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Clauson Captures Lincoln; Goes 2 For 2 in Eastern Storm

And the beat goes on for Bryan Clauson after the Noblesville, Indiana driver continued his fairytale season Wednesday night by picking up his fifth USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Car feature victory of the 2016 season, and 11th overall USAC win, at Pennsylvania’s Lincoln Speedway.

Clauson ran down Chase Stockon for the lead with just six laps remaining in the caution-free affair to claim his 39th career USAC National Sprint Car victory, just one shy of the legendary Gary Bettenhausen for seventh on the all-time list.

Clauson lined up third behind front row starters Shane Golobic of California and Joey Biasi of Pennsylvania, but at the start, it was Biasi who took control as the field headed into turns one and two. As the two drag raced down the back straightaway, Golobic was able to mount a charge to grab the lead by a single car length at the line at the completion of lap one.

By lap four, third row starter and ProSource Fast Qualifier Chase Stockon began to charge to the front, maneuvering around the outside of Biasi for the second spot in turn one.

On lap six, Stockon had reeled in leader Golobic. The pair blasted side-by-side out of turn two, down the back straight without sparing an inch. As the two came wheel-to-wheel off of four, Stockon stole the leader’s lane, cutting across the nose of Golobic to assume the lead. One lap later, Clauson worked the middle and high grooves to take second away from Biasi with Stockon now his lone target.

Stockon took the high side of the 3/8-mile dirt oval after running low earlier while Clauson continued to search both high and low for the fastest way around the joint. Meanwhile, Chris Windom resumed his run of the bottom line from Grandview one night earlier, where he finished a strong third after starting deep into the field. This time, Windom didn’t have as far to travel from his fourth starting position as he ripped third from Golobic on the 12th lap.

Despite applying pressure throughout the middle portion of the 30-lapper, Stockon was able to gain a little breathing room as he distanced himself from Clauson a bit with 13 to go.

With 10 laps left, leader Stockon began to encounter lapped traffic, holding a roughly five-car-length advantage over Clauson in second.

Clauson began to creep ever closer to Stockon, foot-by-foot, inch-by-inch, reeling him in to within an arm’s length distance when Clauson (inside) and Stockon (outside) engaged in a fight that resulted in two near dead-heats at the line on laps 23 and 24, both officially credited to Stockon.

On the 25th lap, Clauson dove to the inside at the entrance of the first turn, pitching his machine sideways to slide up in front of Stockon in turn two, forcing him to slow his momentum, which allowed Clauson to pull away to a good-sized advantage down the back straightaway.

One lap later, when Stockon was still trying to settle back into a groove, Windom used a big run on Stockon heading into turn one, clearing Stockon for second as the duo exited turn two.

In the final laps, Clauson ran away from the pack, taking the victory by a half-straightaway over Windom, Stockon, Thomas Meseraull, Golobic, Ballou, Kevin Thomas, Jr., Biasi, Chad Boespflug and Jerry Coons, Jr.

Clauson has now won an astonishing seven of eight non-wing sprint car starts in the last 11 days in his Dooling-Hayward/B & H Contractors – Cancer Treatment Centers of America/Spike/Stanton Mopar. It’s Clauson’s fifth USAC National Sprint win behind the wheel of the Dooling/Hayward number 63 in only eight series starts this season.

Dating back to the Clauson/Dooling/Hayward combination’s series debut at the Eldora Speedway “4-Crown Nationals” in September of 2015, the duo has won seven of the 15 USAC National Sprint Car races they’ve appeared and now takes a nine-point lead into Thursday’s round three of “Eastern Storm” at New Egypt (N.J.) Speedway. But this night wasn’t easy from the get-go, having to compete in the late stages for the lead with Chase Stockon, who was fast right off the trailer.

“Chase was pretty good,” Clauson admitted. “He was moving around and I was moving around and we were just kind of staying even. It seemed like once he got to traffic, something happened and he couldn’t get into the corner quite as hard and we were able to track him down. I just kind of threw a half-hearted slider at him just to break his momentum and I don’t know if it surprised him or what, but I never saw him again after that. These races are tough. The competition is so deep in USAC right now. I just feel lucky to be able to drive a racecar as nice as this.”

Making his fifth ride since rejoining the Baldwin Brothers Racing stable a month ago, Canton, Illinois driver Chris Windom netted another strong performance in his Fox Paving – AMSOIL/Maxim/Claxton Mopar, his third straight top-five feature finish in a USAC National Sprint Car feature.

“We ran Bryan down, but when he got in front of Chase, he just checked out,” Windom explained. “But, we were really good. The first part of the race, I just had to figure out where to go because the track had been on the bottom all night and then it moved up. Bryan’s on it right now, but I think we’ve got something for him the rest of the week.”

Despite leading a race-high 19 laps in his 32-TBI Racing/Superior Tank & Trailer – Crescent Electric Supply/DRC/Fisher, Fort Branch, Indiana’s Chase Stockon had to settle for third after losing his brakes in the late going.

“I could hear somebody back there when I was running the bottom doing that diamond move and I figured the top would eventually come in,” Stockon said. So, I moved up there just to see if I could stay up front and run away. Shortly after I got into lapped traffic, the brake pedal just went to the floor and this place is pretty tough to run without brakes. But, we’re extremely happy to run third after we had a rough night last night. This was a nice rebound run for us.”

For the first time since November 5, 2011 during the “Oval Nationals” at Perris (Calif.) Auto Speedway, a track hosted multiple USAC National Sprint Car features in one night.

In Wednesday night’s second feature at Lincoln that awarded no points toward the series championship, the lineup was determined by who finished on the lead lap during the first feature and then completely inverted. Nineteenth place finisher Carmen Perigo, the last driver on the lead lap in the first feature, would start from the pole alongside Landon Simon while first feature winner Clauson lined up 19th.

Perigo led the first two laps from the pole, but Simon would run him down to take the number one spot on lap three.

With five laps to go, it became a three-car race between Simon, Brady Bacon and Aaron Farney. The trio were separated by an estimated three-car-lengths as they each hugged the inside guardrail around each turn.

Bacon continuously closed on Simon until he was right on Simon’s tail tank as the two headed for turn three. Bacon threw a Hail Mary to the treacherous high side in order to find a single ounce of moisture that would propel him past Simon. But it was not to be as Simon took his first career USAC-sanctioned victory and, in fact, Farney was able to make up the ground to beat Bacon to the checkered flag for the second spot.

With the win, Simon joined Troy Rutherford (Tri-City Speedway in Granite City, Ill. 2003) as the only driver to be victorious in a non-points-paying USAC National Sprint Car event without having a single full-points series win to his credit.

Contingency award winners at Lincoln Speedway included Chase Stockon (ProSource Fast Qualifier), Carmen Perigo (Simpson Race Products First Heat Race Winner), Jerry Coons, Jr. (Competition Suspension, Inc. (CSI) Second Heat Race Winner), Shane Cottle (Benic Enterprises Third Heat Race Winner & Wilwood Brakes 13th Place Feature Finisher), Chris Windom (Indy Race Parts Fourth Heat Race Winner) and Thomas Meseraull (KSE Racing Products Hard Charger).

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