Testing SpeedwayMedia.com

Tag: Williams Grove Speedway

  • Tony Stewart Fared Better at Local Short Tracks than in Martinsville Cup Race

    Tony Stewart Fared Better at Local Short Tracks than in Martinsville Cup Race

    There is no doubt that Tony Stewart, three-time NASCAR champion, is a fierce competitor. This past weekend, however, Stewart was more successful on the local short track circuit, including Williams Grove and Selinsgrove Speedway, than he was in the Cup race at Martinsville.

    On Friday night, Smoke showed up to race at Williams Grove Speedway in Pennsylvania.  Taking his spot in a sprint car, he was quick in hot laps and started eighth in the heat race.

    Stewart picked his way through the field to finish second behind Brent Marks in the heat event. His finish gave him the opportunity to draw for his start position in the feature.

    Smoke went on to run in the top five for most of the 25-lap main event and was as high as third at the halfway mark. He was then passed by Don Kreitz, Jr. to finish fourth.

    With his appetite whetted for the Pennsylvania short tracks, Stewart jumped back to the sprint car track from Martinsville to compete on Saturday at Selinsgrove Speedway in the Empire Super Sprint/Mach 1 Chassis 358-360 sprint car challenge race.

    “My pilots get a lot of third-shift flights,” Stewart said of his travel between race tracks. “But it makes it all worthwhile when I can come to a cool place like this.”

    “It’s obviously one of the most famous tracks in Pennsylvania.”

    This was Stewart’s first completed race at Selinsgrove, where racers like Jan Opperman cut their teeth and honed their racing prowess. The last Selinsgrove race in which Smoke competed was called due to rain.

    And just like the other racing legends back in the day, Smoke strutted his stuff, setting a new track record in qualifying, with a fast lap of 17.168 seconds.

    Unfortunately, Stewart’s luck did not hold out when it came to drawing for his starting position. He drew eighth in the feature event.

    “I was nervous when we drew an eight for the feature,” Stewart said prior to the race. “Knowing that Pat Cannon and Mark Smith are up there, those are the guys you’re going to have to watch out for and have to beat.”

    Smoke had no reason to be nervous, however, as once the green flag dropped, he drove to the front of the field, winning his first sprint race of the year. The victory was especially sweet since Stewart’s race got rained out last year.

    “It’s an honor to run here,” Smoke said in Victory Lane. “I’m glad we got back here tonight.”

    “The track got so wide and racy,” Stewart continued. “It’s fun when you can go to a track and have a lot of room to race from top to bottom.”

    Although Stewart shared that he would take the momentum of the Selinsgrove win with him to Martinsville, that was not meant to be. Smoke started deep in the field in the Cup race in 26th and finished not much higher in 17th.

    Although Stewart’s No. 14 Rush Truck Centers/Mobil 1 Chevrolet did improve by the mid-point of the race, he suffered from restarting in the outside lane on lap 473 and was stuck there for many of the final laps.

    “We were treed in that outside lane,” Stewart said. “We worked hard on this Rush Truck Centers/Mobil 1 Chevy all weekend.”

    “It wasn’t perfect,” Smoke continued. “But we made steady progress with it.”

    “To have it kind of fall away like that at the end is pretty disappointing.”

    While Stewart may have enjoyed his Pennsylvania short track experiences better than his Cup run, he certainly must have enjoyed seeing his teammate and protégé Danica Patrick outshine him. Danica finished 12th and scored her best Sprint Cup result since finishing eighth in the Daytona 500.

    “It was a nice day for us,” Patrick said. “We’ve had quite a few bad ones since Daytona.”

    “So, we’ll take this and get rolling into the summer because we don’t have a break until July.”

    Unfortunately, Smoke’s other teammate Ryan Newman had an even more miserable day than his team owner. Newman had several flat right-front tires which resulted in a 31st place finish, eight laps down.

    “That wasn’t the finish we deserved today,” Newman said. “We had a right-front tire go down late in the going and that obviously put us behind.”

    “NASCAR penalized us for intentionally bringing out the caution so they held us for three laps,” Newman continued. “We lost another right front not long after that and our day was pretty much done from there.”

    Team owner, Sprint Cup and sprint car racer Tony Stewart can, however, claim one bright spot. He leads both Newman and Patrick in the point standings, currently 22nd, 96 points behind new point’s leader Jimmie Johnson.

    Stewart is scheduled next to compete in the Cup race at Texas Motor Speedway. But one never knows at which sprint car track he will appear next.

     

  • Kasey Kahne Takes His Juggling Act on the Pocono Road

    Kasey Kahne Takes His Juggling Act on the Pocono Road

    [media-credit id=18 align=”alignright” width=”189″][/media-credit]Kasey Kahne, driver of the No. 4 Red Bull Toyota, has been juggling to keep many balls in the air as he motors into Pocono race weekend.

    One of the balls that he has been most worried about juggling is qualifying well at the ‘Tricky Triangle’. But Kahne need not have worried as he scored the outside pole, his 10th top-10 start in 16 races at Pocono.

    “It’s always good to start up front at this place,” Kahne said. “You can definitely pass here but it’s good to start up front too.”

    Kahne will turn his attention next to another critical ball to juggle, staying good throughout the 200 lap, 500 mile Good Sam RV Insurance race.

    “I’ll just try to get through the corners,” Kahne said. “It’s such a rough track.”

    “We looked at notes from earlier in the year and what we struggled with or were good at and what we’ve learned since then,” Kahne said. “We will take all that knowledge and hopefully make ourselves better.

    “This has been a great track for myself and for our team and I think we can do good.”

    Some of the other balls that Kahne is juggling are his intense attempts to make the Chase, finishing out with Red Bull and transitioning to Hendrick Motor Sports, managing his own sprint car team, as well as trying to raise money for the Kasey Kahne Foundation.

    As far as the Chase, Kahne firmly believes that he and his team are still in the hunt. But he also acknowledges that he will not make it in on points.

    “For us, we just need to win a race,” Kahne said. “If you can win two, you’d be a lock at this point.”

    “But things can change so we just have to figure out how to win to get in the Chase,” Kahne continued. “We just got a little too far behind in the points to race our way in points wise.”

    If he does not qualify for the Chase with his Red Bull team, Kahne will be disappointed, but not bereft.

    “If we don’t make the Chase, it won’t be a horrible season,” Kahne said. “But it definitely won’t be what we shot for.”

    “And we’ll just still have to finish the season as strong as we can and try to win.”

    Another ball that Kahne is juggling is his transition from Red Bull Racing, his place holder team this season, to his more permanent gig at Hendrick Motor Sports in 2012.

    “We’re always preparing for next year,” Kahne said. “Kenny Francis (crew chief) is going with me next year and we’re going to work together.”

    “It can all benefit us for next year.”

    Kahne admits that he will really miss Red Bull Racing, from the excitement of their brand to the special friends that he has met.

    “Red Bull is a really cool partner and a lot of fun to work with,” Kahne said. “They’re exciting and they enjoy life and racing and all that.”

    “I think I’ll miss some of that and some of the new people that I’ve met and been able to work with,” Kahne continued. “There are some really good people that are there. I’ll miss that kind of stuff.”

    “As far as Hendrick, I’m looking forward to the best opportunity I’ve ever been given in Cup racing,” Kahne continued. “When you get an opportunity like that, it’s up to you to take advantage of it.”

    Another ball that Kahne has been juggling is ownership of his own sprint car team. This has been especially difficult as his driver, Joey Saldana, recently wrecked and is out for the season and Kahne took his own wild ride in his car, flipping out of the Williams Grove track.

    “It’s been a tough couple of weeks,” Kahne said. “Joey’s out of the hospital but he’s really banged up.”

    “He got crushed pretty much by another car,” Kahne continued. “So, he’s out for the season.

    As for his own condition after his wreck at the Grove, Kahne admitted that he had “about a three day soreness.” Kahne also realized that he created a firestorm of discussion as to whether or not Cup drivers should be taking those chances racing in lower divisions.

    “Yeah, I got a call from Rick Hendrick,” Kahne admitted. “And I got calls from just about everybody.

    While Kahne continues to juggle those calls, his final ball that he is keeping in the air is one that he is intensely passionate about, the Kasey Kahne Foundation.

    “We’re still really after it and doing as much as we can for underprivileged, chronically ill children through the Kasey Kahne Foundation,” Kahne said. “One thing that’s really neat is what Sprint’s doing, giving us the opportunity to win a lot of money, a million dollars, for our Foundation here in the next five races.”

    “We got a chance to do that since these are really good tracks for us,” Kahne continued. “Sprint’s really put up a neat program for everybody to shoot for. It’s pretty awesome.”

    “So, that definitely motivates me,” Kahne said. “To win a million for yourself is great, to win it for a fan is awesome but to win it for chronically ill, underprivileged children would be the best.”