IT'S TIME TO RACE!!

August 1, 2004 FSCR Barros takes Modified Win at Putnam by Jon Harney SATSUMA, FL (7/31) – After several weeks of rained out events, the skies afforded the racers and fans a break and racing commenced on the 3/8-mile, high banked oval. The main event featured a heads-up battle between the drivers of the Florida Sprint Car Association and the USA Sprints. This was the first time ever these two organizations had raced on the same night against each other and, hopefully, will be only the beginning of a long association. Over twenty cars answered the green flag with Mike Love capturing the initial lead. Love’s reign lasted only four laps as Bruce Durden, Jr. zipped past with Gene Lasker following in hot pursuit. Attrition was a major factor as numerous minor incidents shuffled the lineup throughout the 25-lap event. Durden overcame the many restarts and the lapped cars to capture the checkers by a comfortable margin over runner-up Lasker. Tommy Denton worked his way through the field to earn a respectable third ahead of Lee Scrape and Shane Kreidler. Local Modified racers Jason Lowe and Robby Barris also tried their hands at the Sprint cars, but had their problems as Lowe fell early to mechanical difficulties and Barris saw a potential seventh place finish fade as his car malfunctioned late in the event. Barris and Lowe enjoyed much better results when they returned to Modifieds. Both started on the front row and quickly established themselves as the class of the field. Long green flag stretches meant the leaders had to contend with a lot of lapped traffic. Lowe kept things competitive until the last quarter of the race when Barris’ #32B displayed thoroughbred legs and galloped off into the distance for his eighth win of the season. Lowe finished a comfortable second several lengths ahead of Garry Flynn, who upended Morgan Bass in the closing laps for third. Phil Guadagno rounded out the top five. Polesitter Toby Sims ran off with the early Street Stock lead and looked to be a match for multiple feature winner Kenny Hall. Both cars made contact, however, and were taken out of contention. This was fine with Martin Johnson, who was making his first Street Stock appearance at Putnam in quite some time. While Sims and Hall struggled through the pack, Johnson had little difficulty holding off his rivals and sailed to his first feature win of 2004. Hall recovered well enough to take second, but had worn out his car in the process and had nothing left for the leader at the end. Mark Kinley finished third ahead of Mitch Wise. Twenty Pure Stocks started their feature with Randy Moody looking for his first feature win as he converted his pole starting position to the lead. Kenny Durham and Mike Tripp allowed Moody no rest during the first eight laps. Tripp made a run on Moody on a restart to snatch the top spot on the back straight and never looked back for the remainder of the race. Joe Watson passed Moody for second three laps later and that settled the top three as other cars sliced and diced for the remaining order. At the pay window the standings read Tripp, Watson, Moody, Kenneth Hall, Jr., and Street Stock victor Martin Johnson. Eric Platt continued his winning ways in Limited Late Models. He took the lead on the initial start of the race and led every lap to take the checkers. The best battle on the track was between brothers as Rick Singler and Scott Singler waged battle for several laps. Rick appeared to get the better of the exchange in the final stages until his car lost its driveshaft on the last lap. Scott drove by to take second ahead of Brett Carlton and Ivedent Lloyd. Rick Singler managed to coast across the finish line in fifth. Jake Hartley was the man to beat until he spun with a handful of laps remaining in the Mini Late Model feature. Art Souther was in the proverbial right place at the right time and led the remaining circuits to take the win over Hartley, Casey Murphy, Kevin Hawkinberry, and Justin Carney. Racing at Putnam County Speedway resumes this Saturday evening with all four regular classes competing in heat and feature racing action. Pits open at 3 PM, Grandstands open at 5 PM, and the first green flag drops at 7 PM. Have an opinion on this story? Post a message on our Message Board! news@karnac.org or send a letter to the editor!