OHSWEKEN, Ontario – Dave Bailey earned $2,000 for winning the 50-lap Thunder Stocks main event Friday night at Ohsweken Speedway.
Jeff Roelofs and Derek Liverance brought the field of Middleport Mechanical Thunder Stocks to the green flag for the 50-lap and $2,000 to win Gale’s Cash Blast. Roelofs jumped out to the early lead, but was quickly under siege from Mark Bazuin and Ryan Dinning. By lap four, 18th-starting Dave Bailey was up to fourth and two laps later the reigning champion and current point leader had taken the lead over Dinning, Bazuin and Ken Sargent.
The first caution of the race came with nine laps complete when Lee Winger and Mike Thorne tangled in turn three. On the restart, Bailey chose the outside lane with Dinning restarting to his inside. That decision did not pay off as Dinning jumped ahead to lead lap 10.
Behind the top four, four cars battled side-by-side for fifth until the second yellow flag for a spun Kyle Andress in turn two. Dinning led again when the green flag waved with his teammate Ken Sargent challenging Bailey for the second spot in the inside lane.
Following another restart on lap 13, Dinning and Bailey battled side-by-side for the lead until Bailey used the outside lane to emerge the leader on lap 17. Dinning stayed close though as the leaders worked into some slower traffic on lap 21.
Following a lap 23 restart, Dinning initially jumped out to an advantage, but Bailey fought back to retake the lead. By lap 30, Bailey had opened a considerable half straightaway lead and 10 laps later it grew to nearly a full straightaway over Logan Shwedyk who had slowly worked his way through the field and past Dinning into second.
With three laps to go, Bailey worked past 10th and 11th-place runners Donny Lampman and Mike Thorne while maintaining his straightaway advantage to score the $2,000 win over Shwedyk, Dinning, Sargent and Trevor DeBoer.
Jared Horstman and Mack DeMan started on the front row for the 20-lap Kool Kidz-Corr/Pak 360 Sprint Car feature. DeMan jumped out to an early lead as Horstman struggled to find the handle on the opening lap. Fourth-starting Matt Farnham also made his presence felt alongside second starting Dylan Westbrook.
As DeMan led, Westbrook moved into second with Farnham in third, Mitch Brown in fourth and Horstman rounded out the top-five. On the ensuing restart, a bit of contact in turn two bunched up the field and resulted in Jake Brown spinning across the track and slowly rolling upside down to bring out the red flag. Jake Brown was uninjured.
On the restart, DeMan and Westbrook battled hard for the lead with the two drivers briefly exchanging the lead, but DeMan stayed up front. Before lap six could be completed, Brian Nanticoke made contact with Aaron Turkey in turn four after the latter made contact with the outside wall. The contact led to a second red flag and a restart with five laps completed.
DeMan continued to lead on the restart until he worked into lapped traffic on lap nine which allowed Westbrook to gain on DeMan. By lap 11, Westbrook caught DeMan and passed him at the line just as Mitch Brown spun in turn one to bring out the yellow with Jim Huppunen and Derek Jonathan spinning to avoid. On the ensuing restart, Westbrook took the lead from DeMan while Cory Turner raced into third.
The race ran green for three laps until another red flag on lap 16 when Horstman went hard into the turn three fence. He was okay, but his car was destroyed. One lap following the restart, Turner jumped to second past DeMan just before Huppunen got over the berm in turn three and hit the wall, which ended his night.
The ensuing restart led to more chaos as Scott Kreutter hit the inside wall and broke the left front on his car. As he tried to slow the car and take it to the infield, Jamie Turner was collected and made contact that led to a slow roll and another red flag.
On the lap 17 restart with three laps to go, Westbrook jumped out to a commanding lead and DeMan got back by Turner for second with two laps to go. Farnham scored a fourth-place finish and Ryan Turner claimed a fifth-place result.
Other winners Friday at Ohsweken included D.J. Christie, who claimed his first victory in Strickland’s Brantford Chevrolet Crate Sprint Car class, and Jonathan Ayrton, who was also a first time winner in the HRW Automotive Mini Stock feature.