By T.J. Buffenbarger
- Indiana finally received some much-needed rain on Friday. The only twist is the rain came just a few hours before hot laps for the opening night of USAC Valvoline Indiana Sprintweek at Gas City I-69 Speedway. Mother nature unleashed a downpour with quite the light and sound show to go with it. The staff at Gas City never gave up though and as soon as the rain stopped, the Gas City track crew was on the racetrack with equipment trying to get the moisture run in. After the equipment finished up drivers took to the track for wheel packing and just about every sprint car was caked with mud. After a few slimy hot lap sessions the track was worked in, time trials commenced, and the largest crowd in Gas City history saw a stellar sprint car racing event. Thank you to Gas City’s staff and USAC for not giving up on the show, and thanks to the drivers for sacrificing your cars for wheel packing exercises at Gas City.
- Friday’s Sprintweek event at Gas City drew the largest crowd in the track’s history.
- To help spur interest in wheel packing Gas City promoter Jiggs Thomason put up $100 for the first car in line to wheel pack. Kevin Briscoe immediately jumped on the chance to make some extra money.
“This might be the most money we make all week”, stated Briscoe.
Bart Grider’s team though had other ideas and actually pushed their car to the line first.
“We’re normally the first car in line anyway, today we just got paid for it” said Grider, who runs a low dollar operation that runs well every week at Gas City.
- Brandon Petty’s streak of non-wing wins at Gas City ended abruptly on Friday when he failed to make it out of the non-qualifiers race.
“We screwed up in qualifying and hit the fence, and it just continued to go downhill from there” said Petty. “I had a run going in that non-qualifiers race, then I drove off the backstretch. The track was still pretty greesy, and I can’t afford to tear anything up. So I just pulled it in. I hate doing that…”
Petty’s Sprintweek run was helped this week when Brian DeFord, who is now racing with the Great Lakes Outlaw Sprint Car Series, supplied Petty’s team with much needed American Racer tires for the week.
- After the rain finished falling and the track was about to be run in, nobody could have wiped the smile off Cory Kruseman’s face. Kruseman loves a heavy race track similar to what he runs on back in California, and the Gas City surface this night would fall right into his hands.
Kruseman hooked up with Keith Kunz for Sprintweek. Kruseman had previously driven the Mopar powered Kunz entry during the inagural Buckeye Nationals.
“We actually had to tone down the engine. I was telling (Keith) ‘this thing has too much power'” said Kruseman about his Indiana ride. “The guys had it perfect tonight though, and we were able to put all that Mopar power to the ground”.
Kruseman will be running the entire Indiana Sprintweek series.
- J.J. Yeley came out of nowhere after a mid race red flag to score a second place finish, making up 10 points on Tracy Hines who finished in third.
“I could not really get a clear lap early on” said Yeley who had slipped as far back as 10th. “Then after the red I finally picked my way through, and then everyone left me a clear lane up on the top.”
Yeley is very focused on winning the USAC Stoops/Freightliner points championship for the second year in a row. Yeley currently trails Hines by 79 points in the standings.
“We have a plan with the points. We’re going to chip away at (Hines) lead just a little at a time and we’ll see what happens”.
- Florida star Sport Allen, who wants to move to Indiana and race with USAC in the worst way, brought the Taylor Andrew’s hauler up from Florida. Allen is looking for a ride this week.
- Mike Mann made his first Gas City start for 2002 in the Steve Christman entry. Mann, who has been sitting out this year without a ride, said it felt great to be back in the car.
“I had a little trouble getting the firesuit on though. I zipped it about halfway, and then had to suck it in a bit”.
Mann unfortunately had a tough night and did not make the transfer in the non-qualifers race.
- Other drivers turned spectators early via the non-qualifiers events included Brian Tyler, Kent Christian, Dustin Smith, A.J. Fike, Matt Westfall, and Jack Hewitt. Fike started the feature with a provisional.
- Jordan Hermansater is out from the west coast with an Indiana teammate for Indiana Sprintweek, Justin Marvel. Hermansater was probably the biggest surprise entry among the 58 cars checking in for the opening round of Sprintweek.
- Jeremy Sherman and the M&M racing team have made their way east for about a month’s worth of racing. Sherman and the M&M team normally compete with the SCRA. Sherman put on a memorable battle at Gas City several season’s ago with Dave Darland and Bill Rose. Sherman did not have as good of luck on Friday missing the show from the “B” Feature.
- After contact during the Semi Feature with Tracy Hines local favorite and doughnut spinner A.J. Anderson was unable to make the call after damaging a rear end and drive line.
- Levi Jones races his way into the feature through the semi when his car would not fire during the heat race. California driver Troy Rutherford also suffered the same fate with the Arctic Cat backup car while being pushed of for the feature event.