From Jak
Brisbane, AU — Todd Wanless continued his stellar season of oval track racing with victory in Round 9 of the KRE Race Engines Sprintcar Track Championship at Titan Garages Brisbane International Speedway (BIS) on Saturday night, his third win of the Championship and his twelfth Feature win of the season across Winged Sprintcar, Midget and Non-Wing Sprintcar racing. Cameron Gessner finished second ahead of Pete Thorley, Terry Bracken and Darrell Hodges with Series leader Andrew Scheuerle sixth.
While Wanless was a clear winner in the night’s thirty lap A-Main, leading every lap of the event after winning the start over Terry Bracken, the results of the second and third place finishers were clouded in controversy following a last lap incident that involved a number of cars in turn four as Wanless passed under the chequers to claim victory.
Wanless’ ABC Auto Gear Racing team mate Pete Thorley was seemingly about to make it a one-two for the team after holding off numerous challenges from last-start BIS winner Cameron Gessner when the incident towards the tail of the field left Peter Lack rolling to a stop exiting turn four right in front of Thorley. Thorley’s evasive action in turn opened up an opportunity for Gessner and the two scrambled their way to the flag with Thorley wheel-standing his way across the line.
Two issues gave the Stewards plenty to think about as they started the process of sorting out the results, the first being the question of at what point did the yellow lights come on – before or after Gessner and Thorley crossed the line – and second, the timing system failed to score Thorley as completing lap thirty. The Stewards initially ruled and announced Gessner as finishing second according to the timing system, and then deliberated further before supporting their original decision.
Regardless of the questions surrounding the finish, Thorley, Hodges and Wanless will have all made ground on Andrew Scheuerle in the Championship standings and with six Rounds remaining, the chase will come down to these four.
The hard luck story of the race though would have to be Danny Reidy, who after winning the Dash in convincing fashion looked to be about to turn some good runs of late at BIS into an overdue win. Always a tough competitor and a hard man to catch with the wind in his face, Reidy cut a left rear tyre in turn one on the first start and was forced to the tail after changing the tyre under a yellow. With a number of attempts to get the race under way, Reidy would eventually join Melissa Boyes, Matt Butler, Kevin Titman, Ricky Mitchell and Brent Kratzmann on the infield before a lap was finally completed.
Round 9 of the Championship belonged to Wanless though, a very quick 11.368s lap in group qualifying ahead of Gessner’s 11.529s effort the catalyst for his Feature win later in the night. BIS Promoter John Kelly served up a fast track for the qualifying sessions, with the first sixteen cars under the twelve second mark and the first twenty-five within a second of Wanless’ time.
In other racing on the night, Jason Dreaver won the Race Basics AMCA Nationals Feature from Dallas Czerwinski and Andrew Robinson, Natalie Peacock held out Sam Roza and Tim Smith to win the BIS ASCF Junior Sedan Track Championship Feature race and Michael Pronger won the Formula 500 Feature from Kristin Brown and newly crowned Victorian Champion Charlie Brown.
The next event at Titan Garages Brisbane International Speedway is Saturday night April 2 featuring the Polar Ice Qld Midget Car Series, Ian Boettcher Proton Super Sedan Series, Lightning Sprints, Compact Speedcars, Sigmas, BIS Sedans and Outlaw Sedans.