By Starks Racing PR
Puyallup, Wash. — Sept. 18, 2012 — When a driver and team find a combination that works at a particular track, they try to stick to it as best as they can and ride the wave of momentum for as long as they can. Following a win on Sept. 8 at Grays Harbor Raceway in his home state of Washington, Trey Starks returned to the three-eighths-mile this past Saturday night, and earned another podium finish, as he came home third.
The native of Puyallup, Wash., started the 30-lap A-Feature on the pole and led the first lap, before JJ Hickle, who started second, took the point. Starks ran second for the next 13 laps, before veteran and multi-time Grays Harbor winner Henry Van Dam got around him for the runner-up spot. Starks would settle into third and remained in that position for the balance of the main event, en route to earning his third Top-Three finish of the season at Grays Harbor and eighth overall appearance on the podium in 2012 across a wide array of 360- and 410-sprint car races.
Starks opened the night by turning a lap of 13.255-seconds, which put him fifth on the timesheet. He was scheduled to start second in the second 10-lap heat race, but was forced to miss that contest after trouble with one of the spark plugs prevented the car from firing. With an inversion and time trials times being used to set the grid for the main event, the 16-year-old found himself on the pole for the 30-lap contest.
“It was a decent finish,” said Starks. “After taking the lead on the opening lap, I didn’t cover up after I got by the leader (JJ Hickle) and he got right back by me. That was kind of a rookie mistake on my part. We learned a few things and we’ll keep working hard and be ready for this weekend when we go to Yakima.”
The third-generation driver has four Top-10 showings in a 360-sprint car at Grays Harbor this season, with three of those being podium finishes. In his first career 410-sprint car start at Grays Harbor with the World of Outlaws on Aug. 29, Starks finished 12th against a very solid field of cars.
Starks has competed on six three-eighths-mile tracks this season, including a pair in the Midwest with the World of Outlaws. Both of his victories this season have come on tracks that size, including on April 7 at Kings Speedway in Hanford, Calif., and Sept. 8 at Grays Harbor.
“We’ve gotten some good experience this year on three-eighths-miles, especially with the Outlaws, and I think what I’ve learned in a lot of those races has really helped when I come back and race at Grays Harbor,” noted Starks. “Racing with the Outlaws at Grays Harbor helped us quite a bit as well, and we tried some things in that event that have helped us in the last two races we have run there.”
Starks will return to action this week on Friday, Sept. 21 and Saturday, Sept. 22 in the Championship Weekend sanctioned by the ASCS Northwest Region at the Yakima Dirt Track in Yakima, Wash. Last season in the two-night event, he finished fourth in the opener and was seventh in the finale at the track located at the Central Washington State Fair Raceway, which traditionally draws one of the strong fields of the year in the state of Washington.
“Yakima is one of my favorite tracks,” he shared. “A lot of the guys that only run there once a year stick to the bottom of the track and I am kind of the lone wolf that goes up to the top and I’ve been able to make the top work the last couple of years when we’ve raced there. Hopefully we can use that to our advantage again this year, as well as some of things we learned racing in the Midwest this summer.”
Trey Starks and Starks Racing would like to thank their valued partners: BR Motorsports, FX Signs, King Racing Products, Masco Petroleum, Northwest Powerdercoating & Sandblasting, Starks Timber Processing and T&C Concepts.
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