Brad Looney ttok his second checkered flag in as many weeks at Heartland Park Topeka on April 8th. (Lloyd Collins)
MLRA: Looney Two For Two on New Season with Topeka Win
Ashley Berry
TOPEKA, Kan. - April 8. After leading last week's "Spring Meltdown" from start to finish at I-80 Speedway, Brad Looney Brad landed in the Lucas Oil MLRA Victory Lane for the second time in 2011 after leading all but one lap of Friday's MLRA even at Heartland Park Topeka.
Tony Jackson Jr. (56) races three-wide with #32 Chris Simpson and #75 Terry Phillips before racing to fifth at HRP, one position ahead of Phillips at the line. (Lloyd Collins)
Looney won his heat race to start the feature on the pole, but the Republic, Mo. driver did not breeze into victory lane. Four yellow flags in four laps slowed the pace at first, but the final 31 laps were contested caution free. John Anderson made a charge off of turn two late in the race on Looney's high side and briefly took the lead. Looney then changed his line and battled back to the front.
Al Purkey (33) ultimately got by #00 Jesse Stovall to finish third, while young Arizona racer R.C. Whitwell (96) continues to impress with his seventh place run. (Lloyd Collins)
The action was feverish between Al Purkey, who was the night's KRC Hard Charger after advancing from 18th to third, and Jesse Stovall, Terry Phillips, Tony Jackson Jr., and R.C. Whitwell. These five were several lengths back from the top two cars, but battled for the duration in and around lapped traffic.
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Big Gains for Hubbard, Pearson, Ogle - The A-Team Has Been Updated 05-15-12
Scott James battles #13 Barry Doss in heat race action at Florence (Ky.) Speedway, but in the $2,000-to-win feature, the only thing anyone saw was the tail end of James' #81 car. (Roy Walker)
After plenty of trash-talking via the electronic media between Jeff Matthews and Ivedent Lloyd last week, it was #21 Lloyd who got the final word as he reeled in #33 Matthews to win Friday's LM feature at Oclala, Fla.'s Bubba Raceway Park. (R.E. Wing)
Fans at Markleysburg, Pa.'s Roaring Knob Motorsports Comlex were treated to dual LM features Saturday - one a makeup from a May 5th rainout. (Above) Tim Senic challenges eventual regular feature winner Chuck Harper, while Jared Hawkins (below) claimed the makeup race. (Tommy Micheals)
Henley, Missouri's Jason Russell leads the way to Victory Lane in the ULMS Late Model feature at Lucas Oil Speedway Saturday. (Chris Bork)
Some fierce racing action at Lucas Oil speedway. (Chris Bork)
Dalton, Ga.'s Craig Reece returned to Dixie Speedway Saturday and led all the way to win the Crate LM victory. (Steve Hixson)
Ray Guss Jr. races last week's Quad City Speedway winner, Mike Murphy, Jr. This time, it was advantage Guss. (Chris Damitz)
With a strong motor back into his mount, Veteran Lamar Scoggins claimed last Friday's Crate LM victory at Boyd's Speedway. (Steve Hixson)
Veteran racer Lance Matthees navigates Spring Lake, Minnesota's Deer Creek Speedway before taking Saturday's WISSOTA Late Model checkers. (Jason Durst)
Racing hard at mid-pack, it's the dueling 55s of Cory Mahder (inside) and Greg Nippoldt at Deer Creek. (Jason Durst)
Ryan King (above and below) swept both the Ltd. Late Model and Crate Late Model features Saturday at 411 Motor Speedway in Seymour, Tenn. (Chad Wells)
Still riding his wave in Iowa, Mike Murphy, Jr. in early action before taking the main event win at Davenport last Friday. (Chris Damitz)
Jason Jameson ran a gauntlet to finally capture another win Friday night at Moler
Raceway Park (see main page). (Roy
Walker)
After holding back a charge from Alex Ferree, Chub Frank drove home with a Friday night win at Lernerville Speedway in Sarver, Pa. (John Stivason)
Bobby Pierce, Brett Sievert, and Mike Glynn race in a tight pack in Kankakee (Ill.) Speedway's "Crosstown Cup", but (below) it was ultimately Shawn Toczek (42) here racing the high side of Mike Provenzano, who sailed to the win. (Dan Simpson)
NALMS Suspends Remaining Season
In a statement released to the racing media Monday, Northern All All Stars Late Model Series (NALMS) owners Shawn Hall and Bob Mooney relased the following statement:
To all NALMS drivers and fans,
Northern Allstars Late Model Series regrets to inform all of our drivers and fans that as of today (May 14, 2012) we will suspend all series races for the remaining 2012 season. The primary reason for the decision to discontinue the series was mainly economics. Tracks, teams and fans are having a hard time these days with the cost of living in general. With the cost of fuel, parts, tires, tickets and lodging, many people just cannot afford to travel to our shows, so we feel it's best to stop for now and try to regroup for the 2013 season.
Our series needs to be able to have at least 18 to 20 shows to cover our cost of putting on these shows and our drivers point funds. With many tracks cutting back on their special events and other tracks just choosing not to have specials at all, it's has really cut our options for race tracks down to a very few unless you are willing to travel several hours away from the Central Illinois area, and that is not cost effective for the racing teams or fans.
In closing we would like to thank all of the drivers and fans whom have supported the series over the years and we hope to be able to come back with a bigger and better season for everyone in 2013.
A-Team Leaders from 1997-2011 (Click on link for complete rundown)
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