Lucas Punkari
Following two consecutive rain-outs, the 2011 racing season kicked into high gear under clear skies Saturday evening at the Emo Speedway.
The driver to beat during the course of the night in the WISSOTA Modifieds division was Gavin Paull as the Fort Frances driver took the checkered flag in both the heat and feature.
“The car is working good,” Paull said following his convincing victory in the feature.
“We’ve been running out of town over the past couple of weeks, and we’re a third-place car there, so tonight [Saturday] we tried some new shocks and few different things just to get some things fine-tuned,” he explained.
Having started the 20-lap feature in fourth place, Paull rocketed to the lead in just a lap—snatching top spot away from Dwayne Pihulak and never looking back.
“I thought there would be a little bit of bite up top right at the start, so I thought I would go right to the outside,” Paull said of his start.
“Everybody kind of stayed to the middle or to the bottom, and worked out as I was able to get the lead,” he noted.
With only a part-time schedule planned for this season at Emo, Paull used the season-opener to help work on his car for when he runs at other tracks such as Grand Rapids and Hibbing.
“I’ve been doing my homework,” he remarked.
“When we run here early in the season, we can try some things that we don’t know on the car so that when we go out of town, we [are] more familiar with the changes that we have to deal with so the car can work better,” Paull added.
Gary Wilson finished in second place in the feature, nearly a half-track behind Paull, while defending division champ Glen Strachan rounded out the top three.
In the WISSOTA Midwest Modifieds feature, Chuck Lambert was able to work his way up to the front early and then pulled away to a dominant three-quarter track victory over Anthony Visser and Tylar Wilson.
But as the Fort Frances driver pointed out following the race, it wasn’t as easy as it looked.
“I was out of control quite a few times, trust me,” Lambert stressed.
“The car was good pretty much all night,” he added. “I would have liked to have been a little bit faster in the heat race, but that’s the way it goes.”
Lambert took the top spot away from Visser on a Lap 3 restart, and was under attack by Heat #1 winner Christopher Leek as the field made their way into turn #3.
Running the inside line, Leek drove in way too hot and looped his car around before making contact with Visser, with the damage suffered from that incident eventually bringing an end to the Emo driver’s night.
Leek wasn’t the only driver to run into problems in the early stages of the feature. Two laps prior to his incident, Heat #2 winner and defending division champ, Brady Caul, was forced to the sidelines after losing a driveshaft in turn #3.
“I wasn’t really sure what was happening at first,” Caul admitted.
“I got into the back of Tylar going into the corner when everyone was checking up and when I got back going, the driveshaft just fell out of the car.
“It’s a shame, too, because the car was running great prior to that,” Caul added.
And in the Street Stocks division, Don Bowman of Bemidji, Mn. was untouchable as he captured the heat and then led flag-to-flag in the feature from the pole.
Jeff Wickstrom was second, with Ron Westover taking third place.
Racing is set to continue this Saturday at 7:30 p.m. (weather permitting), with bicycle races taking place during intermission.
The grandstands will open to spectators at 6 p.m., with hot laps starting at 7 p.m.
