Sartini cashes in on Wilson's bounty

Early on it looked as though Rob Sartini would not be a major factor in the bounty hunt the in the Laird International Raceway Late Model Division.

With a $350 bounty up for grabs for anyone who could defeat George Wilson in the feature most people, when questioned, would have looked to the likes of Rod Bolduc or last years Late Model Champion Michael Gold to beat Wilson.

Sartini changed all that with one heat race.

After Dave Slingsby won a shortened four car dash to start the Late Model action, Wilson beat out Michael Gold and Rod Bolduc in the division's first heat race.

That's when Sartini began to heat up. The veteran driver held off a charging Wilson and Rick Leonard to win the second Late Model heat race and did so in fine fashion. The veteran driver of the No. 98 car turned his heat race success and brought it into the feature race, where he started on the inside of row two.

Sartini took the lead early on in the race and looked to have things in control but slowed down in the final laps, allowing Gold and Wilson to creep up on him, making for an exciting finish. Sartini held the lead until the final lap and battled Gold right down to the wire for the victory.

With Gold charging, Sartini managed to cross the finish line less than a second before Gold to claim the bounty. Wilson managed to finish a solid third while Bolduc came away with a fourth place finish.

In the Modified Division, the man track announcers Greg Brazeau and George Pinder have nicknamed 'Black Jack' was up to his usual tricks as well. Kevin Oicle has been unstoppable behind the wheel of a modified this season. Thursday night showed that he is just as good even when he's behind the wheel of someone else's car.

After winning the first Modified heat race, Oicle was involved in a crash during the second heat, a heat race in which Jordan Sims walked away as the victor, the veteran driver saw his car left on the shelf for the rest of the evening.

With his own car on the shelf, Oicle raced the feature using Andrew Ebare's No. 41 car for the 20-lap race, and proved to the near 2,000 fans in attendance that he is a force in the Modified Division by finishing in top spot, just ahead of Len Bibeau and Jordan Sims.

In the Factory Stock division, the field strayed away from their usual run of two heats and a feature as their first race of the night was a 10-lap Australian Pursuit, with the basic rules being that if you get passed, you're done for the race. Steve Kent, known by many around LIR as the 'Bar River Flash' found himself in the winners circle after the Pursuit as he defeated Mike Murphy and Chris Jones – the only other racers left on the track – for the win.

Jones redeemed himself in the heat race as he topped John Fragale and Kent to take the checkered flag. Kent was not to be outdone though as he came through when it mattered most by holding off John Hayes, Bill Butler and Murphy to win the feature race.

The Stock Four Division had an interesting night. After Travis MacIntosh won the first heat race of the evening, the racers came back to the track for heat two, only to find out they would be running in the opposite direction. With the cars running against the grain, Garden River's Scott Syrette defeated a hard-charging George Haldenby to take the heat race.

The feature race in the Stock Four Division was run in the same fashion, as voted on by the fans in attendance. The change in direction seemed to be just what the doctor ordered as Syrette and Haldenby finished in first and second respectively in the same fashion as the heat.

Heat one winner Travis MacIntosh finished third and Tyler Parsons finished in fourth spot. Parsons, a third generation stock car driver, overcame some car trouble earlier in the evening to put together a strong feature race, en route to the fourth place finish.

Action will continue at LIR next Thursday night, July 7th, with qualifying set for 6 p.m. and racing set for 7 p.m. Further info as well as results, pictures and statistics can all be found at the official LIR website at www.lairdinternationalraceway.com.