By T.J. Buffenbarger
Knoxville, IA – (August 9, 2013) – Brooke Tatnell became the first winner of the Speed Sport World Challenge to earn a starting spot in Saturday night’s Knoxville Nationals A-Feature. Originally slated to be in the C-Main after Friday night’s feature, Tatnell took the lead from Jason Johnson with eight laps to go and held on for the victory. The win was sweet for Tatnell who has run at Knoxville this season with a smaller team.
The starting spot in Saturday’s A-Main was a bonus, but winning this particular event at Knoxville had more importance to the driver born in Australia and now living in Minnesota.
“It didn’t change anything for me. Yes I knew it was available and it was very important to win,” said Tatnell. “ Just the significance of this race of what Roger Johnson and Kele and Associations did 19 years ago with the inception of this race for what it’s done for bringing Australian’s to the Knoxville Nationals, both spectators and racers, and vice versa the awareness it has given American race fans and drivers about going to the Warrnambool Classic. (Australia’s) version of the Knoxville Nationals that is as good as the Knoxville Nationals and is as tough to win or almost a little tougher just because of the format we have there. So to me it’s always going to be special to win this race. I wouldn’t be racing here today if it wasn’t for what Roger Johnson did for me in the past giving me opportunities when I thought there were none left. The World Challenge will always be important to me and the starting spot is not going to make me drive any harder, it just added a bigger pot at the end of the rainbow.”
Jason Johnson jumped out into the early lead with Tatnell in second. After a caution two laps into the event for Canadian driver Thomas Kennedy stopping on the front stretch Johnson continued to lead while Tatnell stayed right behind him. Ian Madsen and Tim Kaeding racing behind Johnson and Tatnell allowed them to separate from the rest of the field. Tatnell patiently waited for his spot and took it with eight laps to go driving around Johnson for the lead.
“You just have to be patent. If you put a slider on him, you have just washed away most of your momentum. If the guy doesn’t lose too much momentum he is going to do it right back to you. So you have to short cut a little bit, not kill your momentum too much, and it was a matter of taking deep breaths and keeping myself calm, said Tatnell. “This year we haven’t been in position to outrun some of the best in the business and it was just a matter of staying calm, collected, keeping your thoughts.”
With four laps to go Tim Kaeding passed Johnson for second and tried running down Tatnell, but ran out of time as Tatnell took the victory and the 25th starting position in Saturday night’s A-Feature. Tim Kaeding, Daryn Pittman, Jason Johnson, and Donny Schatz rounded out the top five.
53rd Annual FVP Knoxville Nationals
Speed Sport World Challenge
Knoxville Raceway – Knoxville, IA
Friday August 9, 2013
NSSN World Challenge (24 Laps): 1. Brooke Tatnell, 2. Tim Kaeding, 3. Daryn Pittman, 4. Jason Johnson, 5. Donny Schatz, 6. Rico Abreu, 7. Ian Madsen, 8. Shane Stewart, 9. Wayne Johnson, 10. Terry McCarl, 11. Kerry Madsen, 12. Jaems McFadden, 13. Kevin Swindell, 14. David Gravel, 15. Jason Sides, 16. Lynton Jeffery, 17. Danny Dietrich, 18. Paul Morris, 19. Jonathan Allard, 20. Tim Shaffer, 21. Danny Smith, 22. Bill Rose, 23. Glenn Saville, 24. Jack Dover, 25. Thomas Kennedy.