FAIRBURY, Ill. — History continues to follow Shannon Babb. Fairbury Speedway was the scene of the latest chapter in his history-making campaign Saturday night with the DIRTcar Summer Nationals.
Babb fended off Tanner English in a thrilling battle to secure win No. 104 of his illustrious career with the Hell Tour, leading all but three laps of the main event to score the $10,000 check and his second win in the first three series events.
The battle for the lead started right away, as Babb and English battled side-by-side for nearly all of the first six laps. English led the first three laps before Babb was able to clear the No. 96 on Lap 4.
Babb held strong out front through the first half of the 50-lap grind. But then came a restart on Lap 26 where Babb bobbled on the cushion in turn two, allowing English to get to his inside. Despite the slip, Babb continued to rip the cushion and was able to recover with a deep dive into Turns 3 and 4 to maintain the top spot.
A caution on Lap 30 brought English right back in contention for the lead as he took advantage of another Babb bobble on the cushion to pull even. However, Babb still retained the lead with his top side momentum.
Cautions on Lap 35 and Lap 42 gave English more opportunities to pounce but the Benton, KY-racer was unable to find enough momentum around the inside of the track to clear Babb, who was relentless on the top.
Babb continued to pound the cushion around Fairbury and led the field back to the checkered flag ahead of English, Chris Simpson in third, Ryan Unzicker up 18 spots to finish fourth and Jason Feger completing the top five.
“Some days it goes your ways and other days it doesn’t, but we’re really blessed to be having things go our way,” Babb said of his hot start to Week 1 on tour. “I feel like we’ve always been capable of doing it if we could ever hit on the right setup and we’ve had some really good friends help us point us in the right direction and we’ve got some really good sponsors behind it.”
The finish:
Feature (50 Laps): 1. 18-Shannon Babb[3]; 2. 96-Tanner English[1]; 3. 32S-Chris Simpson[9]; 4. 24-Ryan Unzicker[22]; 5. 25-Jason Feger[6]; 6. 75A-Daniel Adam[21]; 7. 42W-Mckay Wenger[2]; 8. 99JR-Frank Heckenast Jr[10]; 9. 15-Clay Stuckey[12]; 10. 09-Michael Leach[15]; 11. 10J-Jordan Bauer[18]; 12. 4G-Bob Gardner[7]; 13. 21B-Rich Bell[24]; 14. 8-Matthew Larson[14]; 15. 22M-Sean Mattingly[19]; 16. Z61-Alex Wilson[23]; 17. 31M-Tyler Millwood[5]; 18. 74-Mitch McGrath[13]; 19. 1W-Donny Walden[8]; 20. 3S-Brian Shirley[4]; 21. 33-Mike Harrison[16]; 22. B12-Kevin Weaver[17]; 23. 89-Mike Spatola[11]; 24. T2-Brayton Wallace[20]
