TULSA, Okla. — Opening the 38th annual Chili Bowl Nationals powered by NOS Energy with a bang, California’s Tanner Carrick held off the challenges of Shane Golobic to win Monday’s Cummins Qualifying Night.
The second time Carrick has topped the Monday opener, the win by the No. 98 is the 35th at Tulsa Expo Raceway clay for car owner Keith Kunz.
Carrick started his trek to the front from fourth position, while Cannon McIntosh bolted to the point at the start.
“It was me just finding the racetrack and getting up where I needed to be,” Carrick said. “The car was there the whole time. I just made a couple of mistakes the first three or four laps, and I fell back to like fifth and was almost racing for sixth at one point, but once I got to the top and the track cleared up, I just got some momentum going.”
Into second on lap five, Carrick began closing the gap on the lead before a caution on lap 10. Using the restart to challenge, caution lights shown again on lap 12. Shooting to third prior to the caution, Shane Golobic served a penalty for advancing before the cone on the previous restart, moving him back to fifth.
On a mission, as green lights flashed on, Shane went to work as Tanner stalked Cannon’s every move. Building momentum into the 14th lap, Carrick pulled the trigger on the slide job to take over the top spot.
A near non-stop battle for the final transfer, Golobic rebounded to the runner-up spot with a slide on McIntosh on lap 20. In pursuit of the lead, a restart on lap 24 saw a shot from Golobic, but could not make the slide stick. Regrouping, one last try at the white flag would fall short as Carrick claimed victory by .505 seconds.
Golobic, in second, will start his 11th championship A-Feature on Saturday. Heavy in the mix for the final transfer spot, New Zealand’s Michael Pickens ended up third, with Chase Briscoe rolling 12th to fourth. Chris Windom clawed his way to fifth from 15th.
McIntosh was shuffled to sixth.
A field of 68 out of 72 entrants took part in Monday’s Cummins Qualifying Night. Another 74 are on the docket for Tuesday’s Warren CAT Qualifying Night.
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 98-Tanner Carrick[4]; 2. 17W-Shane Golobic[6]; 3. 59-Michael Pickens[5]; 4. 5-Chase Briscoe[12]; 5. 89-Chris Windom[15]; 6. 71P-Cannon McIntosh[1]; 7. 32T-Trey Marcham[8]; 8. 51B-Joe B Miller[20]; 9. 2H-Nick Hoffman[9]; 10. 32W-Gary Taylor[7]; 11. 93-Kyle Bellm[10]; 12. 19B-Cole Bodine[23]; 13. 7P-Kris Carroll[21]; 14. 41X-Howard Moore[13]; 15. 8-Alex Sewell[22]; 16. 27-Keith Rauch[18]; 17. 25-Jacob Denney[2]; 18. 55T-Trevor Cline[16]; 19. 75-Mario Clouser[17]; 20. 9-Emilio Hoover[3]; 21. 25K-Taylor Reimer[14]; 22. 20G-Noah Gass[24]; 23. (DNF) 2W-AJ Hopkins[11]; 24. (DNF) 6A-Ricky Lewis[19]