Finally, after almost two weeks of racing action at East Bay Raceway Park, the kind of track we have been hoping for developed. With a long reputation for producing highly competitive races with much passing, for the most part we have not seen that so far through four days of Modified racing and now, a couple of days of Late Model racing. However, Thursday night, February 16th brought all that to an end with a very interesting Lucas Oil Late Model race that saw four different leaders, much passing, drivers running multiple grooves and just a bit of controversy as a couple of drivers dropped "the dukes" and got aggressive.
Forty five Late Models signed in to race on Thursday with the fields now for the point shows on Friday and Saturday appearing to be established as the drivers appear to have made their final moves as to which direction they will be showing their allegiance when it comes to running for series points.
Eight drivers that raced here earlier this week have left with just about all of them heading up the road to Screven for the first World of Outlaws shows that will commence on Friday. Seven drivers also made their first appearance of the week here at East Bay with Don O'Neal, Lanigan, Zack Dohm, Flinner, Bloomquist, Davenport and Horton all turning laps for the first time here. On balance, it would appear that East Bay at the least came out even on the trade offs with the "star power" probably still held by Lucas. However, that means nothing if the racing isn't good and on this night, all events were top notch, starting right with the first heat and continuing all the way through the checkered flag in the main event.
Michael Lake and Hudson O'Neal seem have been attracted toward each other like magnets this week and once again, in their heat race they again put of a spectacular show as they battled for the race lead. Lake would get the upper hand and go on for the win but that was only one of four heats where the intensity level was through the roof. Early on, both Corey Conley and G.R. Smith had their best runs of the week and Conley would carry that on into the main event until mechanical problems ended his evening.
Is there even an event where Scott Bloomquist is entered that he doesn't end up being right in the center of controversy? He just seems to have that knack of making himself the center of everything, sometimes even when he's not trying to. Thursday he was quick qualifier for his heat but when that group rolled on to the track, guess what? No Bloomquist! The word was that his battery had failed and he couldn't get his car started. He just made it on the track before the green waved, had to start in the back and failed to transfer. He did make it through a B feature, although after starting on the pole he got dusted as both McCreadie and Davey Johnson blew past him and he barely held on for a feature spot.
He used the main event as a practice session, twice stopping for tires under yellow and with all the scrambling of positions and cars dropping out, he did end up seventh.
A driver that has been spectacular this week but has no finishes to show for it has been Kentucky's Dustin Linville. Again Thursday he attacked the cushion and made a great run to the front, only to jump that same cushion and pound the wall, effectively ending his night without a main event appearance again.
The main event saw the track turn great as it was like ice and drivers were all over the surface, trying to find the best line. Some worked well up top and others were right on the inside line while yet others were rolling through the middle. Drivers would hit their marks and move up, then turn a bad lap and lose several positions. It made for great racing as drivers would rise and fall then rise and fall again. Two of the top five finishers, Josh Richards and Jimmy Owens, were both up front early with Richards in fact leading laps and then both fell back to ten or worse before making charges back up into the top five.
There were four different leaders during the race including Richards, Lake, O'Neal and then finally McCreadie, who started all the way back in eighteenth after having to run a B.
Included in the jostling of position were two hard battles that likely will carry further on this week. Lake was trying to hold on to a top five after leading a number of laps, a situation that nearly brought the house down. However, young Michael got into turn three too hard, clipped Dennis Erb, and took both of them out of the running.
Two nearly identical looking blue cars of O'Neal and Kyle Bronson also got together but both lucked out when they were able to keep going and retain their positions while O'Neal's son Hudson was the big loser when contact during the same scrum wrecked his front end.
The yellow flew four times in the first half of the race but following the lap twenty three problem by O'Neal, the rest of the race went nonstop with McCreadie jumping up on the cushion at this point, going from third to first and then pulling away from the field as no one could master the top side to equal him. Owens finally got rolling with his best finish of the week and David Breazeale impressed with his first top five.
The best official of Speedweeks here so far has been starter Ronnie Lucock. Coming out of retirement to do this series, the seventy seven year old still has plenty of spirit and he really gets excited on the flagstand, putting on a show that many other starters would be wise to emulate. Many forget they are part of the show and a little flair and flash never hurt anyone, as long as they still competently do their job, which Ronnie excels at. Plus, he seems to have a good sense of humor as series announcer James Essex likes to throw a few barbs his way.
Speaking of Essex, he has been more than frustrated all week with the remote microphones that just don't seem to ever work, thus making his job of trying to interview the race winners more of a task than a fun experience. Plus, many of the drivers get so soft spoken when they are interviewed; they need to speak up louder. East Bay Raceway Park is looking a little "long in the tooth" in many regards such as their sound system. For instance, the burned out lights on the scoreboard are the same ones that were burned out last year too! However, much of that can be forgiven if they can consistently produce a racing surface to match Thursday's.
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