9/26/07
I-30 Speedway
Little Rock, AR
57 cars
Heat one (started): 1. Brian McClelland 87B (2) 2. Ron Blair 35R (1) 3. Jack Dover 53D (5) 4. Kevin Ramey 7m (10) 5. Brandon Berryman 29x (6) 6. Cody Gardner 1G (8) 7. Tyler Blank 75B (3) 8. Tim Simmons 71T (7) 9. Andrew Korte 98 (9) DNS – John Carney II 8c (4)
Korte and Simmons contacted before a lap could be completed, disabling both sprinters. B. McClelland led the 10 lap distance. Ramey was the man on the move.
Heat two (started): 1. Joe Wood Jr. 03 (1) 2. Lorne Wofford 18w (2) 3. Gary Wright 9w (8) 4. Jeff Swindell 12s (7) 5. Paul McMahan 01 (10) 6. Eric Baldaccini B4 (4) 7. Kyle Bellm 14K (9) 8. Travis Rutz 39 (6) 9. Mike Dussel 6 (5) 10. Rick Pringle 38 (3)
Wood led flag to flag despite two cautions. R. Pringle stopped on lap two and exited and Dussel ran into an infield tire on lap four and helplessly got upside down. He was unhurt but done for the night. Wright and Swindell provided a veteran showdown, with Wright garnering third on the last lap.
Heat three (started): 1. Daryn Pittman 21P (1) 2. Darren Stewart 91 (2) 3. Tim Shaffer A12 (10) 4. Nick Smith 15s (3) 5. AJ Rains 3 (5) 6. Josh Fisher 86 (4) 7. Sean McClelland 1 (8) 8. Kenneth Walker 2w (6) 9. Kenny Taylor 66 (7) 10. Jon Freeman 81 (9)
Pittman led the distance. Shaffer did well in moving up seven spots, earning high point getter of the heats.
Heat four (started): 1. Kaley Gharst 3* (2) 2. Tim Crawley 88 (7) 3. Scott Winters R19 (1) 4. Jason Meyers 14m (6) 5. Greg Wilson w20 (9) 6. Danny Smith 5$ (5) 7. Lucas Wolfe 13K (8) 8. Brad Greer 3B (4) 9. Derek Hagar 9JR (3)
This was sort of a race of attrition. Gharst led flag to flag. Hagar was running second early, but a trip over the berm made him lose several spots. After getting passed by Meyers, he flipped over turn two later on. Wolfe spun on lap four, making the road to the front a hard oner. Crawley diced up the competition for second.
Heat five (started): 1. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. 40R (5) 2. Eric Lutz 20E (2) 3. Robbie Standridge 12x (7) 4. Don Droud Jr. 1x (9) 5. Wade Oliver 58 (8) 6. Ronny Howard 44 (4) 7. Mike Boston 51B (1) 8. Jonathan Cornell 28 (6) DNS – Justin Sturch 4T (3)
Boston led and seemed to have the race in hand, before he spun into the infield on lap seven. Stenhouse inherited the lead and finished off a fine run. Cornell exited after contact with Oliver on lap two.
Heat six (started): 1. Ernie Ainsworth 40 (4) 2. Stu Snyder 2D (2) 3. Steve Short 8s (3) 4. Jeff Wingate 8w (5) 5. Lee Sowell 51s (8) 6. Brian Brown 21 (9) 7. Wade Human 7w (7) 8. Mallory Armfield 5MA (6) 9. Zach Pringle 8z (1)
Z. Pringle was winning going away when he spun on lap five. Ainsworth assumed the point and finished the race off. A collapsed nose wing hindered B. Brown's progress.
Qualifier one (started, *qualified for feature): 1. Berryman (1*) 2. Shaffer (8*) 3. Droud (3*) 4. Snyder (4*) 5. Wofford (5*) 6. Short (2*) 7. Walker (12) 8. Korte (13) 9. Boston (11) 10. Bellm (9) 11. Pittman (6) 12. B. McClelland (7) DNS – Wingate (10), Z. Pringle (14), Sturch (15)
Pittman spun on the first lap and collected B. McClelland ending the night for both. Berryman led the distance, and held off a fast Shaffer at the finish.
Qualifier two (started, *qualified for feature): 1. Wright (7*) 2. Winters (3*) 3. D. Stewart (5*) 4. Blair (6*) 5. S. McClelland (10) 6. Rains (1) 7. Fisher (9) 8. R. Pringle (14) 9. Human (11) 10. Sowell (4) 11. Crawley (8) 12. B. Brown (2) DNS – Greer (12), Dussel (13)
Sowell had this one in hand with a charging Crawley in second on the white flag lap, but Sowell blew out his rear-end with a piece punching a hole in Crawley's oil pan, costing both a good starting spot in the A. Wright was opportunistic in inheriting the lead from third.
Qualifier three (started, *qualified for feature): 1. Meyers (3*) 2. Oliver (2*) 3. Gharst (7*) 4. Ainsworth (8*) 5. Lutz (5*) 6. Gardner (1) 7. D. Smith (9) 8. Dover (6) 9. Cornell (12) 10. Freeman (14) 11. Taylor (13) 12. Wolfe (10) 13. Swindell (4) 14. Simmons (11)
Gardner led early before Meyers took the lead on lap three. Swindell broke a cam spud on lap eight. Dover spun on lap four.
Qualifier four (started, *qualified for feature): 1. McMahan (4*) 2. Stenhouse (8*) 3. Standridge (5*) 4. Wilson (3*) 5. N. Smith (2) 6. Ramey (6*) 7. Wood Jr. (7*) 8. Blank (10) 9. Rutz (11) 10. Baldaccini (1) 11. Hagar (13) 12. R. Howard (9) 13. Armfield (12) 14. Carney II (14)
McMahan and Baldaccini exchanged the early lead with McMahan taking control. Contact between the two resulted in Baldaccini spinning on lap two. Stenhouse restarted sixth but was quickly moving forward. He was second by lap 10 of 12, when Armfield tipped over. Stenhouse used a line entering high in turn one and shooting off the bottom of turn two to move through the field. McMahan was able to hold him off in the end.
A main (started): 1. Shaffer (1) 2. Wright (2) 3. Meyers (7) 4. Stenhouse (3) 5. McMahan (6) 6. Wilson (17) 7. Standridge (9) 8. Ainsworth (5) 9. Droud (12) 10. Lutz (16) 11. D. Stewart (8) 12. Oliver (13) 13. Blair (11) 14. Wofford (19) 15. Wood Jr. (21) 16. Snyder (15) 17. Short (18) 18. Ramey (20) 19. Gharst (4) 20. Berryman (14) 21. Winters (10)
Wright used the high side to take the lead in the 25 lapper. Shaffer followed with Stenhouse in tow before a lap six spin by Snyder, just as the leaders were entering lapped traffic. The lead trio led Gharst, Meyers and Ainsworth back to green flag racing. Meyers passed Gharst for fourth after the restart. Two laps later, Gharst took a tumble in turn four. He was uninjured. Stenhouse had taken second from Shaffer and now set his sights on Wright. Shaffer came back into second and gained on Wright when the pair entered lapped traffic. On lap 19, Shaffer slid in front of Wright and blocked his low line in turn two to take the lead for good in Doc Sloan's sprinter. Meyers was able to get by Stenhouse for the third and final guaranteed spot in Saturday's finale. Wilson was the hard-charger, moving by 11 cars on his way to sixth.