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| FASTRUCKS return to Citrus | by Larry MacMillan
(Inverness, Fl. 7/23/03) After a four week hiatus, Citrus County Speedway was able to put the hammer down and get a decent night of racing in with 135 cars taking part in kicking off the delayed second half of the 2003 racing season. Tim Christman was happy with the turn out for his first night of officiating and looks forward to continuing with more of the clean racing action that the drivers displayed last Saturday night. Now if he can control the weather the way he did on his first outing he will definitely be well accepted by the drivers and fans alike. Other than being a little warm, it was a perfect night for racing.
Barring any weather problems this weekend, Citrus is looking forward to the return of the FAST Trucks for their third appearance at the fast 3/8ths mile. Jeff Firestine of Nokomis was top shoe in their last outing in May and looks to return for another win over the likes of Tim Shaffnier, Marty Wolf, Tommy King, Gary Foxworth, Bobby Owens, James Wright III, Wendell Bristol, Graham McCorvey and Bill Stracey who took the top ten spots in the May race over the 21 truck starting field. This will be their last round at Citrus for 2003.
J.D. Goff took the win in the Sportsman 30 lap feature. Mike Bell moved from third to second and picked up 5 points on Sportsman leader Mike Veltman last week with a second place finish, being chased by Veltman to the checkers. Bill Oesterreicher slipped to third and holds a 40 point lead on Johnny Gann in that race. Johnny Sanders managed to pick up a few points on Gann and Oesterreicher but still holds out in fifth. They will be back to take another crack at it in heat and feature action this week end.
The Street Stock race for the top five got a little tighter after a super run by defending point champion Mike Bell who nursed a sick motor to his first win in that division. Danny Cretty still holds on to a slim 12 point lead over Ernie Reed in the race for the crown. Mickey Burns is feeling the heat from behind as Travis Nichols picked up a second place finish and moved around Joe Viverito in the race for fourth. They will have another show down Saturday night.
Chris Hooker logged his first Mini Stock win of the year and took over the point lead by 2 over Chris Thornton who has held the lead most of the season. Phillip Joyner moved up a notch to third in the absence of Dustin DesChamps who was hurt in a non racing accident and this is keeping him out of his seat. Mike Lawhorn maintained his fifth position and will try to improve his position this weekend in the Mini Stock heats and feature.
Richie Smith found his way through the 27 car Hobby Stock field and came up with a decent finish that extended his lead over Curtis Neumann in quest of his third division crown. Sport Wilson blew the 24 car field away with his eighth win of the season and fourth in a row and he is closing rapidly on the top spot. Dean Lawyer and Roy Perkins continue their battle for fourth this weekend.
Pat Quick lost her chance to pick up her 8th win of the season last week and lost ground to Lee Keller who finally got his first win of the year. Quick still leads by 140 points. Louie Cioe holds out in third with John Donahue moving around Larry Triana to round out the top five in Thunder Stock action.
Mike Bresnahan picked up an additional 183 point cushion in his Late Model lead after picking up his first point win of the season in their 75 lap main event last week. Jim Smith maintained his second spot over Ricky Carlton who came home a little beat up after the Late Model special. Herb Neumann and Dale Sanders moved into fourth and fifth spot respectively after the big one last week. Late Models will have two weeks off to make room for the FAST Trucks this weekend and the TBARA Sprints who turn it on next week.
Practice this week will be on Thursday night from 5 until 8 p.m. Pit gates open at 2 on Saturday and the grandstand gates open at 3 with time trials for the FAST Trucks scheduled for 5:30 and racing at 6.
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