Daggett Pulls Away From Field to Take Checkered at Hartford
7.2.2016: Hartford, MI
With twenty one 360 Winged Sprints in the pits for the all sprint show at Hartford Motor Speedway, Great Lakes Super Sprints took the track first for group qualifying. Qualifying in the second group, Dustin “Double D” Daggett in the 2M car laid down the fastest time at 17.201. Randy “The Hurricane” Hannigan was second quick car at 17.203, only 2 thousandths of a second behind Daggett. Chase “Kid Rocket” Ridenour #11R, Andy “Tuna” Teunessen #31 and Trey Smith #11 rounded out the top five.
Inverting 4 positions, the top three qualifiers started 4th in their respective Heats. Placing Daggett in Heat 1, Hannigan in Heat 2 and Ridenour in Heat 3. The next 9 fast qualifiers filled out the remaining 3 positions in the front rows of each heat race, with qualifiers 13-21 filling out the rest of the field starting at the 5th position. With the Heats set, Heat 1 rolled out on the track around 8:35 pm.
Sitting on the poll, Ed Neumeister running the 11N car from Upper Sandusky, OH led the first Heat on the track with Mike “Bull” Dunlap #57 from Wapkoneta, OH next to him. As the caution is taken off and the cars receive the green light, the cars grouped up coming into turn 3. As the cars past the chalk line in turn 4, Daggett and Brett “The Hooiser Rocket:” Mann #19 from Goshen, IN were on the move. Waiting for his opportunity, Daggett charged up front early where he stayed. Mann, starting 5th, took advantage of the “Wicked Wide” half mile track and worked his way through the field for a second place finish, with Teunessen holding his own and keeping the 3rd spot at the finish line.
Leading Heat 2 on the track was Linden Jones #19j of Edwardsburg, MI, with Brad Lamberson #27 of Parma, MI next to him. Jones, who won his first ever heat race a couple weeks earlier at Mt Pleasant, led the group into turn 4 and roared past the chalk line. Hannigan #22H of Pittsboro, IN made short order of getting up front and pulled away from the field. Lamberson and Smith battled and kept their starting positions of 2nd and 3rd respectively and were able to stay out of “Mad Max” Stambaugh’s reach, holding him to a 4th place finish. Alexis Adgate #91L of Middleville, MI after receiving some parts before the Heat was not able to make it to the track and “Did Not Show” DNS.
Tony Bures #58 of Bristol, IN rolled out on the track on the poll of Heat 3 with Joe Swanson #7 of Etna Green, IN next to him on the front row. With Ryan Ruhl #16 and Ridenour in row two, they were chomping at the bit to pass the front row and move out front. However Swanson had other ideas and the battle was on! Bures fell back early as the freight train of Swanson, Ruhl and Ridenour rolled past. With a tough battle developing, Kid Rocket had to use all 120’ of the tracks width to get around Swanson and Ruhl for the lead. Cruising out front in clean air, it appeared Ridenour would pull in another heart race win. However Ruhl was able to get around Swanson and reel Ridenour in enough that Kid Rocket knew Ruhl was there. On the last lap and coming out of turn 2, Ruhl was running out of real estate to over take Ridenour. But as luck would have it, Ridenour was high going into turn 3 and Ruhl seized his opportunity as he pulled off a huge slider putting him in front of Ridenour as they came out of turn 4 and charged to the finish line for the win. Swanson, Foos and Dalman rounded out the top five.
With all the excitement in Heat 3 up front, it didn’t go unnoticed that DJ Foos #38 of Fremont, OH was on the move from the back of the heat. Foos who didn’t make the qualifying call and had to start at the back of his heat. Being the first time to run with GLSS this year and not having a qualifying time to look at, Foos was giving us a taste of what to expect from him in the Feature.
The top 3 finishers in each heat race were eligible to be part of the inversion draw, which was drawn in the GLSS Hauler by the fast qualifier, Dustin Daggett. Reaching into the bag, Daggett sighed pulling a 3, putting him behind Hannigan and Ruhl for the feature. With the inversion done, the field was set with Ryan Ruhl and Randy Hannigan on the front row, followed by Daggett and Mann, Lamberson and Ridenour filling out the front 3 rows.
Around 10 pm in front of a large, vocal crowd of sprint car fans, GLSS rolled on the track for the first A-Main Feature of the night. One can only wonder what was going through the drivers minds, but in my mind I knew we had a show brewing with the front 4 cars having a lot of experience and a number of feature wins to their credit at Harford.
As the track went green, Ruhl led the thundering heard of cars into turn 4 and the start line. As Ruhl took off, Hannigan was on a mission to be first into turn 1 and have clean air to build his lead. The Hoosier Rocket had his car dialed in and he was on Hannigan’s hip coming around into turn 3 with Ruhl and Daggett battling for position behind them. With their own battles, Lamberson, Ridenour, Teunessen and Smith were fighting through the turbulent air left by the 4 up front!
With the early slug fest up front between Mann, Ruhl and Daggett going on behind Hannigan, it was noticeable when all of a sudden Ruhl and Daggett shot by Mann that there was a problem with the 19 car as he was able to get off the track out of turn 4 and in to the infield. With Daggett getting around Ruhl he closed on Hannigan and was looking for his opening. Coming out of turn 2 in the third lap, Daggett seized the opportunity on the high side and was able to separate from Hannigan for the lead. For the next 7 laps, the 2M worked on putting some distance in front of the field. The track looked like it was working wherever the guys wanted to run. For Daggett the car was on a rail and was locked in as he laid the car into the corners. Going down the back stretch and coming into turn 3 the speed was visible from the contrails of dust swirling off the top wings!
At the mid-point of the 20 lap feature, the 58 car ran into a little trouble as the car came around too far and Bures came to rest in the middle of turn 4 facing oncoming traffic. Bringing out the caution we were able to take a breath and take note of the action that was going on in the pack as the leaders had been lapping some of the back traffic. Gregg Dalman #49T from Bellevue, MI and DJ Foos, who started 15th and 12th respectively had moved up into the top 10 and were looking for more.
The caution wiped out the lead Daggett had built, but gave Hannigan, Ruhl and Ridenour the opportunity they were looking for. As the cars came around turn 4 single file and headed toward the flag stand, the cars were staying on the leaders bumper hoping to keep him reigned in. However that opportunity slipped away quickly as Daggett found separation again coming out of turn 2 and was not hanging around to give them another shot at him. With Hannigan determined to be there if Daggett messed up, Ruhl and Ridenour had Hannigan in their sights. Finishing lap 14, it seemed that Ruhl and Ridenour had found some extra speed or at least weren’t slowing down as much and Ruhl was locked on to Hannigan and was surveying the situation as he cruised high in turn 3 along the large cushion, when suddenly his right rear tear blew apart. Miraculously Ruhl was able to hold on without hitting the wall and the car came to rest at the entrance chute on turn 4. With Team Ruhl determined to get him back on the track, a new tire was put on in the work area and Ruhl was pushed out and took his spot at the back of the field. Much to the appreciation of the fans and crowd!
As the field was set with 6 laps to go, Daggett, Hannigan and Ridenour were 1, 2, 3, just as they had qualified. However Dalman battling from 15th , Foos from 12th and Mad Max Stambaugh #16B from 11th, were looking to shake up the top 10. As the green flag dropped and Daggett came out of turn 2, it was obvious that he wanted to shut the door on first. However Foos and Stambaugh methodically picked their way past Swanson, Smith, Teunessen and Lamberson and were determined to end in the top 5. While Ridenour still had hopes of catching Hannigan, he spent the remaining laps fighting off Foos just to hold the 3rd spot.
As the white flag came out, it appeared Daggett was taking the checkered in one more lap. However in lap traffic and with nothing ever coming easy…Daggett was cruising the top of 3 and 4 with the checkered in site and two lap cars in front of him as he caught the edge of the cushion where the turn 4 entrance chute is, that lifted the right side in the air as he was sliding sideways. But not to be denied another feature win at Hartford, he lifted briefly, the car straightened and he flew down the straight away to take the checkered flag, with Hannigan, Ridenour, Foos and Stambaugh rounding out the top 5!
A Feature 20 laps
- 2M-Dustin Daggett[3]; 2. 22H-Randy Hannagan[2]; 3. 11R-Chase Ridenour[6]; 4. 38-D.J. Foos[12]; 5. 16B-Max Stambaugh[11]; 6. 27-Brad Lamberson[5]; 7. 31-Andy Teunessen[7]; 8. 11-Trey Smith[8]; 9. 49T-Gregg Dalman[15]; 10. 7-Joe Swanson[9]; 11. 16-Ryan Ruhl[1]; 12. 19J-Linden Jones[14]; 13. 11N-Ed Neumeister[10]; 14. 84-Kyle Poortenga[16]; 15. 57-Mike Dunlap[13]; 16. 18-D.J. Lamance[19]; 17. 37-Noah Dunlap[18]; 18. 58-Tony Bures[17]; 19. 19-Brett Mann[4]
Heat 1 8 laps
- 2M-Dustin Daggett[4]; 2. 19-Brett Mann[5]; 3. 31-Andy Teunessen[3]; 4. 11N-Ed Neumeister[1]; 5. 57-Mike Dunlap[2]; 6. 84-Kyle Poortenga[6]; 7. 37-Noah Dunlap[7]
Heat 2 8 laps
- 22H-Randy Hannagan[4]; 2. 27-Brad Lamberson[2]; 3. 11-Trey Smith[3]; 4. 16B-Max Stambaugh[5]; 5. 19J-Linden Jones[1]; (DNS) 91L-Alexis Adgate
Heat 3 8 laps
- 16-Ryan Ruhl[3]; 2. 11R-Chase Ridenour[4]; 3. 7-Joe Swanson[2]; 4. 38-D.J. Foos[7]; 5. 49T-Gregg Dalman[5]; 6. 58-Tony Bures[1]; 7. 18-D.J. Lamance[6]
Qualifying 2 laps
- 2M-Dustin Daggett[7]; 2. 22H-Randy Hannagan[13]; 3. 11R-Chase Ridenour[17]; 4. 31-Andy Teunessen[12]; 5. 11-Trey Smith[19]; 6. 16-Ryan Ruhl[1]; 7. 57-Mike Dunlap[6]; 8. 27-Brad Lamberson[9]; 9. 7-Joe Swanson[8]; 10. 11N-Ed Neumeister[2]; 11. 19J-Linden Jones[11]; 12. 58-Tony Bures[16]; 13. 19-Brett Mann[10]; 14. 16B-Max Stambaugh[4]; 15. 49T-Gregg Dalman[3]; 16. 84-Kyle Poortenga[14]; 17. 3-Kyle Locke[5]; 18. 18-D.J. Lamance[15]; 19. 37-Noah Dunlap[18]; 20. 91L-Alexis Adgate[20]
- Barry Marlow on Jul 04, 2016
- Article Date: 7/4/2016