Lonnie Wheatley
CLUTE, Texas (August 9, 2019) – When the green flag flies upon Saturday night’s 50-lap 59th Annual Knoxville Nationals championship finale, Clute, Texas native Aaron Reutzel will be leading the charge aboard the Baughman-Reutzel Motorsports No. 87 Sprint Car.
Reutzel earned the pole position for Saturday night’s $150,000-to-win spectacle by way of a stellar qualifying night on Wednesday that netted him the most event points among the field of 109 competitors.
And the defending All Star Circuit of Champions titlist and current points leader knows that there is still room for improvement with the Folkens Brothers Trucking/Dissolvalloy Downhole Revolution Triple-X Sprint Car.
“We knew we were in pretty good shape points wise after qualifying and the heat, so we tried a few things in the feature,” Reutzel explains. “They didn’t really work, we were actually pretty bad in the feature. But we learned what we needed to and have a good idea of what to go back to for Saturday night.”
What didn’t work that well was still good enough for Reutzel to race to a fifth-place finish in Wednesday’s feature atop the ½-mile Knoxville Raceway clay oval aboard the Precision Catalyst/Hollywood Blasting & Coating/Beard Equipment machine.
That along with a qualifying effort that ranked as second-best on the night and then a rousing rally from eighth to second in heat race action was enough to put the BRM No. 87 atop the point charts and on the pole for Saturday’s feature.
It comes just one week after Reutzel posted another top-five finish in Knoxville 360 Nationals competition aboard the Nattress Construction/Momentum Racing Suspensions machine.
Reutzel raced to a runner-up finish in his Thursday night preliminary before posting a fourth-place run in the Saturday night finale.
“We had a really good car, we learned some things that are helping us out this week,” Reutzel says. “I just got a bad start and lost a few spots. We worked back up there, but there was a lot of lapped traffic and it seemed like every time I had a chance to make a move that there was a lapped car that I had to check up for. We were good though; we were happy with it.”
While tens of thousands of fans in Knoxville and even more watch online on www.dirtvision.com on Saturday night, the citizens of Clute, TX, will be on high alert as Reutzel leads the way to the green flag at the Knoxville Nationals. He’ll be vying to keep the BRM No. 87 out front and the first one to the checkered flag at the end of 50 laps.
2019 Quick Stats: 56 races, 8 wins, 24 top-fives, 34 top-tens.
Next Up: Knoxville Nationals Finale on Saturday night at Knoxville (IA) Raceway. Those unable to be there in person can catch all the action live via PPV at www.dirtvision.com.
Keep Track: Keep track of Aaron Reutzel’s on-track action including schedule and results at http://www.aaronreutzelracing.com/, on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Aaron-Reutzel-Racing/117666254913127 or on Twitter at @AaronReutzel. You can also e-mail Aaron at aaronreutzel@yahoo.com.
If you would like Aaron Reutzel Racing press releases e-mailed directly to you, send your e-mail address to Lonnie Wheatley at lonniewheatley@gmail.com.
Penning the recurring series of “The Wheatley Chronicles” articles on www.sprintcarmania.com, Lonnie Wheatley provides media, public relations and more for select tracks, drivers and events. For more information, Wheatley may be contacted at lonniewheatley@gmail.com.