‘The Cheque Casher’ Tops the Best in the Province 

The Dominos Pizza Thunder Cars were the main event of the evening. 33 of the best cars in the province made the trip to Sunset Speedway for the 50-Lap $1,000 to win spectacular. Fast qualifier ‘The Deuce’ Dave Doucette drew an inversion of 7, putting invaders Shawn Murray and Charlie Smith on the pole.  Smith flexed his motor early on, leaving Doucette, Murray and Herb Walters to battle for position in behind him. Smith worked his way through lapped traffic diligently, putting more back markers between himself and Walters, who had worked his way to 2^nd. The turning point of the race came just one lap past half way, Walters used a terrific run off of corner 2, to propel his Mariodesigns.ca sponsored #88 down the inside of Smith to take the lead down the backstretch. It was far from smooth sailing the rest of the way, as lapped traffic kept Smith and highly touted prodigy Willie Reyns nipping at Walters heels for the remaining 24 laps. At the line, it was the #88 of Walters, #7 Smith and #87 Willie Reyns.

Walters was all smiles in victory lane when discussing the biggest win of his career; “This is huge, I don’t know what to say. It was tough all night, between the lapped cars, the slick track and a stout field of drivers, I’m at a loss for words. I just want to thank all my sponsors, my crew and also the [Stompin’ Tom Walters] crew for all the hard work they’ve put in on this car. This is for all of them".  Charlie Smith was happy enough with his 2^nd place run to almost guarantee a return visit; “We just hook up well here. I don’t run this well [back home] at Barrie Speedway , so I might just have to change the carburetor on the car and come here more often".

Reyns also shared his view on the race towards the end, “Those lappers definitely might have cost us a couple of positions at the end, but we’re happy with what we got. Herby drove a great race. We’re going to try to make it up here again for the [September 20^th] 40-Lapper. It’s a long drive for us, but I’m happy we came”.

The Fox’s Bakery Four Funs certainly took home the award for nail biter division of the night. A combination of inexperienced racers and a very slick track made for some big crashes and tense moments. 24 Four Funs started the feature, and the points leaders starting at the tail end of the field allowed for some fresh faces to find some time at the front. One of these “fresh faces” was actually a veteran of the division; ‘Boxcar’ Mark Kehoe has been a staple of the division since it’s sophomore year in 2005, and on this night he was the fastest car on the track. Starting from the fourth row, Kehoe used every available lane to duck and dodge through traffic, eventually pulling to the rear bumper of race leader Ashley Romano. After a lap of battling, Kehoe deposited of Romano and brought with him the #9 of Marshall Pender and the #35 of defending champion ‘Wunderkind’ Myles Jamieson. Then, “the big one” happened. Just past the halfway mark, heavy impact between the #3 Frederic Lacroix, #15 Bob Mercer and #0 Jeremy Hodder brought an end to the feature. EMT crews responded for Mercer, who was extradited and taken to hospital for a precautionary check-up. However, the story didn’t stop there. After post-race celebrations, Kehoe brought his #4 Tammy’s Ferrier Service sponsored Volkswagen Rabbit to tech lane; It was in post-tech that Kehoe was disqualified and stripped of his feature win for a tire infraction, thus handing the win over to the #35 ‘Wunderkind’ Myles Jamieson.

The HF Smith Home Hardware Late Models were all evenly matched through both rounds of qualifying, and their feature event would prove no different. At the drop of the green it was the 2007 Thunder Car champion and 2008 Rookie of the Year contender Ernie Fumerton with the lead early on. Just behind the top 3, a fantastic battle was shaping up between Chris Morrow, ‘Stompin’ Tom Walters and Jason Witty. The three cars had stormed through the field together, and were now knocking on the leaders back doors.  The move of the night came as Morrow was passing the #45 of Rob Poole for second, as they dove for turn 3, a lapped car couldn’t get out of the way; This forced Morrow to thread the needle between Poole and the lapped car, taking the spot from Poole . ‘Mr. Excitement’ then led the train of 3 cars past the race leader, Ernie Fumerton and began concentrating on holding off the pressuring #47 of Walters. For the closing 5 laps, ‘Stompin Tom’ searched for a way by on the inside, but Morrow had the low groove locked up tight.  As the checkers dropped, the top three were Morrow, Walters and Witty.  In victory lane, Morrow explained just how difficult his campaign for a win was; “We had a tire going down with about 5 to go, I knew [Tom] was behind me, so I really had to pull out some fancy driving”.  This feature marked Morrow’s 2^nd of the year, and with no indication of slowing down, sent the rest of the division a message not to count out the defending champion.

The Fox’s Bakery Four Cylinder Road Runners closed out the show, running a non-points invitational-style feature to close out the night. Under invitational rules, fast qualifiers start at the front; On this night, that meant the #10 of Doug Butler took off from outside pole. At the conclusion of the first lap, Butler had already broken away from the field, bringing with him the #48 ‘Mr. White Walls’ Nick Brown. The race was every bit as uneventful as Butler would have wanted, going flag to flag, with Butler able to manoeuvre around lapped cars with relative ease. Though Brown mounted a legitimate charge at lap 10, Butler was again able to pull away and cruise home to his 2^nd feature win of the 2008 season.  In his post-race interview, Butler expressed hopes of continuing his strong performance through the remainder of the season; “Hopefully we can bring home that championship, I mean, that’s what we’re here for”.