Solomito Wins in First Race at Wall

Fourteen Riverhead Raceway regulars in the INEX Legends division made the trek to the Jersey Shore to try to win Turkey Derby XL. But of course they weren’t the only ones as a total of 40 drivers attempted to qualify for 28 starting spots.

Trevor Alspach started the feature from the pole with Robert French to his outside. Richie Davidowitz set fast time in time-trials, redrew the sixth starting spot, but actually missed the start of the race. He ran into the back of another driver during hot laps that caused damage to the car.

Alspach led the first 10 laps of the race before Nick Ladyga took the lead. Timmy Solomito followed Ladyga by Alspach and moved up to second. Solomito and Ladyga battled hard for half of the race until the fifth caution of the race came out for an incident involving Vincent Colletti in turn four. During that caution period the officials forced Ladyga to the pits because his front bumper wasn’t fully intact. Solomito inherited the lead and French moved back up to second with Brad Van Houten in third.

Solomito, who finished second in the INEX Legends Riverhead Raceway standings with three wins, was really strong on restarts. He was able to pull away by a couple car lengths on French on every restart.

Solomito was able to fend off French, but it was Ladyga who was charging back to the front. He was passing cars in just about every corner, and made quick work of French with two laps to go. But he was too far behind Solomito to make a real charge for the win.

In his very first start at Wall Stadium Speedway, Timmy Solomito pulled into victory lane. Solomito’s first laps on the track came one week ago during Turkey Derby practice.

“It feels great,” said Solomito in victory lane. “We haven’t really been to victory lane outside of Long Island. I’ll take it. Sometimes it’s a little better to be lucky than good.”

The cold temperatures made it difficult to build heat in the tires, which caused a lot of cautions. The yellow flag waved six times.

“It was pretty tough. It’s really slick out there with these radial tires,” said Solomito. “It’s really hard to keep heat in them. I was trying to lock up the front brakes and slide the tires under caution to keep heat in the front tires and just revving it up trying to keep the back hot.”

Top Five Finishers

1. (3) Timmy Solomito

2. (4) Nick Ladyga

3. (2) Robert French

4. (15) Artie Pedersen III

5. (8) Kevin Nowak

Kevin Davison Wins Wreckfest Sportsman Feature

Twenty sportsman modifieds took time in time-trials. Nineteen of them started the race. But only eight of them finished the race at the end of 50 laps.

Zach Alspach started the race from the pole and looked like he might be the car to beat. He led the first 15 laps of the race, but was forced to surrender the lead under caution on lap 15 because he had a flat left-rear tire.

Alspach’s flat tire gave Kevin Davison the lead. The man who finished third in the 2013 sportsman points standings with two wins on the season showed multiple times throughout the race that he would be tough to beat, but Andrew Krause gave him everything he had.

Krause was fast all day long; he put down the fastest lap in time-trials with a lap of 13.264 seconds. Krause drew the eighth starting position and quickly moved to the front of the pack. He was right on Davison’s rear nerf bar for a majority of the race. He tried to go low, but that failed. He tried to hang on Davison’s outside on the restarts, but that failed. Everything Krause tried failed. Davison was just too strong. Krause got a run coming to the checkers, but Kevin Davison was able to hold off Krause to score the Turkey Derby XL sportsman victory.

“I’m out of breath,” said Davison in victory lane. “It took me a while to get out of the car because I was such out of breath. Andrew ran me clean and he has a fast racecar. It’s kind of tough to keep him behind me, but we did this time.”

This race saw nine cautions, including multiple red-flag periods for quite a few big wrecks. One of those big wrecks happened on a restart when Ryan Flores got squeezed into the outside fence. His right side tires rode up the guardrail and then he hit the flag stand. He was okay, as were the flagmen in the stand.

Top Five

1. (7) Kevin Davison

2. (8) Andrew Krause

3. (5) Zach Alspach

4. (9) Dom Fattaruso

5. (4) Kenny Van Wickle

Helberg Holds Off Riggleman For Factory Stock Triumph

The 50-lap factory stock feature saw a fantastic late battle for the win between JR Helberg and Scott Riggleman. Riggleman made multiple pass attempts, but Helberg was just too strong. Riggleman tried the outside and the inside, but Helberg still was able keep him at bay all the while battling lapped traffic.

“It was tough through all that traffic,” said Helberg in victory lane. Helberg’s father, JR Helberg Sr. was also in the race. The younger Helberg joked that his father held him up. “He got in my way once or twice, but I won’t say anything else.”

Top Five Finishers

1. (4) JR Helberg

2. (6) Scott Riggleman

3. (9) Dan Birdsall

4. (12) Marty VanDruten

5. (1) Shanon Mongeau

Meyers’ Late Pass Secures 4-Cylinder Victory

Pete Zaharias was able to hold off multiple attempts by James Meyers and Todd Pilla for the first 34 laps of the 50-lap Four Cylinder feature, but eventually the No. 11x of Meyers was just too tough for Zaharias.

Meyers was able to swing around Zaharias on the outside of turn four on a restart with just six laps to go.

“I wanted this race so bad,” said Meyers in victory lane. “The other 50-lapper I missed. I wanted this.”

Top Five Finishers

1. (2) James Meyers

2. (1) Pete Zaharias

3. (4) Todd Pilla

4. (5) Rick Massaro

5. (7) Mike Wahl

 

Source: Rob Blount/LongIslandJam