STOCKTON, CALIFORNIA – The eighth points race of 2016 at Delta Speedway saw Emily Williams and Jacob Tuttle (Oakley) lead each of their features for the full distance en route to their first wins at the venue in 2016, as part of a busy night of racing at the 1/7th mile dirt oval. Williams’ win keeps her championship hopes alive in Super 600, while Tuttle was able to outlast all of the main contenders in Restricted.
Super 600 started off their feature with a four wide salute to the late Bryan Clauson, while the Restricted and Jr. Sprint drivers of Delta Speedway passed their helmets in the stands to raise over $400 for the USAC Benevolent Foundation. Non-Wing used a missing man formation for their pace laps as well.
Williams led the 30 lap Super 600 feature from the outside pole with fourth starting Shawn Laeber up to second in the early going. The field encountered lapped traffic early as the 19 starters jockeyed for position. The first caution of the race did not come out until lap 10 when John Bordenave spun in turn four. Former track champion Travis Labat had a hard crash head on into the turn four wall for a lap 15 red flag as well. Labat was uninjured in the incident.
On the restart, Williams held the lead while the battle ensued for second position. Laeber jumped the cushion and banged wheels with Alex Panella of Stockton, dropping Panella to fourth. West Sacramento’s Jessica McManus hit the wall in her Super 600 debut in turn four for another stoppage on lap 18. A few laps later Blake Bower did a 720 in turn four but kept it under fire while the caution came out for Michael Laughton sideways in turn two.
Williams held off Laeber over the last eight laps for the victory ahead of Panella, incoming points leader Brandon Carey of Ripon, and Rocklin’s Tucker Lacaze.
Tuttle’s 25 lap Restricted win saw him avoid trouble with lapped traffic on several narrow misses. Things were intense from the start when 2015 champion Caden Sarale and Brody Petrie banged wheels from the front row and were both bounced out of the top-five. Tuttle took hold of the lead position and was in the midst of traffic by lap eight. He narrowly snuck through tangling lapped cars in turn two on lap nine, before a caution came out on lap ten.
The lap ten caution was initially for Ethan Lesser spinning but escalated to Dan Bava on his side for a red flag. More wild action at the halfway point of the race saw Tuttle avoid another close call before another caution on lap 20 for Lesser stopped on the backstretch.
Tuttle pulled off a very strong restart to motor away from Garth Kasiner for a strong .961 second victory over Colton Huelssman, CoCo Carver, and Sarale. Incoming points leader Nikko Panella ran sixth at the finish.
Mike Ludwig took advantage of a fellow competitor’s bad luck, and used some late race heroics, to get his second Delta win of the year in Non Wing. 16 cars took the green flag for the 30 lap feature. Australian born Danny Carroll was disqualified from qualifying for being light on the scales but drove to a top-four in his heat race. A large eight car inversion gave him the pole for the feature which he held for much of the feature.
A wild crash stopped the action on lap eight with Mike Ibarra up in the air in turn three and 2015 champion Kent Stephens also stopped. Harlee Aguilera stopped in turn four for another caution on lap 10. Stephens stopped in turn four on lap 14 to end his evening after starting the night with a fast time in qualifying before suffering mechanical problems in the heat race.
The best battle on the track was points leader Brandon Carey challenging Ludwig for second place, but that became the battle for the lead when Carroll slowed from the lead on lap 22. Carroll’s mechanical problem turned out to be a broken chain. The race stayed green and turned into a great battle.
The two briefly ran side-by-side before Ludwig pulled away by a straight away. A caution on lap 26 for Jacob Williams spun out in turn three set up a great battle for the finish. Carey took several looks inside with Lodi’s Chris Hinkle entering the fray. Ludwig won by a nose ahead of Carey, Hinkle, Clinton Heck, and Brent Brooks.
Dylan Bloomfield won his second straight Jr. Sprints main event by only leading the final two laps after both early race leaders got tangled in lapped traffic.
Jackson Kohler of Sacramento led the race from the pole after a four car invert. Kohler paced a strong top four that had 2015 champion Isabel Barnes, Bloomfield, and Jeffrey Pahule, Jr. all in tow.
Unfortunately Kohler was bumped from the lead in lapped traffic on lap 12, allowing Barnes to take over. Bloomfield ran closely on Barnes’ rear bumper with five laps to go. Barnes started to pull away and looked in position to win before she too was struck by bad lapped traffic luck. Bloomfield drove around the outside of Barnes in turn two to take the lead for the final two laps for the victory. Pahule drove through for second ahead of Barnes, Kohler, and Karter Velasquez.
Points racing continues at Delta Speedway Stockton on September 3rd & 4th for the inaugural Dual at Delta. Two complete points races to celebrate Labor Day weekend! Thanks to McDonalds of San Joaquin County, Tuleburg, Interstate Truck Center, Morrill Industries, Van De Pol Petroleum, and Motion Media for your support of Delta Speedway!
For more information on Delta Speedway, follow them online at www.deltaspeedwaystockton.com or on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
August 20, 2016 – Points Race #8
Delta Speedway – Stockton, CA
Super 600 (20 cars)
Qualifying: #12 Alex Panella 9.772
Heat 1: #44x Shawn Laeber
Heat 2: #19 Tucker Lacaze
Feature (30 laps): 1) 6E Emily Williams, 2) 44x Shawn Laeber, 3) 12 Alexander Panella, 4) 55 Brandon Carey, 5) 19 Tucker Lacaze, 6) 94 Greg Decaires V, 7) 83V Timothy Vaught, 8) 15S Michael Sellers, 9) 5BC KEnny Wanderstadt, 10) 38 Mike Barnes, 11) 06 Blake Bower, 12) 55S Billy Sellers, 13) 89 John Modderman, 14) 15 Michael Laughton, 15) 27 Ron Singh, 16) 55x Scott Mauldin, 17) 11J Jessica McManus, 18) 1 Travis Labat, 19) 5 John Bordenave
Lap leaders 6E Emily Williams 1-30
Non-Wing 600 (16 cars)
Qualifying: #38 Kent Stephens 10.858
Heat 1: #12 Mike Ludwig
Heat 2: #55 Brandon Carey
Feature (30 laps): 1) 12 Mike Ludwig, 2) 55 Brandon Carey, 3) 3 Chris Hinkle, 4) 1* Clinton Heck, 5) 33b Brent Brooks, 6) 85 Robbie Lewis, 7) 16S Randy Smith, 8) 13W Jacob Williams, 9) 55T Allan Taylor, 10) 8C Buddy Chappell, 11) 1C Danny Carroll, 12) 82 CJ Bunch, 13) 38 Kent Stephens, 14) 35 Harlee Aguilera, 15) 13H Coleton Hilardes, 16) 11 Mike Ibarra
Lap leaders 1C Danny Carroll 1-22, 12 Mike Ludwig 23-30
Restricted 600 (15 cars)
Qualifying: #32a Colton Huelsmann 10.184
Heat 1: #2 Brody Petrie
Heat 2: #73 Nikko Panella
Feature (25 laps): 1) 87P Jacob Tuttle, 2) 21G Garth Kasiner, 3) 32a Colton Huelsmann, 4) 57 CoCo Carver, 5) 32 Caden Sarale, 6) 73 Nikko Panella, 7) 6R Ryan Williams, 8) 95 Colby Greig, 9) 2 Brody Petrie, 10) 10H Lance Hurst, 11) 77 Sage Bordenave, 12) 87X Ashlyn Rodriguez, 13) 184 Riley Jeppesen, 14) 73E Ethan Lesser, 15) 42J Dan Bava
Lap leaders 87P Jacob Tuttle 1-25
Jr. Sprint (8 cars)
Heat 1A: #44x Jeffrey Pahule, Jr.
Heat 1B: #33 Dylan Bloomfield
Feature (20 laps): 1) 33 Dylan Bloomfield, 2) 44x Jeffrey Pahule, Jr., 3) 30 Isabel Barnes, 4) 73 Jackson Kohler, 5) 62K Karter Velasquez, 6) 20 Otto Perreira, 7) 20A James Andrichuk, 8) 55X Lucas Mauldin
Lap leaders 73 Jackson Kohler 1-12, 30 Isabel Barnes 13-18, 33 Dylan Bloomfield 19-20
