By Troy Hennig
CHICO, CALIFORNIA (March 29, 2013) – The Wells Fargo Friday night point championship season kicked off Friday might, March 29th, with five racing divisions and over 1300 fans packed into the grandstands. Not even a special appearance from the Easter Bunny was going to slow Medford, Oregon’s Roger Crockett from continuing his hot streak at Chico. Crockett won the Silver Cup Main event on March 9th, finished fifth with the World of Outlaws at the Mini Gold Cup and tonight led all 25-laps for the wire-to-wire victory. Even though he has been critical of the speedway’s surface, there must be something that is clicking this year for Crockett and his team. Crockett now has 18 career wins at Chico tying him with the legendary Wayne Sue for 11th on the all-times win list.
The track never quite came in throughout the night of racing and left the competitors with a narrow, fast surface that didn’t allow for much passing. Shadowing Crockett all race long was defending champion Sean Becker. While Becker was able to close on Crockett in slower traffic, “the shark” never was able to put himself into a position to make the pass. Fourth place starting Willie Croft enjoyed a nice night will putting the Tri-C Machine #3c on the podium with a third place finish. Auburn’s Andy Forsberg ran fourth while Mason Moore came home in fifth.
The Tyler Wolf Fast Time Award went to Forsberg with a lap of 12.430. For the lap, Forsberg received the $100 bonus provided by the Wolf family.
On this night we said goodbye to our 2011 champion Tyler Wolf. The family and friends of Wolf were able to get the #19 onto the track and allow Keith Bloom the chance to race. Bloom, along with Michael Tarter, conducted the Memorial laps for Wolf. Bloom went on the start 18th in the main event and charged his way to a ninth place finish. Bloom passed the most cars during the night earning him the Stephen Allard award for the hard charger of the night.
Bud Walberg won the first 8-lap heat race. Two-time track champion Jason York won the second heat. Becker started outside the front row of heat three and wins the eight lap race.
The 410 sprints will take the next two weekends off and return for the second point race of the year on April 19th.
Full results at www.silverdollarspeedway.com.