BRL NSCT S1 R11 Recap

06 January 2023
Bootleg Racing League | Season 1 | Round 11
National Sprint Car Trail | Lernerville Speedway

James Tiernan took the checkered flag tonight with the Bootleg Racing League National Sprint Car Trail at Lernerville Speedway ahead of Jospeh Grandy and Bruce Jones. Tiernan took a moment to speak with us at the end of the night and shared, “Pretty much one lane for most of that race up at the top and then kind of figured something out through the middle and kind of walked away from there.”

Joseph Grandy started off the night by securing the pole with a 4-lap average time of 15.479 in qualifying beating James Tiernan by 0.017. Leading the field around, Grandy took the green flag and got a good jump off the start but wasn’t able to clear ahead of Tiernan to his inside initially. Tiernan tried to challenge for the lead but eventually had to concede back in 2nd ahead of Stephen Spies. With 5 laps behind them, Tiernan again tried to get under Grandy clearing with a slider in turn three. Grandy tried to pull a crossover, but Tiernan used the high side momentum to hold the lead.

Further back in the field, Neville Ulph and William Hargreaves had contact sending Hargreaves into the outside wall down the front stretch and bringing out the caution. Restacking single file, Tiernan took the green flag as racing resumed going into lap 8 getting a very strong jump off the start. Tiernan was slowly extending the gap ahead of Grandy as Spies was starting to pressure Grandy for 2nd with 10 laps completed. Justin Morton had closed in on the battle and tried to get in between the two drivers and the battling allowed Aiden Young and Bruce Jones to close in on them.

Spies went off the track through turn three falling back to 9th giving Grandy a breather while Morton, Jones, and Young continued to fight over 3rd going into the 2nd half of the night. The caution came out on lap 17 with more bad luck for Spies when Todd Liston lost momentum going through turn four and Spies closed too quickly unable to avoid contact. Tiernan again took the green flag ahead of Grandy with 13 laps remaining. Julian Valadez took advantage to challenge for 4th getting alongside Jones.

Morton slide over the edge of turn three falling back to 9th giving 3rd over to Jones was under pressure from Young for 4th as they had to deal with lap traffic and Spies quickly closing on the battle. Valadez used the lap car of Hargreaves to hold the position while Spies and Young fought over 5th. Coming out of the final corner, James Tiernan was untouchable with over a 1 second lead to take the checkered flag ahead of Jospeh Grandy, Bruce Jones, Julian Valadez, and Stephen Spies rounding out the top 5 tonight at Lernerville Speedway.

Aiden Young holds onto the lead in the overall point standings with 683 points. Justin Morton sits in 2nd with 663 points with Bruce Jones in 3rd with 647 points. Stephen Spies sits into 4th with 592 points and Rory Collins rounds out the top 5 drivers with 555 points. Bruce Jones is the current points leader in the midgets with 208 points ahead of Stephen Spies and Aiden Young. The drivers of the Bootleg Racing League next head to Lucas Oil Speedway on January 13th in the nonwinged 360 sprints with all of the intense action brought to you live at 10:30PM ET exclusively on the Virtual Grip Network!