From Port Royal Speedway
Port Royal, PA – Midwesterner Justin Henderson won his first-ever Port Royal Speedway sprint car feature Saturday night after ripping around leader Chad Layton with a lap and a half to go in the 25-lap main. Henderson’s win was worth $3,000.
In the 20-lap late model main, Gary Beward of Thompsontown wired the field for the payday while Bruce Buckwalter Jr. sped to victory in the ARDC Midgets feature and Theresa Kepner won the powder puff event.
Henderson started on the pole of the Aumiller Insurance 410 sprint main and led just the first circuit before defending track champion Layton of Harrisburg took over from his third starting spot on a restart.
In a quest for his first feature win of the season anywhere, just like Henderson, Layton looked good out in front as the leader while Keith Kauffman motored up to second.
But after falling to fourth early on, it was second starter Cliff Brian of Ephrata who staged the first comeback of the race, to be back up to second after passing both Henderson and Kauffman before a red flag appeared with seven laps down for John Brennfleck.
Brian kept Layton in sight for the next 10 laps before running down the leader to be on his bumper as the pair raced off of turn four with five laps to go. It was then however that Brian lost the handle on his No. 16C, looping the car in front of the field on the frontstrecth forcing the rest of the field to take evasive action.
Then it was time for the second comeback story of the race as Henderson realigned third for the restart behind Kauffman and he quickly disposed of the Mifflintown veteran on the restart before coming after leader Layton.
And while Layton hugged the bottom, Henderson pitched his Sorokach No. 35 around the top side of the first and second turns after taking the two to go sign to rocket by Layton as the pair raced down the backstretch headed for the white flag.
Layton was second followed by Kauffman, 16th starter Greg Hodnett and 10th starter Tyler Walker.
Sixth through 10th went to Doug Esh, Ryan Taylor, Lance Dewease, Todd Shaffer and Mike Wagner.
Heats for the 23-car field went to Kauffman, Brian and Layton.
Beward sped to his fourth career AB Auto Glass Port late model feature for car owner Ed Powell.
Defending champion Scott Haus moved into the second spot from fifth starting spot with six down could do nothing with a stout running Beward despite three subsequent restarts over the final 14 circuits.
Haus finished second followed by Jim Yoder, Scott Flickinger and Dylan Yoder.
The balance of the top 10: Terry Naugle, Bryon Sipe, Tim Fedder, Mike Lupfer and Alan Sagi.
Four heats for the outstanding 38 cars in attendance were taken by Jeff Rine, Tim Gray, Waylon Wagner and Beward with Jeremy Miller scoring the consolation race.
The 20-lap ARDC Midgets feature saw fourth starter Alex Bright lead the first nine laps before crashing on the backstretch in a melee that caught up seven other cars and produced a lengthy red flag period.
Bruce Buckwalter Jr. restarted with the lead and rode the position all the way to the checkers.
Drew Heistand was second followed by Ryan Smith, Steve Buckwalter, who dropped out just prior to the red only to make repairs and rejoin, and Nick Wean.
Twin ARDC heats went to Steve Buckwalter and Bruce Buckwalter Jr.
Theresa Kepner led all five laps of the main event for the powder puffs.
Port Royal Speedway will return to action on May 21 with 410 sprints, late models, 305 sprints and an enduro dash. There will be no racing on May 14 as the speedway observes Spring Break.
May 7, 2011 Feature Finishes:
410 sprints, 30 laps: 1. Justin Henderson, 2. Chad Layton, 3. Keith Kauffman, 4. Greg Hodnett, 5. Tyler Walker, 6. Doug Esh, 7. Ryan Taylor, 8. Lance Dewease, 9. Todd Shaffer, 10. Mike Wagner, 11. Rick Lafferty, 12. Curt Stroup, 13. Mark Coldren, 14. Davey Sammons, 15. Joey Hershey, 16. Nicole Bower, 17. Cliff Brian, 18. Mike Erdley, 19. Mark Bitner, 20. John Brennfleck, 21. Brian Ehrenzeller, 22. Mike Walter II., 23. Bill Jones.
Late models sprints, 20 laps: : 1.Gary Beward, 2. Scott Haus, 3. Jim Yoder, 4. Scott Flickinger, 5. Dylan Yoder, 6. Terry Naugle, 7. Bryon Sipe, 8. Tim Fedder, 9. Mike Lupfer, 10. Alan Sagi, 11. Bryan Bernheisel, 12. Tim Wilson, 13. Andy Haus, 14. Jason Miller, 15. Troy Miller, 16. Jeff Rine, 17. Waylon Wagner, 18. Billy Wampler, 19. Tyler Hershey, 20. Mitch Hack, 21. Derrick Byler, 22. Tim Gray, 23. Bobby Stokes, 24. Bob Dunn
ARDC Midgets, 20 laps: 1. Bruce Buckwlater J r., 2. Drew Heistand, 3. Ryan Smith, 4. Steve Buckwalter, 5. Nick Wean, 6. Brett Arndt, 7. Shane Penny, 8. Keith McIntyre, Jr., 9. Parker Evans, 10. Steven Bull, 11. Brenden Bright, 12. Steve Craig, 13. Dave Shirk, 14. Shawn Jackson, 15. PJ Gargiulo, 16. Steve Drevicki, 17. Alex Bright, 18.. Andrew Hannula, 19. Steve Lenig, 20. Joe Butera, 21. Greg Fitzpatrick, 22. Randy Reid, 23. Mark Gilmore, 24. Dusty Heistand, 25. Tim Buckwalter
Powder puffs, 5 laps: 1. Theresa Kepner, 2. Julie Colyer, 3. Jen Powell