BRL DSS S11 R5 Recap
22 Apr 2022
Bootleg Racing League | Season 11 | Round 5
Dirt Street Stock Series | Cedar Lake Speedway
Photograph by: Billy Northcutt
Sim Racing Software: iRacing
Billy Northcutt with the Dirt Panda Racing Team led flag to flag for the win tonight in the Bootleg Racing League Dirt Street Stocks Series at Cedar Lake Speedway ahead of Brandyn Proudfoot and William Hargreaves. “That was a really fun race… I’d give money for [an] all green race tonight so I don’t have to get nervous if I’m up here leading and everybody accomplished that.”, Northcutt commented after his dominating run tonight, “I can’t guarantee that I was the fastest car on the track, but [Hargreaves] and [Proudfoot] were racing clean once they got behind me.”
Billy Northcutt sat on the pole with a fast time at 15.878 in the qualifying session tonight around 0.03 faster than William Hargreaves, Brandyn Proudfoot, and Jason Best behind him. Northcutt and Proudfoot shared the front row as the green flag came out over the first heat of the evening. Northcutt dominated the event taking the win ahead of Proudfoot by over 0.5 crossing the line. Hargreaves had Best to his inside as he took the green in the second heat. Hargreaves had a strong launch off the start pulling ahead and leading every lap to the checkered flag while Best battled with John Wilson holding onto 2nd place in the end.
Stephen Spies started out front for the C-Main consolation race with Bobby Hayes to his outside. Spies cleared Hayes early with Joe Segalla challenging Hayes for 2nd place. Spies and Hayes were able to separate themselves from the rest of the field to battle over the lead as the white flag came out with Spies able to hold the lead for the win. Wilson was leading the field to the inside of J R Shepherd to start off the B-Main consolation. A great launch from Wilson allowed him to clear Shepherd quickly taking control of the field. Running single file, Wilson led Shepherd and Hunter Hill to the checkered flag unchallenged.
Billy Northcutt took the green flag in the 40-lap feature event opting to start from the outside line with Hargreaves to the inside. Northcutt took a very high line jumping out to a strong lead over Hargreaves with Best, Proudfoot, and Spies following single file behind. The top 5 were able to pull away from the rest of the field with Bobby Hayes leading the second group ahead of Wilson and Shepherd. 10 laps down, Proudfoot overtook Best with an aggressive slider and Best wasn’t able to get the crossover completed in time to hold back Proudfoot’s advance.
Northcutt and Hargreaves built a two second gap ahead of Proudfoot as they crossed the halfway mark. Spies, Best, and Hayes battled over 4th as Wilson and Shepherd waited for an opportunity from behind. Wilson stuck his nose in and was able to get around Hayes into 6th with 15 laps remaining as Spies still led the rear pack from 4th place. Northcutt still led the field, but Proudfoot had reeled the leaders back in and overtook Hargreaves now right behind Northcutt.
Going into the final 5 laps over the race, Northcutt had caught up to lap traffic with Proudfoot pressuring for the lead. Negotiating through the rear of the field, Northcutt used the lap traffic to hold Proudfoot at bay and took the checkered flag crossing the line 0.142 ahead of Proudfoot with Hargreaves, Spies, and Best rounding out tonight’s top 5 finishers.
William Hargreaves continues to lead the points standings with 394 points after finishing 3rd tonight. Brandyn Proudfoot closed to gap from 2nd place to only 6 points with Billy Northcutt in 3rd place with 374 points, 20 points off the lead. Bobby Hayes and Johnny Ratley round out the top 5 drivers at this point in the season. The Bootleg Racing League now heads over to Lernerville Speedway on April 29th for the next round with all of the dirt slinging action broadcast live at 7:10PM ET only on the Virtual Grip Network!
PGRL S1 R10 Recap
19 Apr 2022
Pretty Good Racing League | Season 1 | Round 10
Premier Series | Talladega Superspeedway
Sim Racing Software: iRacing
Thomas George with Steel Horse Racing claimed his second win of the season tonight with the Pretty Good Racing League in the ‘Chuckles‘ I’m in Danger 250 presented by MC2 Editing Services at Talladega Superspeedway beating Ricky Hardin and Kevin Bartelt to the line in a photo finish. “It’s Dega so, I mean, anything can happen.”, George commented after his win tonight, “That caution just came out perfectly… When that came out, I knew it’s like, alright, I just want to survive. Let me get to the end here.”
Joe Hassert started the night off leading the field to the green flag with Jason Galvin to his outside as the field doubled up quickly running side by side. Scott Eckrich was one of a few drivers that decided to drop out of the main pack playing a safer strategy for the long run in an attempt to avoid the “big one”. Mike Rasimas opted to stay up near the front tucked in a few rows back on the inside line keeping the leaders within sight. As the drivers put 10 laps behind them the field had already split into two separate packs.
20 laps into the race, the leading pack tried to go three wide, but the outside line fell apart leaving the field two wide with Brian Yaczik leading the inside line and Paul Pepper leading the outside swapping the race lead back and forth between them. The first round of pit cycles began on lap 29 in small 8 to 12 car groups spreading the 38 car field out around all ends of the track in several smaller packs. A single car incident brought the caution out as the last group’s pit cycle was underway stacking the field back together once again.
The field again divided back up into two smaller packs going into the second half of the evening as the competition in the front pack started to pick up. The drivers continued to try to get a third line working to the outside but weren’t able to maintain for long before merging back into a two wide race. Eckrich led the second pack, in 17th place, from around one second behind the lead pack, holding a safe distance anticipating the chaos that Talladega is known for as the laps counted down.
Drivers started to feel the pressure to move toward the front to get into a good position for the end and bump drafting became more frequent which caused some trouble approaching lap 50 as the caution was thrown out for a bad bump that sent Jason Galvin around on track. Adam Jurski pushed Rich Jette out front around Jeff Ward off the restart taking away the lead. Much more of the field stayed in the lead pack off the restart as they aggressively positioned themselves.
With 40 laps remaining a large group of drivers were caught up in a massive wreck coming out of turn four ending the night early for Adam Blattell and stacking the field back together. Woody Mahan and Eckrich were on the front row as the green flag came back out over the field. Mahan had a very early launch off the restart which spread the field out into three separate groups on the first lap with only the top 14 drivers in the leading pack. The second pack followed four seconds behind with the third pack 2 seconds behind them.
Chris Lanini found himself taking the lead while controlling the inside line with Mahan battling back from the outside. The outside line had a strong run and cleared five cars past Lanini and choose to stay up high and continue pushing further out front as the inside line began to look less organized and not able to match pace. The leading pack shrunk down to the top 12 drivers and the third pack contained the majority of the field with 25 laps to go. The second pack of drivers were only three cars, consisting of Rick Thompson, Pepper, and Rasimas, and were slowly catching up to the leading pack almost ten seconds ahead of the rear pack.
Mahan held the lead as the entire front pack went single file along the outside wall knowing there would be one more required pit cycle for fuel going into the last 20 laps. Mahan and Eckrich were among the first drivers to pit only taking fuel and rejoining the track in 20th through 23rd place running together and quickly cycling back to the front as the rest of the drivers had to make their stops during the following laps. With 10 laps remaining, the final group of drivers made their pit stop.
Eckrich was set to overtake Rasimas who was exiting the pits but was spun around with Yaczik from aggressive pushing with Mahan bringing out the caution and allowing Rasimas to hold the lead for the restart with Jurski to his outside. Eckrich and Yaczik were far back in the field as the green flag came out taking them out of contention for the win. Thomas George had a great run on the outside and jumped out to the front as the “Big One” struck a few rows back involving the majority of the field with only 5 laps to go.
The Pretty Good Racing League does not have GWC finishes which left the drivers tonight with a one lap shootout to finish off the race at Talladega as the green and white flags came out together. George and Ricky Hardin battled over the lead coming out of tour four and down the front stretch with George taking the win by 0.037 in a photo finish across the line. Scott Eckrich climbed back up to 7th place in the end after all of the chaos.
Scott Eckrich continues to lead in the point standings after his strong recovery tonight with 360 points ahead of Thomas George by only 1 point. Jeff Ward still sits in 3rd place with 324 points with Mike Rasimas and Rich Jette each moving up one spot and rounding out the top 5 drivers with two rounds remaining in the season. The Pretty Good Racing League now heads over to Dover International Speedway for the “I Hate Octane93 on Twitch.tv” Dover 200 for the next round on April 26th with all of the action broadcast live at 8:50PM ET only on the Virtual Grip Network!
BRL SLM S17 R4 Recap
16 Apr 2022
Bootleg Racing League | Season 17 | Round 4
Super Late Model Series | Five Flags Speedway
Sim Racing Software: iRacing
Mathew Thunhorst claimed his first win of the season tonight with the Bootleg Racing League Super Late Model Series at Five Flags Speedway ahead of Kenny Kibbey and Justin Morton. “It was quite the eventful race”, Thunhorst commented about his hard charge to the front, “I was able to get up to like 7th or 8th pretty early before the cautions started coming and then I was just able to get to the top five and I kind of felt like once I got there the pieces kind of fell [in place].”
Donny Moore led the field to the green flag starting to start the evening off with Austin Boelke to his outside. Boelke and Moore battled side by side around the first several laps with Boelke being able to clear for the lead going into the 5th lap. Kenny Kibbey stayed close being Boelke trying to get around Moore in the same manner and was able to push Moore back to 3rd. Boelke and Kibbey then immediately started to pull away from the rest of the field.
A caution at the 20-lap mark stacked the field back together and put Justin Morton and James Lowe directly behind the leaders on the restart. Kibbey continued to chase Boelke around the track with Morton and Lowe close behind, but Thunhorst had also climbed up from 13th place through the field throughout the first 30 laps and joined the battle for the lead from 5th. Morton was able to get around Kibbey for 2nd place as Thunhorst moved up into 4th ahead of Lowe. Thunhorst wasted no time challenging for 3rd diving below Kibbey clearing for the position 40 laps into the event.
Going into the second half, Boelke continued to hold the lead. Thunhorst cleared Morton for 2nd place and started reeling Boelke in. Thunhorst’s move gave an opportunity to Kibbey who got around Morton before Morton could get back into line back in 4th ahead of Moore. Thunhorst made several attempts to pass but Boelke held a defensive line tight to the inside not leaving any room for Thunhorst to get beneath him. With 35 laps remaining, the top 3 of Boelke, Thunhorst, and Kibbey started to again pull away from the field.
Boelke slid up the track just enough to give Thunhorst an opening on lap 68 and Thunhorst took the lead away with Kibbey tight on his bumper to push Boelke back to 4th behind Morton. Boelke continued to fall back with 25 laps to go falling back to 6th ahead of Jeffrey Hardin. Kibbey stayed close to Thunhorst waiting for a mistake he could take advantage of, but Thunhorst was slowly starting to build a gap between them running 0.4 apart with 15 laps to go. Continuing to build that gap to over 1 second, Thunhorst took the win mostly uncontested tonight.
Kenny Kibbey leads in the points standings with 154 points, 4 points ahead of James Lowe after tonight’s win. Justin Morton holds onto 3rd with 140 points over Austin Boelke and Michael Goodman rounding out the top 5 drivers so far in the season. Mathew Thunhorst, last season’s champion, currently sits back in 7th place tied with Joe Segalla with 113 points. Now the Bootleg Racing League heads over to North Wilkesboro Speedway for the next round on April 23rd with all of the action broadcast live at 8:55PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
BRL DSS S11 R4 Recap
15 Apr 2022
Bootleg Racing League | Season 11 | Round 4
Dirt Street Stock Series | I-55 Speedway
Photograph by: Billy Northcutt
Sim Racing Software: iRacing
William Hargreaves with the Dirt Panda Racing Team led every lap to the checkered flag tonight with the Bootleg Racing League Dirt Street Stock Series at the I-55 Speedway ahead of Brandyn Proudfoot and Billy Northcutt. “It’s a great track, I think it’s pretty racy all around really.”, Hargreaves commented after his photo finish win tonight, “My only hope was to defend that slider line. I knew [Proudfoot] was going to go for it, and I just had to send it down there as far as I could and hope it worked.”
William Hargreaves and Billy Northcutt started the night off matching fast laps at 14.565 in qualifying with the pole going to Hargreaves who led the field to the green from the front row inside of Brandyn Proudfoot in the first heat. After several attempts on the lead from Proudfoot, Hargreaves was able to hold him off and take the checkered flag. Billy Northcutt led the second heat with Chris Davis to his outside.
Northcutt cleared Davis quickly and instantly went on the defensive not giving Davis an opportunity to challenge him. John Wilson and Chris Hill started the B Main consolation race from the front row. A strong launch from Wilson set him off to a good start as the field single filed out. Wilson was able to outpace the rest of the field pulling away by over 0.7 before taking the checkered flag.
Hargreaves took the field to the green flag starting off the 40-lap feature event with Northcutt to his inside. Hargreaves wasn’t able to clear Northcutt as the drivers battled side by side around the first few laps before Northcutt slid back into 2nd to defend against Brandyn Proudfoot close behind in 3rd. Chris Davis started challenging for 3rd trading sliders with Proudfoot back and forth as the drivers passed the 10-lap mark.
Proudfoot was able to get to the outside of Northcutt but wasn’t able to clear as Proudfoot made contact with the outside wall and found himself back in another heated battle with Davis. The battle came to a head as Proudfoot got loose and fell behind Chris Hill before settling back in 5th ahead of Joe Segalla. Going into the second half of the event, Davis and Hill battled hard over 3rd and Hargreaves managed to pull away from Northcutt by over 2 seconds.
Davis and Hill came together with 10 laps to go unfortunately sending both drivers around and to the rear of the field. The gap of over 2.5 seconds that Hargreaves had built over Northcutt was taken away as the caution came out from that incident. Hargreaves ran the outside line to clear Northcutt, but Proudfoot took advantage of the restart to stay with the leader and quickly took 2nd place away. Proudfoot made a hard charge for the front, but it wasn’t enough in the end as they crossed the line slamming doors with Hargreaves crossed the line 0.029 ahead of Proudfoot.
William Hargreaves took the lead away from Johnny Ratley with his win tonight now with 317 points total. Brandyn Proudfoot moved up to 2nd place 7 points behind the leader. Billy Northcutt trails behind in 3rd at 290 points with Ratley and Bobby Hayes rounding out the top 5 in the points standings 4 weeks into the season. The drivers now set their sights to Cedar Lake Speedway on April 22nd with all of the mudslinging action broadcast live at 7:10PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
PGRL S1 R9 Recap
12 Apr 2022
Pretty Good Racing League | Season 1 | Round 9
Premier Series | Bristol Motor Speedway
Sim Racing Software: iRacing
Jeff Ward with Graafix LC Motorsports took the mud-covered checkered flag tonight in the Laps for Muscular Dystrophy 125 presented by Patriot Media & Marketing Services with the Pretty Good Racing League in the dirt at Bristol Motor Speedway ahead of Isaiah Dupre and Woody Mahan. “I’m wore out, that was probably the hardest I’ve ever drove a sim racing car”, Ward commented after the race, “Man it was a handful. It feels good to get that one for sure.”
Michael Whiting started the evening off leading the field to the green for the first heat race of the evening. Isaiah Dupre gained on Whiting from 2nd place being able to take away the inside line and overtake for the lead. Whiting stayed close behind but wasn’t able to challenge back for the lead before Dupre took the checkered flag. Rich Jette led the second heat with Don Runkle Jr to his outside. However, Jeff Ward had the best launch from a row back quickly overtaking the front row and taking the lead. Ward pulled away to an impressive 4.3 second lead before taking the checkered flag.
The third and final heat of the night had Travis McQuistion in the front with Norm Pelletier to his outside as the green flag came out. McQuistion had a good launch off the start and pulled away from Pelletier, but Woody Mahan caught the leader and tried to overtake from the outside with Scott Eckrich jumping both cars into the lead as McQuistion dropped back into 3rd behind Mahan. Eckrich was caught up negotiating around lap traffic which gave the lead over the Mahan who took the win.
Dupre had Ward to his outside as the field took the green flag in the feature event. Ward ran the highline well clearing for the lead very early with Mahan and Eckrich following him around pushing Dupre back to 4th place. Eckrich tried several times to overtake Mahan from the inside but couldn’t get enough speed coming out of the corners to stay alongside. Ward had caught the beginning of lap traffic early into the race as the rear of the field became very spread out.
Mahan and Eckrich closed the gap to Ward going into lap 20 and started searching around the track for a line to use to challenge for the lead. Mahan and Ward door slammed knocking both drivers loose and letting Eckrich get past Mahan into 2nd place. Eckrich was able to then use the outside line to overtake Ward and started to build a gap while Ward and Mahan battled over 2nd. Lap traffic hindered Eckrich’s run allowing Ward and Mahan to get back up to his bumper.
25 laps into the race, only the top 8 drivers were still on the lead lap with 14th place and back already multiple laps down. The 24 car field was spread out to all ends of the track complicating matters for Eckrich who had to continuously change lines to negotiate around the traffic. The dense lap traffic also forced the top 3 drivers apart as over a 1 second gap had extended between Eckrich and Ward as well as Ward and Mahan. With 50 laps completed, Dupre in 4th place was the last car on the lead lap.
Eckrich made hard contact with lap traffic that allowed Ward and Mahan to close the gap back up with both drivers overtaking the leader as Eckrich was forced to pull off track with damage from the incident. The competition caution was thrown out over the field on lap 60 for the only scheduled pit stop of the night with Ward and Mahan the only drivers on the lead lap. Dupre was the first car a lap down and was granted a pass around rejoining the leaders on the lead lap as the stewards threw the green flag back out for the second half of the feature.
Ward wasn’t able to clear Mahan off the restart and the drivers battled side by side for several laps before Mahan was able to clear for the lead from the outside line. Ward worked to stay with Mahan as Mahan wove through the traffic. Mahan and Ward came together a few times as the laps counted down. Lap traffic and over rotation through the corners caused Mahan to check up and Ward wasn’t able to avoid, but in every case both drivers were able to quickly recover and continue racing. After a more severe instance of contact between them, Ward gave Mahan a chance to recover instead of overtaking showing the sportsmanship and respect between the battling leaders.
With 25 laps remaining, Dupre had managed to close up the gap to the lead battle to within 3 seconds after starting from the rear of the field on the restart. Ward was able to clear Mahan for the lead with 20 laps to go along the outside line and started pulling away with the end of the night in sight. Ward made contact with McQuistion that sent McQuistion around and collected Mahan giving him significant damage and allowing Dupre to take away 2nd place going into the final 10 laps. Mahan was forced off track with damage leaving Ward and Dupre the only cars on the lead lap.
Mahan was able to quickly fix the necessary damage for the stewards to allow him back on track in time to hold onto 3rd place, 2 laps down ahead of Thomas George. Ward took the checkered flag unchallenged with a 4 second gap ahead of Dupre. The dirt proved too much for some drivers as almost half of the field retired early for the night with no one making it to the end without an incident or two.
Scott Eckrich holds onto the lead in the point standings with 326 points. Thomas George closed the gap slightly now 16 points behind the lead. Jeff Ward moved up to 3rd in the standings after tonight’s win now at 289 points. Michael Chrobok and Mike Rasimas round out the top 5 going into the final two rounds of the season. The Pretty Good Racing League now prepares for the chaos of Talladega Superspeedway for the Chuckles I’m in Danger 250 presented by MC2 Editing Services on April 19th with all of the fast-paced action broadcast live at 8:50PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
ASC S11 R11 Recap
11 Apr 2022
Autobahn Sportscar Challenge | Season 11 | Round 11
LMP2/GT3 Multiclass Event | Le Mans
Carter Kundinger with Satellite Racing Apollo took the checkered flag tonight in the Prototype Class with the Autobahn Sportscar Challenge 90-minute event at Le Mans ahead of Robert Tinsey and Luc Carbonneau. Ross Booth beat Ryan Robertson and Ryan Washeleski to the line in the GT Pro Class as Ryan Robertson took the win in the GT AM Class ahead of David Parry and Dale Green. “That was a really fun and stressful race”, Kundinger told us tonight after his win, “Really it was just traffic kind of that was really what decided who was in front and who was behind.”
Jeffrey Ooms led the field to the green starting off the evening at Le Mans for the Prototype Class drivers with Ross Booth leading the GT drivers. The field had a very clean start as the drivers in all classes single filed out quickly and settled in for the 90-minute event. Carter Kundinger and Joshua Wolf battled early over 3rd place with Kundinger able to hold onto the position, but the battling allowed Ooms to pull away ahead of the field. Nathan Jue, who was running in 2nd behind Ooms, pulled off the track and ended his own evening in the first 5 minutes of the race.
Several smaller incidents and close calls through the first 30 minutes shuffled the running order around, but Ooms continued to lead in the Prototypes ahead of Kundinger and Robert Tinsey. Booth and Robertson each started building gaps ahead of the rest of their respective classes in the GT Pro and GT AM. Ooms pulled into the pits on lap 9 and stayed in for an extended amount of time at over 1:10 repairing damage picked up while negotiating through GT3 traffic and dropping him far back in the running order and giving the lead to Kundinger with Tinsey staying close behind waiting for an opportunity to challenge for the lead.
As they approached the halfway point in the race, Robertson had over a 46 second lead over the rest of the GT AM Class with Dylan Parry and Matthew Gosch battling hard over 2nd place. Ross Booth led the GT Pro Class with a gap of over 16 seconds ahead of Washeleski. Tinsey took the Prototype lead away from Kundinger, but as Tinsey and Kundinger continued to battle over the lead Wolf and Lou Carbonneau were able to close up the gap to the leaders while battling amongst themselves over 3rd place.
Going into the final 30 minutes, Kundinger was able to retake the lead from Tinsey and Wolf lost 3rd place to Carbonneau, but all four drivers stayed within reach to take advantage of a potential mistake from their competitors. Both GT Pro and GT AM fields had become very spread out with multiple seconds between most drivers as Booth and Robertson continued to lead from far ahead. Ooms found himself back inside of the top 10 as the drivers completed their second pit cycle of the event.
Ooms continued his hard charge through the Prototype field with 20 minutes remaining from 7th place. Kundinger and Tinsey continued their fierce battle over the lead as the time counted down going into the final 5 laps. Tinsey slid wide going around a corner with 12 minutes remaining costing him any chance at taking the win from Kundinger and putting him under immediate pressure from Carbonneau and Wolf. Carbonneau overtook for 2nd quickly while Tinsey was trying to recover. With nearly a 7 second lead, Kundinger was able to relax and just maintain his pace to the finish. Carbonneau, Tinsey, and Wolf chased each other stacked close together single file.
Tinsey took 2nd place back from Carbonneau with 2 laps to go and Ooms climbed his way back into 5th and closed the gap to Wolf up to within 2.5 seconds. Seemingly in response to Ooms gaining, Carbonneau was aggressively pushing with Tinsey instead of attempting for an overtake and built up a gap ahead of Wolf around the final lap. Going through the final corners, Tinsey and Carbonneau fought hard over 2nd place with Tinsey able to hold the position in the end. Kundinger crossed the line 7 seconds ahead of Tinsey, Carbonneau, Wolf, and Ooms all tightly stacked together rounding out the top 5 finishers in the Prototypes.
Billy Smith continues to lead in the points standings in the Prototype Class with a total of 200 points and 21 points ahead of Carter Kundinger in 2nd. Ross Booth has a dominating lead in the GT3 Pro Class at 354 points. Ryan Washeleski sits in 2nd place 42 points behind. Ryan Robertson again goes unchallenged in the GT AM Class points standings with 243 points and a 77-point lead over Trent Brown in 2nd. Satellite Racing, consisting of Robert Tinsey, Ryan Washeleski, and Ryan Robertson, leads in the team standings with 258 points. The Autobahn Sportscar Challenge now heads over to Imola for the next round on April 25th with all of the fast-paced action broadcast live at 9:05PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
BRL SLM S17 R3 Recap
09 Apr 2022
Bootleg Racing League | Season 17 | Round 3
Super Late Model Series | Stafford Motor Speedway
Kenny Kibbey with Nocturnal Gaming took the checkered flag and became the third different winner of the season in the third round of the Bootleg Racing League Super Late Model Series at Stafford Motor Speedway ahead of James Lowe and Austin Boelke. “It’s always fun to get, well any victory, but the first victory in the new series”, Kibbey commented after his win tonight, “With these [Super Late Models] you almost have to race to halfway or so because it comes to a point where, unless your tires are way better than the guys around you, if you’re pretty even it’s really, really hard to pass when you get into the late goings of these races.”
Bryan Dehn started the evening on the pole with Michael Goodman to his outside as the field took the green flag. After a rocky start to the event the drivers managed to get sorted out after several cautions early on caused frustration within the field. 20 laps into the race, Dehn continued to lead ahead of Kenny Kibbey and James Lowe. The field began to single file out as drivers settled into a rhythm and started putting laps behind them. Seeming to take the early incidents into account, the drivers stayed single file with very few moves being made to advance for several laps thereafter.
Kibbey stayed close behind Dehn staying within reach to take advantage if Dehn made a mistake which happened on lap 38 as Dehn went high enough in a corner for Kibbey to get to his inside and take away the lead. Kibbey quickly started to pull away extending the gap ahead of Dehn as Lowe started to pressure Dehn for 2nd. Going into the second half, Lowe had yet to get around Dehn, but Dehn was showing signs of excessive tire wear and was dropping off the pace as Kibbey continued to extend the gap ahead by more than 1 second.
Out pacing the rest of the field by 0.2 each lap, Kibbey maintained a strong lead over the rest of the drivers with 40 laps remaining. Dehn defended 2nd place against Lowe and Justin Morton, who caught up to the battle, by controlling the inside line. A caution came out on lap 62 stacking the field back together and putting Lowe behind Kibbey for the restart with Dehn to the outside at a significant disadvantage. Kibbey had a strong launch and Lowe stayed with him getting to the inside of Dehn with Austin Boelke trying to close the door before Dehn could get down to the inside.
Dehn fell back to 5th before he tried to dive down low behind Morton but caught the front end of Goodman to his inside and spun sideways before sliding back up the track collecting several other drivers. Kibbey continued to lead now followed by Lowe, Boelke, Morton, and Goodman rounding out the top 5 with 25 laps remaining. Kibbey continued to show a strong pace holding a 0.2 lead over Lowe going into the final 10 laps as Boelke and Morton battled over 3rd. Kibbey crossed the line mostly uncontested followed by Lowe, Boelke, Morton, and Goodman.
Kenny Kibbey and James Lowe are now tied for 1st place in the point standings each with a total of 115 points. Michael Goodman moved up to 3rd place with 107 points followed closely behind by Justin Morton and Austin Boelke rounding out the top 5 drivers. The Bootleg Racing League now moves over to Five Flags Speedway for the next round of the season on April 16th with all of the short track action broadcast live at 8:55PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
BRL DSS S11 R3 Recap
08 Apr 2022
Bootleg Racing League | Season 11 | Round 3
Dirt Street Stock Series | Volusia Speedway Park
Photograph by: Billy Northcutt
Johnny Ratley with the Dirt Panda Racing Team took the checkered flag for the first time this season tonight in the Bootleg Racing League Dirt Street Stock Series at Volusia Speedway Park beating out William Hargreaves and Billy Northcutt. “It felt like the top was the place to be in the beginning”, Ratley told us after the race, “[The] last restart of the race, [Hargreaves] took the high side and then I was just grinning because I knew that bottom was coming in and I was able to sneak on by him.”
William Hargreaves stood at the top of the boards starting the evening off with a fast lap of 19.46 in qualifying beating Johnny Ratley by 0.02. Hargreaves swept the first heat of the night holding off Billy Northcutt pressuring from behind. Ratley took the win in the second heat beating Brandyn Proudfoot to the line. Jason Best took the win in the C Main consolation as Chris Hill got around Bobby Hayes taking 2nd place before the end. In the final consolation race, J R Shepherd took the win in the B Main event ahead of John Wilson.
Hargreaves and Ratley battled hard over the lead immediately going into the feature event with Northcutt and Proudfoot catching the lead in the first few laps. The battle intensified with no driver giving an inch as Hargreaves continued to hold onto the lead. Proudfoot slid back to 4th behind Northcutt with Ratley looking to the inside of Hargreaves giving the lead over to Ratley going into the second half of the race.
As the battle continued, more drivers caught up to the front with Jason Best and J R Shepherd joining the pack. The top six drivers pressured each other hard as Proudfoot struggled and dropped back to 5th behind Best. Best continued his forward momentum diving to the inside of Northcutt but wasn’t able to complete the move. With 10 laps to go Shepherd tried to use the low line to get around Proudfoot and was denied as Proudfoot slammed the door. Proudfoot tried to recover some positions throwing a slider on Best, but Best anticipated the move and completed a cross over retaking 4th with Proudfoot going high into the outside wall and dropping back to 7th behind Chris Hill.
Proudfoot threw a slider to move back up to 6th behind Shepherd but found himself too far back to make up much more ground. The final laps saw Hargreaves and Northcutt trading sliders back and forth battling hard over 2nd place with Hargreaves taking the position in the end as the Dirt Panda Racing Team crossed the line 1st, 2nd, and 3rd with Johnny Ratley taking the checkered flag.
Johnny Ratley now leads in the points standings with 241 points followed by William Hargreaves in 2nd only 8 points behind. Brandyn Proudfoot dropped back to 3rd in the points after struggling tonight 9 points behind Ratley. Billy Northcutt and Jason Best round out the top five drivers of the season with eight races remaining. The drivers now set their sights to the I-55 Speedway for the first time in the Bootleg Racing League Dirt Street Stock Series on April 15th and all of the action can be seen live at 7:10PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
PGRL S1 R8 Recap
06 Apr 2022
Pretty Good Racing League | Season 1 | Round 8
Premier Series | Martinsville Speedway
Thomas George with Steel Horse Racing took his first win of the season tonight in the Hide the Pain & Celebrate the Joy of Driving 250 at Martinsville Speedway with the Pretty Good Racing League ahead of Adam Jurski and Norm Pelletier. “We were working on the restarts and trying to get Steel Horse a one-two finish here tonight and those cautions played out just perfectly for us tonight.”, Thomas George told us, “I didn’t have the best car but with the track position we had, it was right place right time.”
Adam Jurski started out on the pole tonight after being away for several weeks for shoulder surgery. “Passing usually is difficult here so I think track position is going to be really key.”, Jurski shared before the event, “Hopefully we can get into our groove and get some green flag racing in and be there in the end.” As the PGRL took the first green of the night and the drivers all scrambled to get single filed out quickly with Jurski having a strong launch out front.
Cold tires and tight corners caught several drivers out early on in the event. Brian Yaczik made his way up to 2nd place coming to lap 15 and started pressuring Jurski for the lead. Thomas George and Scott Eckrich continued to move up through the field both getting into the top 6 with the first 50 laps of the night completed and several cautions keeping the field tightly stacked. Two drivers had their races ended early out of the 28-car field to that point with Jurski still leading over Yaczik in the front.
Yaczik took advantage of a restart on lap 62 diving down below Jurski and overtaking for the lead. Jurski tried a cross over taking the inside line back but wasn’t able to match Yaczik’s pace on corner exit and conceded back in 2nd place ahead of an intense battle between Woody Mahan and Thomas George over 3rd. George had the position as the caution flag was thrown out with Eckrich and Jeff Ward moving up into the top 5 and Mahan taking the opportunity for his first pit stop of the night.
Drew Carroll made a hard charge to the front quickly clearing past Ward and George into 4th behind Jurski. The battle over the lead between Yaczik and Eckrich was heating up with Eckrich pressuring hard going through the corners. Most lead lap drivers choose to pit when the caution came out on lap 87 shuffling the running order. Norm Pelletier stayed out and led the field as the green came back out with Yaczik and Eckrich rejoining the field in 6th and 7th respectively with fresh tires. Ward had to drop to the rear of the field for a pit road violation restarting back in 21st.
Yaczik cleared for the lead again on lap 103 with Eckrich following close behind. George had made his way back into the top 5 as the drivers that choose to stay out fell off the pace quickly. An unfortunate restart on lap 110 saw Pelletier dive to the inside when Yaczik had to check up forcing a three wide situation with the leaders that sent Eckrich and Yaczik around on track and hard into the outside wall collecting several other drivers coming up from behind and giving the lead back over to Pelletier.
As the drivers crossed the halfway point in the race, George was in the lead followed by Pelletier, Ricky Hardin, Danny Gutierrez, and Marc Cohn rounding out the top 5. 23 of the 28-car field were still in competition with 5 drivers having to call it a night early. Eckrich and Yaczik were quickly charging back to the front both back in the top 5 by lap 150 showing their paces to be dominate in the field. Frequent cautions limited the chances for drivers to advance through the field with George able to hold off any attempts on the lead through the short green flag runs.
Eckrich was pressuring George hard for the lead on one of the longer green flag runs when Eckrich’s front end snapped loose on lap 162 sending him hard into the outside wall and collected several other drivers including Yaczik who was still fighting his way through the field further back. Yaczik was able to stay on track dropping back to 16th, but Eckrich needed substantial repair to his car sending him down several laps from the pits as the race resumed back under green.
Jurski had been quietly moving back up through the field throughout the second half of the race after some bad luck early on and was back up to 4th with 75 laps to go. George and Yaczik made slight contact sending George around, but he was able to recover clean and continue on from the middle of the field in 11th place between Mahan and Pelletier. Yaczik, who was having a rough night, was back up to 7th still showing a strong pace on lap 182. Drew Carroll was leading the field with Isaiah Dupre and Jurski following close behind.
More unfortunate situations for drivers benefited Yaczik and George letting each of them jump several positions at a time with drivers ahead getting loose in the corners and sliding high and out of their way. With 60 laps remaining, George caught up to Yaczik and the drivers battled hard over 5th with Jurski joining the fight. Yaczik had more bad luck spinning around in the midst of the battle and resulted in serious damage to his car as he joined the growing list of drivers who had ended their night early.
Carroll continued to lead ahead of Dupre with teammates Jurski and George in 3rd and 4th going into the final 50 laps of the event. George was able to leap past both Jurski and Dupre into 2nd place with Jurski keeping 3rd. George then inherited the lead from Carroll who chose to take his final pit stop during the resulting caution moving Jurski up to 2nd followed by Mahan, Pelletier, and Cohn rounding out the top 5. The remainder of the race was plagued by short green flag runs giving George a strong advantage over the Jurski and Pelletier behind him as he held the lead to the checkered flag.
Scott Eckrich holds onto the lead in the point standings with a total of 300 points as the most winning driver of the season thus far. Thomas George moved up two spots up into 2nd place now 27 points behind the leader. Mike Rasimas dropped back another spot from last week now sitting in 3rd with Jeff Ward and Michael Chrobok close behind rounding out the top 5 drivers. The PGRL drivers now set their sights to Bristol Motor Speedway for the Laps for Muscular Dystrophy 125 on April 12th. They’ll be running around on the dirt configuration, and you can catch all of the dirt slinging action broadcast live at 8:50PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
BRL SLM S17 R2 Recap
02 Apr 2022
Bootleg Racing League | Season 17 | Round 2
Super Late Model Series | Hickory Motor Speedway
James Lowe took his first win of the season tonight in the Bootleg Racing League Super Late Model Series at Hickory Motor Speedway ahead of Mathew Thunhorst and Kenny Kibbey. “It feels great, but I’m worn out… These things are hard to win and whenever you can get one you gotta kind of enjoy it a little bit.”, Lowe told us after leading all 100 laps tonight, “These cars, it seems like if you can get out front you can stay out there unless you mess something up.”
Joe Segalla started the night off on the pole with James Lowe to his outside as the green flag came out. Lowe wasted no time dropping behind Segalla off the start and diving down low to take the inside line away going into the first turn and pulling ahead into the lead. Contact between Segalla and Austin Boelke soon thereafter shuffled the running order in the front letting Michael Goodman and Kenny Kibbey move up into 2nd and 3rd. Kibbey cleared Goodman and went to work closing the gap to Lowe.
Mathew Thunhorst cleared for 3rd place when Goodman found himself stuck on the outside line with a tightly packed group of cars running single file below him. Thunhorst and Kibbey battled side by side as the field had 20 laps completed with Thunhorst taking the position away with Justin Morton and Todd Liston catching the lead pack. Thunhorst started pressuring Lowe trying to force a mistake, but Lowe held the inside line running very close together lap after lap.
Going into the second half of the 100-lap event, Thunhorst stayed tight on Lowe’s rear bumper waiting for an opportunity to take advantage, but Lowe held his line not letting Thunhorst get beneath him. Kibbey stayed close behind ready to follow Thunhorst when the move was made for the lead. With 30 laps remaining, Liston cleared Morton for 4th place and started to close the half of a second gap to Kibbey as the leaders caught up to lap traffic for the first time of the evening.
Thunhorst became more aggressive giving Lowe a few light taps to his rear bumper with 20 laps to go. Lowe continued to run a consistent low line in the corners with the laps counting down and not giving Thunhorst a chance to get below him. Kibbey followed closely behind preventing Thunhorst from adjusting his entry for a better run off in the corners as it would open the inside line up enough for Kibbey to take advantage in the final laps. After an intense final few laps, Lowe took the checkered flag beating Thunhorst to the line by 0.139.
James Lowe jumped to the top of the point standings with tonight’s win with a total of 76 points. Kenny Kibbey follows behind by only 1 point and Mathew Thunhorst 3 points off the lead. Michael Goodman sits in 4th place with 71 points and Justin Morton rounds out the top 5 with 65 points. The Bootleg Racing League now heads out to Stafford Motor Speedway for the third round of the season on April 9th and you can catch all of the action broadcast live at 8:55PM EDT only on the Virtual Grip Network!
Virtual Grip Network 