FERNLEY, NV (May 12) – Saturday evening looked like an epic night for Fernley 95A Speedway on Saturday evening. The Sprint Car Challenge Tour was visiting, a large crowd was on hand and Willie Croft set a blistering fast lap of 13.70 seconds during qualifying in his Americoat-Holy Smoke BBQ sprint car.Rounding out the show was a field of 18 IMCA A Modifieds that also had some fast times in the clay track. The night started full of promise and blazing speeds for the fans.
Giving the night promise of great speeds Willie Croft set fast time during qualifying of 13.70 seconds.
In addition three Northern Nevada drivers were in the sprint car field for their only appearance here this year. They were Tanner Thorson, who is starting to race in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series, Adam Walters and Dyllan Ogden.
The evening began with sprint cars wheel packing the track, now sporting a new layer of clay. Then after hot laps for both groups sprint cars qualified before the IMCA racers began their main.
When the IMCA Modified main began Thomas Martin (5) briefly led Robert Miller.
When the green waved Thomas Martin was briefly on point until Robert Miller took over. Things slowed after there was a two-car tangle in Turn 2.
Once racing resumed Miller took off followed by Travis White and Martin. Behind the leaders Ryan McDaniels was carving his way toward the front with his sights set on the leaders
Ryan McDaniels (10) takes second away from Travis White.
After another quick caution due to a spin in Turn 4 racing resumed with 12 laps to go in the feature.
By now McDaniels was in second after passing White and began to challenge Miller for the lead. Then there was another caution caused by a car stopping in the exit to Turn 4.
Before the rain stopped the race McDaniels (10) was challenging Miller for the lead.
Once racing resumed it was halted at the 18-lap mark due to rain. All the cars were taken off the track and put into staging with the hope it would soon stop.
Unfortunately the rain kept coming so the race was called official as the drivers had gone past the halfway mark.
Out on the track trucks from officials and the sprint car folks were circulating trying to prevent the surface from getting too soaked
Finally after over an hour the rains stopped and the sprint cars were back out wheel packing the surface. Then they did a series of hot laps.
Based on the speeds they were turning it appears the race was going to be very fast.
By then the crowd had dwindled to only the hardcore fans hoping to see the sprint car main.
Sadly once the field got back onto the track Mother Nature literally threw a wet blanket on the evening. Once the rains returned the surface was too wet to race on and the officials had to cancel the main. It was a sad ending to what appeared to be a great night of racing. Hopefully the tour will return next year and Mother Nature will cooperate.
Earlier in the evening this reporter had a chance to talk with two of the three drivers from Northern Nevada.
• Minden native Tanner Thorson has come from the midget ranks and is not only racing sprint cars but stepping up into the Camping World Truck Series of NASCAR.
Minden Native Tanner Thorson stands by the sprint car he’s racing in the challenge series.
“I’m a one time USAC Midget champion and actually won the national midget driver of the year I think three years in a row,” he said.
Two weeks ago he had his first ride in a NASCAR Camping World Truck at Dover, Delaware, the Monster Mile.
“It was fun you know, I had a blast, it’s always fun jumping into something new then kind of learning the learning curve,” he said. “It’s definitely something different, something I look forward to progressing for the next few months as I get into more races. Our trucks are getting better and better. This weekend Bubba Wallace was in my truck that I ran and they got even better.
“I’m excited and I’m really focusing on the sprint car and the truck. I grew up running midgets, go karts and stuff now I’m still in the learning curve in sprint cars with only 30 races or so or maybe a little bit more under my belt racing a winged sprint car.”
One thing Thorson appreciates is the sprint car team he driving for.
Tanner Thorson at speed in the sprint car he races.
“I’m really blessed to get to work with the teams and crews I get to work with. Clyde LeMar, he’s one hell of an owner, he gives us what we need, when we need it. If we need something tomorrow and it’s always cross-country it’ll be here tomorrow,” he said. “I can’t thank him enough for giving me the opportunity to kind of get out and race winged sprint cars without having much experience at all.”
Asked about the evening ahead of him he replied, “I’ve never really considered any racecar track, as far as sprint car tracks or anything as my home track just because I never raced in Nevada much. I did a couple of times when I was little as far as Go Karts but sprint cars I race in California and in Outlaw Karts. I actually consider Silver Dollar (Chico) probably my home racetrack.
“Now to come back here to actually get on a racetrack in Nevada, is pretty cool. I know there are a lot of people from my home town coming out. So it’s pretty cool, know there’s a lot of fans, I heard the stands will be packed so I’m pretty excited.”
• Adam Walters Another Nevada native driver has lived on the east coast and in California but now has returned to Northern Nevada.
Adam Walters stands by the sprint car he’s racing in the Challenge Series.
“We’ve done two or three races so far this year but I took a year off and truthfully that’s probably the best thing I could have done for my racing career. I care more about it now than I ever have,” he said. “What I did is move back east and went racing there for about a year then moved back down to Southern California did some modified racing, some non-winged stuff then moved back up here. I live in Nevada now and been back for about a month.”
He was also excited about getting to race in front of his home town fans.
Adam Walters turning laps at 95A Speedway.
I really feel like we have a good team behind us, good guys working on the car and just a good group of people surrounding me,” he said “It definitely helps being from Nevada and having laps around here. For a lot of these guys it’s their first or second time here and this is my hundredth time here. I’m pretty comfortable, I’m happy, we go out kind of late in qualifying but they do it by your heat race so I’m ready for tonight.”
Unfortunately there was one more Nevada driver from Reno I was not aware of. That was Dyllan Ogden so my apologies to him.
Reno Dyllan Ogden at speed during hot laps.
REPORTER’S NOTE: While I took more photos than shown in the article there were two other photographers at the track.
Troy White specializes in sprint car photos and his website is, www.twracefotos.smugmug.com and Melissa Coker also covers all types of cars and her website is, www.melissasoutonalimb.smugmug.com.
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RESULTS:
SPRINT CAR CHALLENGE TOUR – ROUND 4
Fernley 95A Speedway – May 12
• SPRINT CARS:
+ Qualifying: 1. Jodie Robinson, 2. Lucas Ashe, 3. Kyle Hirst, 4. Tim Kaeding, 5.Colby Copeland, 6. Shane Hopking, 7. Colby Johnson, 8. Zach Lynskey, 9. Chase Johnson, 10. Andy Forsberg, 11. Cody Lamar, 12. Sean Becker, 13. Shane Golobic, 14. Justyn Cox, 15. Tanner Thorson, 16. Justin Sanders, 17. Michael “Buddy” Kofoid 18. Dyllan Ogden, 19. Adam Walters, 20. Willie Croft*, 21. Tony Gualda Jr., 22. Ryan Souza.
*-Set fastest lap of 13.70
+ Heat Races
+ #1: 1. Colby Copeland, 2.Colby Johnson, (Remainder of the results were not posted.)
+ #2: 1. Sean Backer, 2. Tanner Thorson, 3. Andy Forsberg, 4. Shane Golobic, 5. Justyn Cox, 6. Chase Johnson, 7. Cody Lamar.
+ #3: 1. Willie Croft, 2. Justin Sanders, 3. Tony Gualda Jr., 4. Michael Kofoid, 5. Adam Walters, 6. Ryan Souza, 7. Dyllan Ogden.
+ Dash: 1. Shane Golobic, 2. Michael Kodoid, 3. Colby Copeland, 4. Willie Croft, 5. Colby Johnson, 6. Sean Becker.
• IMCA A Modifieds:
+ Heat #1: 1. Robert Miller, 2. Travis White, 3. Alec Childs, 4. Riley Simmons, 5. Don Childs, 6. Robert Tatum.
+ Heat #2: 1. Thomas Martin, 2. Ryan McDaniels, 3. Royce Goetz, 4. Walter Ball, 5. Shawn LaRocque, 6. Jay Bradley.
+ Heat #3: 1. Shawn Natenstedt, 2. James Thibodeaux, 3. Barry Stone, 4. Byron Huuchinson, 5. Fred White, 6. Andy Strait.
+ Main (18-Laps): 1. Robert Miller, 2. Ryan McDaniels, 3. Travis White, 4. Shawn Natenstedt, 5. Riley Simmons, 6. Royce Goetz, 7. James Thibodeaux, 8. Thomas Martin, 9. Walter Ball, 10. Shawn LaRocque, 11. Alec Childs, 12. Andy Strait, 13. Barry Stone, 14. Byron Hutchinson, 15. Robert Tatum.
DNF: Jay Bradley, Fred White, Don Childs.
