{"id":21298,"date":"2014-04-07T16:14:30","date_gmt":"2014-04-07T16:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/?p=21298"},"modified":"2014-04-07T16:15:07","modified_gmt":"2014-04-07T16:15:07","slug":"wild-night-at-orlando-speedworld-conlin-bennett-and-sinkula-take-wins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/front-page-news\/wild-night-at-orlando-speedworld-conlin-bennett-and-sinkula-take-wins\/","title":{"rendered":"WILD NIGHT AT ORLANDO SPEEDWORLD – CONLIN, BENNETT AND SINKULA TAKE WINS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"OrlandoThere was no full moon\u00a0Friday\u00a0night at Orlando SpeedWorld but it sure seemed\u00a0like it as the fans saw plenty of slam-bang action that kept wrecker driver\u00a0Tim Cordell busy most of the night. \u00a0A very nice field of Sportsman cars saw their pair of heat races won by\u00a0Richard Fiore, Jr. and Daniel Conlin, Jr. but it would be pole sitter Ron\u00a0Gustafson jumping out to an early lead in the 25-lap feature. \u00a0Gustafson would\u00a0lead the first five circuits before Earl Beckner got by to assume the point as\u00a0he was looking to make it two wins in a row. \u00a0Timmy Todd, Jr. spun his\u00a0brand-new mount coming off turn four to bring out the first caution flag on\u00a0lap seven. \u00a0Beckner continued to set the pace until yellow flag number two was thrown for\u00a0debris on the track at the completion of lap ten. \u00a0On the restart, Gustafson\u00a0found himself in the backstretch wall, coming to rest in turn three with a\u00a0badly crunched car and out of the event. \u00a0By this time Derrick Wood, who started deep in the 14 car field, had worked\u00a0his way to second place and looked like he might have something for leader\u00a0Beckner. \u00a0However, Wood’s car suddenly slowed coming off turn two during the\u00a012th lap and he coasted to the infield. \u00a0Two laps later Fiore and Roger\u00a0Blevins collided going into turn one with Blevins’ car in the wall and\u00a0ultimately done for the evening. \u00a0On the restart Conlin, now up to second, got into the back of Beckner’s car\u00a0going down the backstretch sending Beckner’s machine hard into the wall. \u00a0A\u00a0not so happy Beckner walked back to the pits, done for the night. \u00a0It was even\u00a0more frustrating for the Orlando driver as he and his crew had to thrash for\u00a0several days just to get here for the action after blowing an engine and\u00a0crashing the car badly at Auburndale Speedway two weeks ago.<\/p>\n

Steve Barnes inherited the lead at this point as Conlin was sent to the back\u00a0of the restart line-up for rough driving. \u00a0Barnes was looking good out front\u00a0but his progress was slowed by yet another crash on lap 21 that saw Noah\u00a0Cornman hard into the turn four wall. \u00a0The young driver walked away unharmed\u00a0but his Bramlett Motorsports race car was shortened up considerably. \u00a0With\u00a0just eight cars left on track, Conlin found himself back in the thick of\u00a0things and he immediately began to pressure Barnes for the lead, taking the\u00a0top spot on the white flag lap and leading to the finish for his second careerwin here. \u00a0A disappointed Barnes held on for second while Fiore rallied to claim third
\nplace ahead of a great drive by newcomer Justin Starr and veteran Andy Nichols\u00a0who was making his first SpeedWorld start in over a year. \u00a0Ted Helmes took\u00a0sixth trailed by Todd and Brandon Christian, the last cars still running. \u00a0Rounding out the finishing order were Cornman, Beckner, Wood, Blevins,\u00a0Gustafson and Ted Head.<\/p>\n

The Modified feature was a much tamer affair and saw just one leader as Bruce\u00a0Bennett of Belle Isle led from green to checker after starting from the pole. \u00a0Bennett had his car on rails and was never seriously challenged, despite two\u00a0caution periods for minor incidents. \u00a0Alan Bruns tried his best to track down\u00a0the fleet Bennett but it was to no avail and he settled for second in front of\u00a0Chad Pierce and Matt Wheeler who both made a run back to the front after\u00a0bringing out the first yellow when they tangled on the sixth lap. \u00a0Fifth went\u00a0to Zach Harris while Austin Howell, Billy Tokes, Beckner and Matt Jarrett\u00a0completed the finishing order. \u00a0Modified heat race victories went to Wheeler\u00a0and Pierce.<\/p>\n

It was a rough start to the Legend Car feature as Joey Langis, making his\u00a0first start of the season, pounded the turn three wall on the opening lap\u00a0badly damaging his mount. \u00a0Mark Bibeau led the opening pair of laps before\u00a0being passed by Donovan Ponder. \u00a0Keith Sinkula attempted to follow Ponder by\u00a0Bibeau but got into Bibeau’s car sending him for a spin. \u00a0Tony Stanbuck had\u00a0nowhere to go and hit Bibeau broadside. \u00a0Stanbuck’s car had to be towed from\u00a0the track while Bibeau drove his damaged car back to the pits, but both were\u00a0done for the evening. \u00a0Ponder continued to set the pace but gave way to Darin Coker on lap six with\u00a0Sinkula following into second a lap later. \u00a0From there the race was on as the\u00a0two Southwest Florida drivers traded the lead over the second half of the race\u00a0with Sinkula taking over on the 19th lap and holding off a determined Coker
\nthe rest of the way to score his first win of the year. \u00a0So far in the very\u00a0competitive Legend Car class, there have been four winners in four races so\u00a0far this season. \u00a0Coker claim the runner-up spot followed by Ponder, David Owen, William\u00a0Hindman, Bibeau, Stanbuck and Langis. \u00a0Heats were won by Owen and Sinkula.<\/p>\n

It was a David vs. Goliath battle in the Strictly Stock feature race that saw\u00a0the V-8 cars combined with the Four Cylinder Stocks for the evening’s\u00a0activity. \u00a0Zachary Curtis put his Saturn out front for the first two laps but\u00a0could not hold off the much bigger Chevy Monte Carlo of William Hindman who\u00a0eventually claimed his third win in a row. \u00a0The smaller cars showed their\u00a0stuff though as Curtis came in second followed by the Ford Escort of Eric\u00a0Hodge and the Toyota Celica of John Gross. \u00a0Fifth went to a Lincoln driven by\u00a0Rich “Crash” Tyner while Jamie Sullivan, Kevin Ledford, Jim Erb, Megan\u00a0Metheny, Warren Howie, Paul Cornelius and Rex Carr rounded out the finishers. \u00a0Ledford and Hindman won the heat races.<\/p>\n

Colton Bramlett dominated the Bandolero action winning both the heat race and\u00a0feature over Sam Cornman and Brandi Bibeau. \u00a0During the evening, over $500 was raised for the family of Niokoa Johnson, the\u00a0young girl who lost her life in a recent accident at Ocala Speedway. \u00a0Race\u00a0promoter Butch Carr, Sr. will present the donations to Ocala Speedway\u00a0management on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There was no full moon\u00a0Friday\u00a0night at Orlando SpeedWorld but it sure seemed\u00a0like it as the fans saw plenty of slam-bang action that kept wrecker driver\u00a0Tim […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"publish_to_discourse":"","publish_post_category":"","wpdc_auto_publish_overridden":"","wpdc_topic_tags":"","wpdc_pin_topic":"","wpdc_pin_until":"","discourse_post_id":"","discourse_permalink":"","wpdc_publishing_response":"","wpdc_publishing_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[22,3,18,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","category-front-page-news","category-orlando-speedworld","category-race-results"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21298"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21298\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21304,"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21298\/revisions\/21304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karnac.com\/flanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}