 17 third and Adam Gullion rounding out the top 4 in the #91. Dillon Knudson’s 3G stopped in the entrance to the pits on lap 7 for a caution. The Eastepwheels.com Choose Cone was placed on the front stretch with the top 4 remaining the same. Cole Wayman passed Gullion for fourth on the restart, putting the 18W into that position. Jason Danley put the 4X into fourth place the next lap but Wayman jumped all the way up to third after 1 more lap with Bolte also passing Danley to regain fourth. Danley passed Bolte the next time around for fourth. Hendrickson snagged the lead on lap 12. 2 laps later Danley got past Wayman for third position and advanced to second place with 8 to go. 3 laps later Tyler Drueke’s 12T came to a halt coming out of turn 4 with 5 laps left and was pushed to the pits. The restart saw Wayman move back up to third as Brandon Horton put his 1B into fourth with 2 to go. Your top 4 were Hendrickson, Danley, Wayman and Horton.
This was Tyler’s first ever sprint car win an he was all smiles as he said “That was a good run, but it was difficult figuring out the hole in turn 3 but I could get through it pretty fast. It’s been a while waiting for this first win because we couldn’t seem to get it all together or something would go wrong but we finally got it all together and get a good result.” Tyler’s sponsors include Rod’s Auto Service, Down the Hatch and Techniques as well as his grandfather, Mother and Dad.
Next Saturday at Eagle Raceway is Fast and Furious Night, presented by A1 Iron. The intermission entertainment will be a water balloon toss aimed at the Eagle Officials. Water ballons can be purchased under the VIP deck for $1 each. All proceeds will go to the Non-qualifiers Fund at the IMCA Racesaver Nationals.
Your running order will be A1 Iron Stock Cars. Avid Realty SportMods, Nebraska's Best Modifieds, Valentino's Hobby Stocks and Nebraska Septic Sprint Cars. The sprints will be the draw/redraw class for the evening with an additional $2250 added to the purse for the A Feature. They will be competing for $1,100 to win and $300 to start.
Grandstands open at 5:15, hot laps kick off at 5:45 with racing at 6:30. Adult front gate admission is $15, youths 6-12 just $5 and children 5 and under free.
Pit gates open at 3:30 with pit passes costing $30.
RESULTS:
IMCA Sprints 21 Entries A Feature 1 25 Laps 1. 14T-Tyler Hendrickson[2]; 2. 4X-Jason Danley[9]; 3. 18W-Cole Wayman[8]; 4. 1B-Brandon Horton[14]; 5. 11-Bily Aley[10]; 6. 14G-Gene Ackland[1]; 7. 25-Gunnar Pike[15]; 8. 91-Adam Gu lion[12]; 9. 4W-Nathan Weiler[18]; 10. 45C-Mike Boston[6]; 11. 32-Trefer Wa ler[17]; 12. 35L-Ty Ledger[7]; 13. 03-Chris Helget[20]; 14. 12U-Tyler Devenport[16]; 15. 25A Alex Davenport[13]; 16. 8B-Kaedon Thurman[21]; 17. 12T-Tyler Drueke[11]; 18. 17-Justin Bolte[5]; 19. 3G-Dylon Knudson[19]; 20. 2T-Cameron Thompson[3]; 21. 2A-Alex Salzman[4]
Heat 1 10 Laps | 00:02:09.972 1. 2T-Cameron Thompson[2]; 2. 18W-Cole Wayman[5]; 3. 35L-Ty Ledger[4]; 4. 11-Bily Aley[6]; 5. 25A-Alex Davenport[3]; 6. 12U-Tyler Devenport[7]; 7. 3G-Dylon Knudson[1]
Heat 2 10 Laps | 00:02:09.262 1. 14G-Gene Ackland[1]; 2. 45C-Mike Boston[3]; 3. 2A-Alex Salzman[2]; 4. 12T-Tyler Drueke[6]; 5. 1B-Brandon Horton[5]; 6. 32-Trefer Waler[4]; 7. 03-Chris Helget[7]
Heat 3 10 Laps | 00:02:13.001 1. 14T-Tyler Hendrickson[1]; 2. 91-Adam Gu lion[6]; 3. 17-Justin Bolte[2]; 4. 4X-Jason Danley[5]; 5. 25-Gunnar Pike[4]; 6. 4W-Nathan Weiler[3]; 7. 8B-Kaedon Thurman[7]