Saturday night, March 18th was night number two of the Spring Chiller at the Tulsa Speedway. Saturday night's program would see the Factory Stocks settle things with a two grand to win main event along with a second full show of the weekend for the Tuners and with a last minute schedule change during the week, also racing would be the OCRS Sprint Cars in a full show also.
The event name was more than appropriate for this weekend's racing as conditions were very cold and I could only use the word brutal to describe Saturday night's weather conditions. After a Saturday where the actual temperatures struggled to get above forty degrees, as soon as the sun set so also did the temperatures plummet. By the time the final checkered waved for the night, the actual temperature was down to thirty two degrees and the "feels like" temperature was much lower indeed as a strong wind refuses to lay down and of course, that wind was blowing directly into the spectator grandstand.
Not surprisingly, the spectator attendance was a bit on the sparse side. There did appear to be more people on hand Saturday than Friday although most seemed to be either Sprint fans or associated with the Sprint Cars as only when they appeared on the track did the grandstands start to fill up some. The Factory Stocks did seem to be too much of an attraction for the general fans and quite frankly, with the long and drawn out portion of their program both nights, they certainly didn't put their best foot forward if they were trying to attract new fans.
Track management wisely moved up the starting time for Saturday's show with the cold temperatures predicted and the first green flag would fly at about a quarter to seven. With this being a special for the Factory Stocks, their field of cars, which numbered the largest of any for the weekend, would see a pair of B Features qualifying the rest of the starters for the thirty lap main event. Twenty five cars would start the finale. Approximately a dozen cars would start each B Feature with six moving on to the main. And these races would prove to be "time suckers" as in order to get two fifteen lap races completed, we would see the yellow waved thirteen times as repeated spins and crashes would mar both races.
It was a shame that the same pattern would hold for the thirty lap main as there was the potential for some good racing to take place and indeed we would see a good battle for the lead that would continue for most of the race. However, the yellow would wave a mind boggling eleven times during that thirty laps and the longest stretch of green flag racing would be for six laps during the mid laps of the event.
There would be three different leaders during the first six laps of the feature but there would also be four yellows. Donnie Wright was the initial leader of the race but would be passed just one lap later by Stephen Torrez. Early yellows really shuffled the running order but the driver to watch was Dalton Garrison who had started fourteenth.
The track was quite different on Saturday than it had been for Friday night's action with it being smoother but more significantly, much drier with many of these slick tired Factory Stocks scratching for traction and hugging the tires on the corners.
However, Garrison was different as he drove his car high around the banking and found success as he passed a number of cars early. By lap four he was up to fifth and following yet another slow down, he jumped to the top side again and proceeded to drive around both of the front rows of cars and into the lead with a remarkable gain of positions. Moving into second place was Matt Norwood and these two would be the show the rest of the race.
From the point that Garrison would take over the lead, he would have to withstand seven slowdowns for a variety of spins and crashes but always he had Norwood close behind. In the later stages of the race, Garrison would start to lose a little momentum running the top shelf and Norwood nearly slipped past him a couple times. However, Garrison wisely adjusted his line and went to the low groove, forcing Norwood to make an outside pass if he wanted the lead.
The last five lap sprint to the finish would see Garrison protect the low line and Norwood not able to find a way past as they would finish in that order. Norwood had survived an early race incident when then leader Wright spun and hid car launched Norwood high into the air but he was lucky in that no damage resulted. Robert Scott would finish third. According to Operations Manager Nathan Hager, this would be the largest purse the Factory Stocks had ever raced for in Northeast Oklahoma and his prediction that forty cars would be on hand would be very close to the number that actually raced. Eight cars didn't finish the race and all seventeen still running were on the lead lap, at least partially because they never strung enough laps together for anyone to fall back that far.
This would be my first time to see the OCRS(Oil Capital Racing Series) Sprint Cars in person. I did find out that this series has rules where the cars are running 360 motors but are running two barrel carburetors and not fuel injection. They also allow the 305 RaceSaver Sprints to run with them but I don't think there were any 305's here on Saturday. They had a very nice turnout of cars with twenty nine of them signing in to race with drivers as far as from Forth Worth on hand. They would not qualify but instead draw and then use passing points to set the feature lineup. They would have four heats and a B Feature to set the feature field with twenty cars starting the main.
Racing for fifteen hundred bucks to the victor, there would be plenty of enmity on display before this race was completed. Terry Easum would start on the pole and take the early lead. Fred Mattox would move into second and at the halfway point, Johnny Kent was third.
Just past halfway and things would get wild. Easum was having trouble with a lapped car as they shared the same lane on the track and Easum couldn't get past him. He quickly lost his fairly comfortable lead with Mattox closing in rapidly. Just as Easum got beside the lapped car in an attempt to pass, Mattox would make a bold(and some might say foolhardy) move as he dove low into turn three, trying to squeeze under both the lapped car and leader Easum. As you might guess, it didn't go well with Mattox slamming the slower car up the track where that machine then slid into leader Easum, spinning him out.
Since Mattox didn't stop, he would assume the lead for the restart with some boos from the crowd waffling in the breeze. The green would no more than come back out when a couple of other cars got together so hard that the top wing was torn off the car of Zach Chappell. Zach responded by giving a "double bird" to that driver as they idled around the track under yellow before Chappell's car was hauled off the track.
The rest of the race would see Mattox continue to hold the lead and he wouldn't be challenged as he drove home for the win over Kent and Lane Goodman. Easum would "buzz" Mattox after the checkered waved and tap on his bumper but it didn't seem to bother Mattox, who didn't seem too sorry in his victory lane comments, even when the boo birds took flight once again.
The Tuners were a bit "deTuned" on Saturday as only four of them would return for the show. They would run their feature nonstop with last night's flat tire victim Alex Scarlett leading from start to finish over Dylan Whitley and Friday night winner Nikk Sands.
The Dwarf Cars were also racing and their ten car feature was topped by Paul York. Tulsa Speedway has a lot of big races on their schedule for the rest of the 2023 season and if you happen to be in the Tulsa area, check out what they have going on. Thanks to all the track workers for doing their jobs on what had to have been a rather uncomfortable weekend and special thanks to Operations Manager Hager for all his help.
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