The Tampa Bay Area Racing Association Sprint Cars made their first appearance of the year Saturday night with Scotty Adema of Ft. Myers holding off a hard-charging Sport Allen to take the victory at what he describes as his


favorite race track.  Twenty-one Sprint Car teams made the tow to the high-banked half mile with 19 cars still around for a trio of heat races after both Matt Alfonso and Mickey Kempgens had trouble during hot laps and parked their machines for the night.  Heat race victories would go to Ben Fritz, Dude Teate, and Brian Gingras setting the stage for the 30-lap nightcap.  One driver who had a rough go was "Flyin" Ryan Partin who had the brakes fail on his mount going into turn three during the second heat race.  Partin hit the outer wall virtually head on, then, with no way of stopping the car, slid back down the track and crashed hard into the inside railing.  Even though the car was shortened up a good two feet, Partin climbed out unharmed.  Partin was racing a second Sprinter for eventual feature winner Adema who got to experience both the highs and lows of being a race car owner on this night.  Dave Retzlaf and Larry J. Brazil, Jr. brought the field down for the start of the feature with Retzlaf leading the opening lap.  Adema, who started sixth, was on a roll right from the get-go and took the lead during the second lap bringing Fritz with him by Retzlaf.

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It was Fan Appreciation Night at New Smyrna Speedway Saturday and a nice crowd was treated to some great racing plus a large number of kids and their parents took part in a fun “Tire Race” at intermission that produced two of the worst “crashes” of the night.  All the kids were OK (especially after an ice cream treat) and got a chance to head home with a real race car tire in their possession.

Both the Super Stock and Open-Competition Modifieds ran 50-lap events while the Mini Stocks hit the track for a 25-lap feature.  The Super Stock drivers came out in force with 23 cars signing in although Warren Schurr’s Ford Torino broke in warm-ups and he was unable to start the big race.  Garrett Hill of Orlando established himself as the early favorite by blistering the track in qualifying with a lap of 20.753 seconds easily outdistancing the second-fast qualifier, Merritt Island’s Justin Reynolds who turned a lap at 21.170 seconds.  Hill pulled a five pill placing him fifth on the starting grid while it would be David Gould and Danny Frye on the front row for the start. Gould led the opening lap only to see the caution flag quickly out for Michael Bedient who spun in turn four.  Frye snared the lead on the restart and was out front when Michael Held bit off a chunk of the turn four wall to bring out the yellow on lap seven.  On the restart a multi-car melee took place in turn one involving the cars of Brandon Christian, Charles King, Butch Herdegen, Bedient and Joe Gerard.  Both Christian and Bedient were done for the night while all others continued with just “cosmetic” damage.  Frye set the pace for a few laps after the restart but Reynolds was on the charge in his “Mellow Yellow” Chevrolet and he took the lead, proceeding to draw away from the field, lapping cars well into the top ten before a caution flag appeared with five laps to go as Joe Bandur spun on the front stretch.  Hill was now up to second and everyone though Reynolds would now get a real challenge but is was not to be as he pulled away easily from Hill to claim a big victory made even sweeter because his grandfather was in attendance from Niagra Falls, NY to watch him race. (more…)