From Bryan Gapinski
Belleville, KS — (August 3, 2012) — Jerry Coons Jr. won the“Prelude to the Belleville Midget Nationals” 25-lap feature, Thursday Night on the quarter-mile dirt oval inside the Belleville High Banks. The event marked the first ever midget race on the track.
After setting fast time, Coons started from the pole position and quickly jumped into lead at the start. The events only caution appeared on the third lap for a stalled car. On the restart Coons began slowly increasing his lead over Darren Hagen and Zach Daum. Close action racing occured behind Coons for all positions. Coons held at 1.6 second lead at the midway point, and increased the advantage to two seconds, with ten laps remaining.
Coons began lapping sower cars with six laps remaining. On Lap 22 Daum passed Hagen for second place. Coons driving the Joe Dooling owned Spike/Ford-Esslinger No. 63 finished 2.38 seconds ahead of Daum, Hagen, Brad Kuhn and Rico Abreu.
“It was a racy track, the car was perfect, I cant wait till we run the big track tomorrow night” commented Coons.
Several car owners opted to “save” their equipment for Friday Night when actions switches to the half-mile track, as a full field is excepted to compete for starting positions in Saturday Night Championship Feature. Blake McMillian topped Wyatt Burks and Curtis Spicer to win the JayHusker 600 Micro Series non wing feature, while Jake Galusha finished ahead of Shon Pointer and Chad McWirither in the Winged feature.
SUMMARY
Qualifications: 1. Jerry Coons Jr., Dooling#63-12.182; 2. Darren Hagen, RFMS#3-12.285; 3. Chris Windom, Wilke-PAK#5-12.360; 4. Zach Daum, Daum#5-12.442; 5. Casey Shuman, Lein#2-12.503; 6. C.J. Johnson, Martin#45-12.558; 7. Brad Kuhn,
RW#17-12.589; 8. Chet Gehrke, Mattson#11-12.655; 9. Terry Goodwin, Goodwin#2-12.850; 10. Randy Boyer, Boyer#69-12.882; 11. Rico Abreu, Kunz#67-13.037; 12. Vance Lein, Lein#7-13.234; 13. Jeff Stasa, Stasa#91-13.377; 14.Patrick Stasa, Stasa#19-15.035.
10-lap Heat Race#1: Daum, Hagen, Johnson, Gehrke, Lein, Boyer, P. Stasa.
10-lap Heat Race#2: Abreu, Coons, Kuhn, Windom, Goodwin, J. Stasa, Shuman.
25-lap Feature: 1. Jerry Coons Jr.; 2. Zach Daum; 3. Darren Hagen; 4. Brad Kuhn; 5. Rico Abreu; 6. Chet Gehrke; 7. C.J. Johnson; 8. Terry Goodwin; 9. Randy Boyer; 10. Chris Windom; 11. Jeff Stasa; 12. Vance Lein; 13. Casey Shuman.
Feature Lap Leaders: Coons 1-25.
*Goodwin flipped during practice, uninjuried.