7/29/2022
Lincoln Park Speedway
Mitchel Moles Takes Inidana Sprint Week At Lincoln Park Speedway
On a night where I checked my phone before I signed in a 15% chance of rain was all that we had. Sure enough we found that 15% on this Indiana Sprint Week night at the Capitol Of The Cushion. 52 strong signed in with Usac for the big stage. The first time through qualifying we made it about 35 cars in and the sprinkles started. Then about 40 cars in it was more than a sprinkle. A rain delay that would last about an hour then stalled our night. Joe Spiker and crew went to work and got the track ready again and we were back on the track with race cars about 9:30. With the rain delay and not all the cars getting a time the only way to do it fairly was restart qualifying. This time it was 2 cars at a time. Fast time for the evening went to the “Macho Man” Brady Bacon with a time of 12.848. Following him was Matt Westfall 12.903, Max Adams 12.903, Briggs Danner 12.911, Ryan Timms 12.934 and Justin Grant 12.990. It was now time for 4 heats with 13 car fields only taking the top 4 to the A main. Heat race one and all of the heats were hammer down on a surface that was juiced up. There was not much off the throttle for anyone or you would get passed. The Peoples Champ Dave Darland started it off and lead every lap of heat 1 over Kevin Thomas Jr, Brent Beauchamp and Brady Bacon. Heat race 2 was won by Tye Mihocko in the 2E car. The Bull got it done over Jason Mcdougal, Emerson Axsom and Shane Cottle. Heat race 3 was won by Brayden Fox over Mitchel Moles Robert Ballou and Mario Clouser. The final heat 4 went to AJ Hopkins in the O4 Burton car over Jadon Rogers, Logan Seavey and CJ Leary. As an LPS employee it was great to see some of the local LPS guys winning the heats putting them in the big show. To make the A main in a 52 car field with this much talent is an awesome deal no doubt.
On to the C main where only the top 4 get a ticket to the Semi or B feature. Taking the win in the C main it was Brody Roa, Scotty Weir, Brandon Mattox and Xavier Doney. Then it was the final B main or Semi which only takes 6 to the main dance. Matt Westfall picked up the big win over Ryan Timms, Chase Stockon, Justin Grant, Briggs Danner and Kyle Shipley. As you can see with those names a Usac Semi is like watching a feature before the A main except they only get 12 laps. This setup the final 30 laps of the A main and time wise we weren’t doing bad as we started heats around 10 and it was feature time around 11:30. Kudos to the track crew, USAC and all 52 awesome teams that were always quick to meet the 8 minute horns before their race.
On to the big dance the A main for night #5 of Indiana Sprint Week. The front row after the 6 car invert of the cars that made it through their heats was Jadon Rogers and Mitchel Moles. Lap 1 Jadon took the early lead from Mitchel but by lap 2 the 19AZ car took over the lead. Mitchel was good on the bottom but so was Jadon and stayed within 1 to 2 car lengths behind him putting on the pressure. By the halfway point there was a lot of action in the middle of the pack with 2 guys making a lot of moves. They were Justin Grant and Chase Stockon. Chase and Justin at the halfway point had already passed 5 to 6 cars and were neck and neck for the hard charger of the evening. The wild finish that we are always ready to see at LPS looked as if it was going to happen. Brady Bacon with 3 to go in 3rd place found the top groove was finally really fast and at the line with 2 to go he was 3 wide and took the lead going into turn 1 past both of the top guys but the Yellow Flag ended his awesome banzai move after Ballou and KTJr. brought out the caution. Reverting back a lap Brady had to restart 3rd with 2 to go. We will always say now “What If That Yellow Didn’t Happen”. On the final restart with just 2 to go Mitchel got a very strong start and led the final 2 laps for the big win with Jadon taking 2nd over Brady by just inches. Shane Cottle and Justin Grant rounded out the top 5. Chase Stockon got the hard charger from going 21st to 11th. Justin Grant came close from going 14th to 5th. An outstanding show at LPS leads us up to Night #6 at Bloomington Speedway at the Red Clay. Thank you to all the great teams and especially for all the great fans that came out and stayed through the rain delay. See you tonight at the Red Clay and then back to LPS Saturday night for 5 classes to finish up the great weekend.
Article Credit: Kenny Clark
Submitted By: Jill Spiker
