Lawrence Nips Eder for ABC Super Stock Win

by Nick Gima

            Ashland, WI, June 28 -- Fans and drivers alike “jammed the stands” as sunshine and high clouds graced another AmsOil Dirt Track Series stock-car racing program at the ABC Raceway Saturday night.

            The program, sponsored by WIMI-FM and Budweiser, featured half-price admission for all adult patrons and included several visiting drivers preparing for the track’s many upcoming events, including Thursday’s visit by the Como Modified Series. This pushed the car count to a season-high 108 entries.

            On the track, the action produced a last-lap pass for one win, three of the six features running non-stop, and plenty of shuffling of the season’s standings.

The closest finish of the night came in the WISSOTA super stock feature, where Scott Lawrence made the last-lap pass on Kevin Eder for his second win of the season here. The green-to-checkered 20-lapper started with Eder edging ahead of Ken Truscott for the early advantage and fending off several challenges by Truscott throughout the first half of the event.             Meanwhile, Lawrence, who started outside on row 3, slipped back a bit early before beginning a solid climb towards the front. By midrace he was already within the top five and challenging Brian Mikkonen for third.             Once past Mikkonen, Lawrence had nearly a full straightaway to make up on Truscott, who had begun to lose ground on Eder. But Lawrence worked the outside groove to perfection, reeling in Truscott within a half-dozen laps and slipping by on the inside with three circuits left.             At the same time, Eder was struggling to put Don Koivisto a lap down. This tightened up the frontrunners and allowed Lawrence the chance to draw alongside Eder coming out of turn 2 for the final time. Lawrence hugged the bottom and Eder skated up the final corner, and Lawrence won the drag race to the checkers.             Truscott wasn’t far back in third, while Mikkonen held off Curt Myers for fourth. Points leader Randy Spacek finished sixth.
The first 12 laps of the WISSOTA modified feature clicked off very quickly as well, with Kent Baxter hustling away from the pole to the early lead. A distance behind him was fellow front-row starter Jody Bellefeuille, whose car needed a little time to get up to full gallop - but once there, Bellefeuille was the man to beat.             After just five laps Bellefeuille was on Baxter’s tail, and with a low-line move Bellefeuille scooted past and went on to build up a commanding lead within the next five laps.             Just as Dean Yrjanainen and Al Uotinen were about to converge on Baxter for runner-up honors the caution lights came on to slow the pace, as John Frydrych and Ross Lightner spun. On the first restart effort two more cars got loose, but from there on Bellefeuille sped away to his second career win here - the other coming last September at the Red Clay Classic.             Baxter slipped back through the field after Yrjanainen and Uotinen quickly overtook him after the second restart, while visiting Jayme Lautigar worked his way up to fourth at the pay window ahead of Jeff Spacek, who gained a little ground on mod points leader Bill Byholm (seventh).
The lap 12 caution in the mod A-main ended a streak of 56 straight green-flag laps on the night going back to the six-cylinder main event. Included in those fast circuits was the 15-lap WISSOTA Midwest modified headliner, which also went caution-free. Division rookie Steve Stuart got a great jump on polesitter and fellow rookie Pat Cook and led the initial laps, but it was another Mid-mod rookie - Mike Truscott - who stole the show.             After a runner-up finish last weekend here, Truscott wasn’t about to settle for second again. He pressured Cook until Pat gave up second place, then challenged Stuart for the lead. On lap 7 Truscott finally worked his way around Stuart and ran off to a stout 12-length advantage.             On lap 11 Stuart, running all alone in second, lost control and spun his ride in turn 2, but because of the distance between himself and the rest of the field he lost only a handful of positions. This did, however, give second place back to Cook, who stayed there for the duration, followed by Adam Archer, Jim Latvala and Taylor Leuthner.             Points leader Duane Dunbar extended his advantage in the standings to a track-high 21 markers despite a 12th-place run, with Cook now in second.
Pat Beeksma was certainly dominant in the latter half of the six-cylinder feature, but he did have to work for his second win of the season here. Myron Basina was the front runner in the early going and looked very impressive as he pulled away from the battle for second between Zach Pagels and Neil Adamczak. But four laps into the 15-lap run Beeksma was into second spot and challenging for the lead.             A caution flag for a two-car spin saved Basina from losing his position at the front, but it was only a temporary reprive, as Beeksma slipped past immediately after the restart and was out front to stay.             Cory Marincel’s slowing car brought out a second caution flag - this would be the last until the mod main - after which Beeksma again drew away. But the run of the night came from Travis Swanson, who had won the last three six-cylinder features but suffered engine trouble during his heat race tonight.             Swanson, who started 22nd on the 24-car grid, had bolted up to 13th by the lap 4 slowdown and was in eighth for the lap 6 restart. From there he blasted through to fifth, trailed while Shawn McFadden, Jr, used a daring three-wide move to take second on lap 9, and then sped around McFadden for that spot within another couple of laps. Fortunately for Beeksma he had a half-straightaway advantage when he took the checkered flag.             Dale Coddington claimed fourth in front of a very impressive run by rookie Neil Adamczak. Scott Ovaska’s car suffered early problems and he took it to the pit area during the lap 4 caution, leaving him with a 23rd-place run and dropping him into a tie for the divisional points lead with Beeksma.
John Kallas used a strong car and the outer groove to take his second feature win of the season in the WISSOTA street stocks. After a scramble down the back straightaway sent Steve Anderson and Rob Weber spinning on the initial start, Paul Milanowski jumped out to the early lead. But Milanowski’s car pushed up out of the racing groove in tunr 2 on lap 2, and Kallas threaded his car through a slight opening in a wild five-wide move for the lead.             From there Kallas worked a two-car-length advantage over Weber into a more significant one over the next few laps by running the outer groove of the red-clay track. The only thing that might take the win away from Kallas was Kallas himself, and he nearly did give it away when he slid too far up the track and almost hit the guardrail at the top of turns 3 and 4.             By the time he gathered up the car and regained his momentum, Weber and company had drawn back up to the leader’s rear bumper. But Kallas got back in rhythm and held on for the win, just ahead of Weber, Anderson and Tim Baum. Greg Kuklinski was a distant fifth. Larry Haderly retained his points lead despite an eighth-place effort.
Al Rapp is now two-for-two in visits to Ashland this summer, and in Victory Lane he revealed the secret to his success in winning Saturday night’s pure stock feature.             “I just changed my fuel filter,” Rapp told the capacity crowd, “and now she’s a rocket!”             Early on it seemed that more than a clean fuel filter would be needed to top the surprising Ron Poppe, who won his first-ever race at Ashland earlier in heat action. Poppe fought off Nathan Dees’ every challenge and even pulled away with the early-lap lead despite a couple of yellow-flag slowdowns.             But after Rapp restarted third on lap 3 he moved in and threatened Dees before pulling into second on lap 7 of the ten scheduled. Rapp then used the same move to take the lead from Poppe one lap later and held on for the win. Dees tried once more to overtake Poppe but had to settle for third, a distance up on Dustin Follett and Tim Carbon.             Chad Carlson struggled some but still held on to his points lead after a ninth-place performance.

On Thursday night the track will host the third stop of the eight-race Como Oil & Propane Modified Series. The program will be headlined by a 30-lap feature paying $1,000 to win and $100 to start. Fast Lane Motorsports will also present a Midwest modified special paying $400 to win, and there will be a fireworks display at the conclusion of the race action.