By Jeff Bonilla, Mark Funderburk Racing photos.
06/08/11 – It was back to Beaver Dam Raceway for Bill Balog & the B Squared Motorsports team this past Saturday, & they were determined for a better night after the first show at the Beaver Dam facility ended with a flip while battling for the lead.
The night started with Bill going out 2nd of the 31 cars in qualifying & he would turn a lap time of 12.625 seconds which would end being 14th quick after all 31 cars finished. By virtue of the qualifying effort, Bill would line the HRP Wings 17B outside the front row for the heat race. Once the race went green, Bill jumped out to a quick lead & would go on to open up a half track lead before claiming the 10 lap event.
The 30 lap Feature was the final event of the night & Bill once again lined up outside the front row. As the field took the green, Bill fell to 2nd, but only for ¾’s of a lap as Bill took the lead in turn #4 of the first lap & he began to open up a sizable lead before the 1st caution came out. On the ensuing restart, Bill once again began to open up a large lead & quickly found himself in lapped traffic which is when the 2nd place car was able to close the gap on Bill & the 2 would have a great battle over the next few laps before Bill would once again open a sizable lead. The race stayed green until lap 28, when the final caution came out, at this point Bill had managed to put a few lapped cars between himself & the 2nd place car, but with IRA rules stating with less than 5 laps remaining in the feature all lapped cars move to the tail. So the all the top running cars were lined up nose to tail with 2 laps remaining, on the restart Bill was briefly passed for the lead in turn 1 before he reclaimed it coming out of turn 2 & he would go on to claim his 2nd IRA feature win of the 2011 season & 17th of his IRA career.
Bill & the team will be back in action with the IRA this Saturday at Deer Creek Speedway in Spring Valley, MN & Sunday at Eagle Valley Speedway in Jim Falls, WI.
To keep up on all the latest news regarding the team be sure to visit the team website at www.b2motorsports.com. You can also follow the team on Facebook at www.facebook.com/bsquaredmotorsports or on Twitter at www.twitter.com/bsqdmotorsports.
Sponsorship for the 2011 season comes from the following companies: Buesser Concrete, Hoeft Builders, Hepfner Racing Products & HRP Wings, Diversified Machine Inc., XYZ Machining Inc., Allstar Performance, K&N Engineering, Astro Titanium, Super Shox, BLZ, FK Rod Ends, B Squared Visual Solutions, Weld Racing, Outerwears Inc., Race Gear X, Gleason Racing Equipment, Maxim Chassis, Competition Driveline, Saldana Racing Products, Fibrestar Industries, and A&E Collision and Service.