| Leonard Makes It Two In a Row For East Bay Raceway Drivers | By Jean Lynch
 TAMPA, FL - "Maybe we locals can keep this streak going the rest of the week", said Greg Leonard after leading all 25 laps of the second preliminary night of the 4-day 7th Annual 360 Winternationals at East Bay Raceway Park Thursday night.
After an early yellow on lap two, the feature required Leonard to sit up in the seat for the next 21 laps and dice through traffic as he was chased by Danny Martin, Terry McCarl and Gary Wright who were poised to take advantage of any mistake the leader might make. Leonard made the right choices and pulled off the win.
After timing 12th, Leonard was able to start on pole after two faster cars, Jason Sides and Darren Stewart were unable to make it past the C-Main and four other cars who timed faster, had to run the B-Main.
Leonard showed the way the entire distance, despite a late yellow flag with two laps to go. The drama there was to see if second place runner, Martin, suffering with a bent front wing, could catch him. On the last lap in turns one and two, Martin pulled a wheelie because of no down-force on his front end and lost second spot when McCarl and Wright zipped by. Zach Chappell, Kenny Adams, Mike Chadd, Chad Kemenah, Wayne Johnson and Kelly Kinser rounded out the top ten.
It was the second big-time win for Leonard within the last three months here driving for the car-owner and driver Tom Winegardner, Sr. Leonard won the USCS Fall Brawl at East Bay in November and tonight, once again, substituting for Winegardner, Leonard powered his way to a $l,500 win.
When Winegardner had open-heart surgery this past summer, he picked the 22-year old Leonard who had an impressive record of 30 career sprint car wins, to get behind the wheel of his J&J car. The team got the job done tonight against a field of 46 of the countrys best 360 drivers.
Tom, Jr., the younger Winegardner, who also drives, was in victory lane with the happy crew and explained, This is Dads car. Its two years older than mine and I guess its bent just right. Their business, WRP in Pierson, Florida is a J&J dealership that also handles Fuel Safe, Red Devil Brakes, Fast Wings, Race Bolts, Sander Engineering supplies, Winter Performance products, Racing Optics, Earls fittings and Schoenfeld headers.
Greds Dad was turning the wrenches on the car all night long. His job was to keep tightening the car by playing with the set up and changing the front shocks. Proof that he had the car nearly perfect was told by looking at the Hoosier tires on the rear of the car. We ran that right rear two nights in a row and the left rear still looks like it did when we put it on, he said.
Heats went to Tony Bruce, Jr., Chad Layton, Paul Sides and Leonard. The C-Main advanced Tighe Schloss, Chadd, Cody Geldart, Terry Pletch, Lincoln Gatwood and Danny Jones. Then Geldart, Kemenah, Chadd, Greg Wilson, Jesse Giannetto, Sport Allen, Mike Senecal and Ryan Myers moved up from the B. The winner of the Gulf Coast Produce Strawberry Dash went to Mike Schroeder. The 20-lap Florida Mini-Sprint winner was Duane Harbaugh.
Qualifying Results:
1. 4A Kenny Adams ? 13.364; 2. 9 Gary Wright ? 13.478; 3. 1M Terry McCarl ? 13.651; 4. 7S Jason Sides ?
13.662; 5. 6G Cody Geldart ? 13.678; 6. 7A Johnny Anderson ? 13.741; 7. 13.771; 8. F1 Nick Fratto ? 13.806; 9. 50Z Zach Chappell ? 1 Martin, Jr. ? 13.866; 11. 4C Mike Chad ? 13.878; 12. 11 Greg 13. 2 Trevor Lewis ? 13.938; 14. 15K Chad Kemenah ? 13.951; 15. 40R Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. ? 13.963; 16. 97 Kelly Kinser 0 Glenn Styers ? 14.028; 18. 55 Chad Layton – 14.046; 19. 33K Kyle Patrick ? 14.046; 20. 94 Wayne Johnson ? 14.049 Jr. ? 14.061; 22. 96 Bronson Maeschon ? 14.076; 23. 11J Paul 20B Mike Becht ? 14.112; 25. 42X Sport Allen ? 14.119; 26. 3 14.181; 27. 82 Brian Maddox ? 14.181; 28. D1 Jesse Giannetto ? Greg Wilson ? 14.214; 30. 45 Tighe Schloss ? 14.249; 31. 42 14.259; 32. 4 Mike Senecal ? 14.285; 33. 18JP Robert Pillon ? David Kountz ? 14.469; 35. 3 Daryl Smith ? 14.482; 36. 99 Da 37. 56R Ryan Myers ? 14.518; 38. 21 Johnny Gilbertson ? 14.5 Carlsson ? 14.677; 40. 2D Doug Day ? 14.741; 41. 38 Lincoln Gatwood ? 14.793; 42. 12 Bryan Eckley ? 14.805; 43. 29P Terry Pletch ? 14.876; 44. 6 Mike Schroeder ? Tom Wingardner ? N/T; 46. 02 Gene Lasker N/T
1st Heat – 1)Tony Bruce, Jr. 2)Glenn Styers 3)Zach Chappell 4)Kenny Adams 5)Trevor Lewis 6)Greg Wilson 7)Sport Allen 8)Ryan Myers 9)Lincoln Gatwood 10)Cody Geldart 11)Robert Pillon DNS 12)Gene Lasker DNS
2nd Heat – 1)Chad Layton 2)Gary Wright 3)Branson Maeschen 4)Danny Martin, Jr. 5)Chad Kemenah 6)Johnny Anderson 7)Steve Darvalics 8)Johnny Gilbertson 9)Tighes Schloss 10)David Kountz 11)Bryan Eckley 12)Tom Wingardner DNS
3rd Heat – 1)Paul Sides 2)Terry McCarl 3)Kyle Patrick 4)Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. 5)Paulie Milum 6)Brian Maddox 7)Frank Carlsson 8)Daryl Smith 9)Terry Pletch 10)Mike Chad 11)Darren Stewart
4th Heat – 1)Greg Leonard 2)Mike Becht 3)Wayne Johnson 4)Kelly Kinser 5)Mike Senecal 6)Nick Fratto 7)Jesse Giannetto 8)Doug Day 9)Danny Jones 10)Mike Schroeder 11)Jason Sides DNS
C Main – 1)Tighe Schloss 2)Mike Chad 3)Cody Geldart 4)Terry Pletch 5)Lincoln Gatwood 6)Danny Jones 7)Mike Schroeder 8)Bryan Eckley 9)Darren Stewart DNS 10)David Kountz DNS 11)Jason Sides DNS 12)Robert Pillon DNS 13)Tom Wingardner DNS
B – Main – 1)Cody Geldart 2)Chad Kemenah 3)Mike Chadd 4)Greg Wilson 5)Jesse Giannetto 6)Sport Allen 7)Mike Senecal 8)Ryan Myers 9)Frank Carlsson 10)Johnny Gilbertson 11)Johnny Anderson 12)Tighe Schloss 13)Doug Day 14)Brian Maddox 15)Paulie Milum 16)Nick Fratto 17)Terry Pletch 18)Stephen Darvalics 19)Daryl Smith 20)Lincoln Gatwood 21)Trevor Lewis 22)Danny Jones
A – Main (25 Laps) ? 1)Greg Leonard 2)Terry McCarl 3)Gary Wright 4)Danny Martin, Jr. 5)Zach Chappell 6)Kenny Adams 7)Mike Chadd 8)Chad Kemenah 9)Wayne Johnson 10)Kelly Kinser 11)Ricky Stenhouse 12)Greg Wilson 13)Mike Senecal 14)Tony Bruce, Jr. 15)Cody Geldart 16)Sport Allen 17)Chad Layton 18)Paul Sides 19)Ryan Myers 20)Glen Styers 21)Jesse Giannetto 22)Kyle Patrick 23)Bronson Maeschen 24)Mike Brecht
Gulf Coast Produce Strawberry Dash – 1)Mike Schroeder 2)Danny Jones 3)Nick Fratto 4)Frank Carlsson 5)Tighe Schloss 6)Steve Darvalics
MINI SPRINTS RESULTS:
Heat Winners – 1st heat)George Ulmer; 2nd heat)Duane Harbaugh
Feature (20 Laps) – 1)Duane Harbaugh 2)Jim Brookens 3)Ron Taggart 4)George Ulmer 5)John Craddock 6)Jim Young 7)Eddie Moss, Jr. 8)Ralf Herrero 9)James Fairfield 10)Jason Brown 11)Harold Matthews 12)Dereck King 13)Gregory Skyta 14)Cory Spencer 15)Andrew Griffin 16)Jess Teed 17)Paul Gottschalk 18)Darryl Wills
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