CHICO, Calif. — Shane Golobic walked a tightrope between needing to stand on the gas and having no brakes to win the Sprint Car Challenge Tour to open Gold Cup weekend at Silver Dollar Speedway Wednesday night.
Golobic, who started fourth, waged a wheel-to-wheel battle with Max Mitry for the runner-up spot while polesitter Chance Gasty set the pace during the opening laps.
But by lap 14, the pair took their duel to the front, with Mitry chasing Golobic, while behind them Kyle Larson was blasting up through the field from the back row after recovering from an uncharacteristic spin on the first lap.
A yellow flag for a spinning Chase Johnson set the stage for a six-lap shootout to the checkered flag with Golobic leading Mitry, Tanner Carrick and Larson, who had moved from the 24th spot by running up against the cushion in a groove that had been ignored most of the night.
On the restart, Larson again went to the outer edge of the racing groove on two consecutive laps to take over the runner-up spot as Golobic ran a more conservative inside groove to the checkered flag.
Golobic said he was too pre-occupied with trying to control the car without brakes to know that Larson was closing in.
“I knew he was back there somewhere, but the scoreboard wasn’t working so I didn’t know exactly where he was,” said Golobic, who lost his brakes early in the race when a rock knocked the brake line loose.
“Luckily, I didn’t need a lot of brake, except I had to be careful getting around lapped cars,” said Golobic, “but I was able to use the wing to slow the car down.”
Larson said that engine problems in the Paul Silva-owned car were the reason for his spin in the first turn of the first lap, which found him facing the wrong way as the entire field parted like the Red Sea to miss him. “I wasn’t sure what the throttle was going to do so I changed my arc into the corner and found myself in the slick and off the gas,” he said.
But after restarting at the back of the field, Larson found his rhythm and barreled his way around traffic to get to the top 10 in just eight laps and sixth at the halfway point before the final six-lap shootout.
“I got into a rhythm and I just needed two more laps,” said Larson. “But it’s fun coming from the back of the field.”
Mitry, Carrick and Gasty filled out the top five, with 14 of the 24 car field running at the end.
Shawn Jones led all 30 laps to claim the win in the preliminary feature for the Hunt Magneto Wingless Series.
The finish:
Shane Golobic, Kyle Larson, Max Mitry, Tanner Carrick, Chance Gasty, Joel Meyers, jr., Landon Brooks, Michael Faccinto, Tim Kaeding, Sean Becker, Chase Johnson, Ryan Robinson, Dylan Bloomfield, Luke Hayes, Andy Forsberg, Shane Hopkins, Ashlyn Rodriquez, Gauge Garcia, Steel Poswell, Isaiha Vasquez, D.J. Netto, Kalib Montgomery, Brian McGahan.