A Full Race Weekend By: Bob Lawless This past weekend at Peterborough Speedway offered a full plate of racing. Along with our normal series we also had an Enduro race, Hurricane Midgets, and The OSCAAR series for the fans to enjoy. Saturday night offered a change from the normal routine by running the Enduro under the lights. As the huge field of 32 cars moved off it wouldn’t be presumptuous to guess that number would be dramatically reduce 250 laps later. Surviving this race with a car still running is the first obstacle that most drivers attempt to overcome, but with this much metal on the track it’s a hard obstacle. Most of the events of the race were predictable until the last few laps. The 8-cylinder class leader Nathan Mitchell #347 was involved in a head on collision with another car coming off turn 2 and it looked like he was finished with only a handful of laps remaining. The car was towed off with major wheel damage to the right front tire and it looked to be headed to the trailer. Once in the pits the crew checked the car and found the tire would still rotate but the steering arms wouldn’t let it turn. Fortunately the left tire would still turn and Mitchell asked tech for permission to take the car back out. After discussion with the powers that be it was determined he could continue but he had to stay high and out of the way. If any problem developed he would be black-flagged and out of the race. Nathan held a good pace and stayed out of the way and much to the cheers of the fans crossed the finish line first to win the race. Of the remaining 14 cars on the track Bill Goddard in #2X won the 4-6-cylinder class. On Sunday night our regular series took to the track and offered up two first of the year feature winners. Booby Love took home his first feature of the year in the mini stock division along with Tony Tiemersma capturing his first feature at Peterborough in the Late Model division. The only one that wasn’t a surprise was Lance Foster in the X car taking his 5th feature of the season. Congratulations to all the racers and I’ll turn this story over to Don McLeod from OSCAAR to describe their 50-lap run. See you next weekend After waiting almost a month through a weather wrecked schedule, OSCAAR fans finally got their fix of Outlaw Super Late Model race action at Peterborough Speedway. At the end of the night it was Rob Clarke who emerged victorious as “Magic Shoes” wheeled his famous black and gold Super Late Model a full 50 laps to the checkers. Having embarked on a part-time race schedule for 2009, the rained-out events have fallen like a deck of lucky cards for Clarke. He now sits 2nd in points only 14 back of the leader Glenn Watson after competing in all three feature races completed to date. Had the full slate of 7 race events taken place, Clarke could have been well back by this time. The next race at Kawartha will be a turning point, as Clarke makes the decision whether to continue with his part-time race schedule. For now it is time to celebrate the win and thank his team and sponsors. Clarke was joined in victory lane by crew Jim Clarke, Dan Emslie and Jeff Sim. Rob really appreciated their help along with the rest of the crew in getting the car ready. He would also like to thank Jeff Sim of JBM Leasing and Dieter Fiest of London Mechanical Plumbing and Heating for their continued sponsorship. Clarke is always quick to acknowledge that without his crew and sponsors, he wouldn’t be racing. The crew were chuckling a bit at their driver who keeled over and coughed as he climbed from the car. “We always get excited when Rob is sick, for some reason he usually does better” exclaimed the crew. For Rob Clarke there is probably no better medicine than getting behind the wheel of a Super Late Model and winning! Starting on the pole position, Clarke jumped out to a quick lead. For the first half of the race it was TJ Woolsey in 2nd trying to catch Clarke. A few car lengths back was a duel between Glenn Watson and Jeff Hanley. Hanley won that and was working on Woolsey when he started to fall off the pace. A few laps later he pulled off with motor problems and was finished for the night. That put Watson back in 3rd. As the duo of Clarke and Woolsey pulled up on the tail end of the lead lap, they encountered a fierce race amongst several cars trying to stay ahead. This allowed Watson to catch up where he was ready to take advantage of any miscue. It was a case of quickly guessing which cars to avoid and Watson beat Woolsey to the punch on that score. Quickly moving to 2nd while Woolsey got stuck behind the lapped cars, Watson set his sites on Clarke. But it wasn’t enough to take down the “Black Bear” who was determined to take home the win. Glenn Watson and his Rival Office Solutions/Race2Way.ca #22 Team can take great pride in a night that saw them salvage a wrecked race car to take home 2nd place. The main crash of the night happened during the 6th and final heat race. Fluid on the race track heading into turns 3 and 4 caused spins for Rudy Oppersma, Roy Passer and Watson. All three cars sustained significant damage with Oppersma taking the hardest hit, ending his night of racing, while the 22 and 27 teams got out for the feature. Looking at the damaged 22 Outlaw in the pits just before the feature, it seemed improbable that the car could stay in the top five. Coming away with 2nd in that car must have felt like a win. “After the heat race I didn’t think we would have a car that good” said Glenn, “The guys pulled it together and I really owe a lot to them. And to all the other teams that came around to ask if we needed any help – that was really cool to have everybody pitching in.” The V&L Transportation Sales #88 car with Outlaw driver TJ Woolsey at the wheel fared much better than at the Don Biederman Memorial when just about everything went wrong. The long break appears to have played in their favour as they worked hard on getting their car back into winning form. Woolsey was competitive all night long with the only regret being the miscue while coming up on the lapped cars. “That was a bummer losing 2nd,” said TJ, “Just didn’t know where to go. I was waiting for Robbie to make a hole and Glenn got me. It was a good points night and we’re happy with that.” Rounding out the top five were the Wayfreight #7 of Derrick Tiemersma in 4th and the Zancor Homes #48 of Dwayne Baker in 5th. The two drivers wrapped up the race in a competitive style along with John Owen who had another strong night. The three cars crossed the finish line in a three car nose-to-tail pack. Tiemersma keeps in the points hunt only 35 back of Watson. Baker made his second ever OSCAAR appearance and the top five finish was his best yet. Wayne Isaacs made his first appearance of the season in the #00 Outlaw. The car looked very sharp and was on rails in the 6th heat race where Isaacs picked up his first OSCAAR heat race win. In the feature he stayed on the lead lap and took home a respectable 7th place. Also out for his first race of 2009 was Rob Bickle in the #16 Outlaw who also had a good race moving up 5 spots to finish 10th. He shares the APX Racewear Hard Charger Award with John Owen who moved from 11th to 6th. Winner of the Hoosier Tire Award was Jeff Dunford. Thank you to all the drivers, teams and officials who helped put on a great show. It was a good night of racing at Peterborough Speedway and a good crowd on hand to watch OSCAAR Outlaw racing. We’ll be back at Peterborough on September 5th.