By Susan Arnold
LAKE ODESSA, Mich. (June 1, 2013) – Whenever Joey Saldana sets four sprint car wheels down on the I-96 Speedway 3/8- mile dirt oval he takes a drive down memory lane.
This is the track where he scored his first of 83 World of Outlaws career victories. Win No. 1 occurred in 1995, which was also the inaugural Outlaws event at this facility.
Saldana, driver of the Motter Equipment Fatheadz Eyewear 71M, qualified tenth (15.133 seconds) for tonight’s NAPA Auto Parts Rumble. The Brownsburg Bullet saw his existing track record of 14.834 seconds eclipsed by No. 1 qualifier Paul McMahan’s 14.731-second lap.
After applying the Outlaws formula for the heat race inversions, Saldana rolled off on the pole of the first heat race. On lap one, second place starter Donny Schatz took the lead and led wire to wire. Saldana was a strong second, holding off a late charge by Paul McMahan.
Earning a starting berth in the dash, after the inversion draw, Saldana was eighth on the starting grid and gained one position in the six-lap event to finish seventh
Outlaws officials picked up the pace of the evening turning the dash competitors around quickly to run the A-Main before nearby rain made its way to the race track.
Saldana was the seventh starter in the A-Main. When the green flag flew, Saldana began to pick off the competitors in front of him, sometimes going double-wide, but driving and hunting with a dog-with-a-bone-persistence until he worked his way up to a third-place finish in the feature. Three yellow flags slowed the action, but the rain held off until the top three made their way to victory lane ceremonies. The race was won by Paul McMahan and Donny Schatz was second.
“We’re happy to be in the top three tonight,” said Saldana. “We hit a rough patch recently but it’s nice to see that we’re making improvements. We knew we had the speed. We just had to harness it and get the set-up going in the right direction.”
Besides celebrating a top-three finish at I-96, Saldana and wife Shannon were proud of their 9-year old son, Reece, who made a great catch, hit his first home run, and was named player of the game on his little league baseball team today. High fives and big smiles all around.
Next on the schedule for the World of Outlaws is a Wednesday night event (June 5) at Kokomo (Ind.) Speedway.