Knoxville, IA, August 14, 2015 – For the second year in a row, Indiana’s Bryan Clauson will take the green in the FVP Knoxville Nationals presented by Casey’s General Store on Saturday night, but this time it comes with a $4,000 check and his first career victory at the Knoxville Raceway in Friday’s National Speed Sport News Qualifying Night. Danny Dietrich, Brent Marks and Billy Alley also punched their tickets into Saturday night’s championship event by finishing second through fourth!
“I told these guys after Wednesday night, I think we had the car to get it done and we honestly felt like if we were in the fourth or fifth row of the ‘B’ we would think about coming back,” commented Clauson when asked about the teams decision to compete in Friday’s last chance event.
“I can’t say enough about my guys, they’ve been busting their butts all year. I’ve been trying to catch up and do my job, and it’s taken all summer but I can’t thank Shane Bowers enough. Him, Adam Clark, Cole Wood, just everyone on this racing team. It feels good to be locked into tomorrow night. We talked about getting a win here, and how special it would be and what better way to do it than here during the Knoxville Nationals. I don’t care what you call it, we just won at Knoxville!”
Taking off third, Clauson moved to the runner-up spot on Lap 4 with the pass on Danny Dietrich. A small bobble on the part of the Matt Wood Racing No. 17 allowed the No. 29w to retake the spot, putting the pair in a multi lap battle with Clauson finally taking the position.
Chasing Billy Alley for the race lead, the pair worked Lap 8 with traffic about to come into play. With a run off the cushion exiting the fourth turn, Clauson broke rank to the bottom, sliding to the cushion with the race lead in the second turn on the following circuit.
With Dietrich in tow to second, the Gettysburg, Pennsylvania shoe closed on Clauson, with the run short lived. Building a comfortable advantage, a few close calls in traffic brought Dietrich and Alley within striking distance, but was quick enough to keep the pair at bay.
As the leader split slower cars, the inadvertent caution waved for the No. 18 of Ian Madsen on Lap 22. The Australian spun while running fourth; doing a pair of donuts. Madsen was placed eighth in the restart order.
Fanning out into the first turn on the restart, Clauson stuck top shelf to hold the lead, pulling to a 0.973 second advantage at the drop of the checkered flag.
Danny Dietrich raced to the runner-up spot, earning 18th and his first feature start on Saturday night, “That was the goal coming into tonight. You know we wanted to win obviously, but Bryan was really fast and we were happy to run second. That caution came out, and I really wasn’t worried about contending and costing ourselves a spot in tomorrow night’s main event.”
Racing for the lead early on, Brent Marks made a late race move around Alley to cross third for the 19th starting spot on Saturday night; his first start in the $150,000 to win event, “That was a really fun race, and I’m just so excited to be in the A-Main here at Knoxville. This is awesome. It’s a dream come true and I didn’t really care about that win tonight, I just wanted to get into the A-Main.”
For the first time since 2008, a fourth place by Nebraska’s Billy Alley will see the Ironwood Builders No. 3 starting 20th on Saturday night.
“That’s something a kid dreams about. I lay in bed and I think about moments like that; racing with these guys,” said an elated Billy Alley. “Joe Steinbach, he gave me an awesome opportunity and the truth is, we didn’t have a motor a week ago, and ours wasn’t going to be done so Greg Nichols and Jack Woods at Speedway Motors bought us a motor and said, go run it.”
Mark Dobmeier from 13th came up to complete the top-five. Chad Kemenah from 12th was sixth with Ian Madsen settling for seventh. Lynton Jeffrey crossed eighth with Jamie Veal and Craig Dollansky making up the top-ten.
Single lap, split qualifying for Friday’s program saw Brent Marks fastest in Group A at 15.586 seconds. One of the few drivers to utilize the low line in his qualifying run, Billy Alley topped Group B with a 15.987 second lap.
Six Heats, split evenly by the group qualifying went to Lynton Jeffrey, Bryan Clauson, Christopher Bell, Jamie Veal, Jac Haudenschild, and Jacob Allen. Going 10 laps in the C-Feature, Bud Kaeding topped the event with twin, 12 lap B-Features, based on Group A and B qualifying went to Steve Kinser and Aaron Reutzel.
Join us Saturday night, August 15 for the championship proceedings at the 55th FVP Knoxville Nationals presented by Casey’s General Stores! For more information on Knoxville Raceway, visit www.KnoxvilleRaceway.com!
- administrator on Aug 15, 2015
- Article Date: 8/15/2015