The racing weekend that was - UPDATED

ADRL, at Gateway Drags IV, St. Louis:

Snyder with 2 track records

With near perfect atmospheric conditions on Friday, and continuing on Saturday, the Gateway Motorsports park saw numerous world and track records, as well as a bunch of first time winners.

Pro Extreme driver Mick Snyder put his Corvette for the second race in a row in the winner's circle, with a 3.63 at 208.23 mph. "To get two in a row is just crazy," Snyder commented after the race. He also set two track records.

Unfortunately, during the first round of PX's qualifying on Friday, Todd Tutterow met the wall but was able to walk away unscathed. For pictures of the accident, click here.

Pro Nitrous winner Doug Riesterer was the feel-good story of the weekend, having arrived Saturday morning at the track and hereby missing the three previous qualifying sessions, he dug deep inside and qualified his Camaro into the field. He then went on to win of Rickie Jones and matching the latter's  Friday night track record. In the final, Riesterer edged Burton Auxier with a 3.826 at 189.10 mph.

Extreme 10.5 winner Todd Moyer had lady luck on his side as his competition couldn't get his car started, leaving Moyer to a solo pass of 4.608 at 125.17 mph. "It was ugly, that's all I can say, but we haven't had any luck this whole year so this feels good" Moyer said. "I almost forgot what it feels like."

Todd takes out Trevor in XPS

Extreme Pro Stock winner Todd Hoerner has lot's of reasons to celebrate, after beating a hard charging Trevor Eman, of Team Aruba. Hoerner became the first ever driver in XPS to win running electronic fuel injection (EFI) and this was also his first win ever in this class. En route to this final, he had an awesome .002 reaction time in a holeshot win against defending World Champion Cary Goforth.

XPS runner up Trevor Eman had a very fruitful weekend and made great strides towards winning a race in the very near future. He ran a career best of 4.07 seconds.

A shout goes out to "Lil" JD, son of our friend Jeff Dobbins, on being the winning crew chief in XPS and who got them the first ever win in XPS while running EFI in the Sonny Racing Engines sponsored Camaro.

Pro Mod driver Jeff Naiser went 3.876 in the semis and later improved to a 3,867 at 193.32 mph to pick up his first win in the new class.

No. 16 qualifier in Top Sportsman class, Chris Nyerges met the no. 15 qualifier Jim Sackuvich in a a race that was called "a matchup of underdogs" by many. Nyerges came out on top with a pass of 4,467 at 157.72 mph.

Pro Extreme Motorcycle rider Eric McKinney won back-to-back races for the first time with a 4.072 et at 176.01 mph victory over Travis Davis in the finals.

The next race will take place at the Virginia Motorsports park on June 22-23. For more info, please click here. If you can't make it to the race, like many of us, just go to the ADRL website for live streaming content. Two thumbs up for ADRL.


Moto GP, at Catalunya:

Lorenzo immediately after the race

Spain's largest newspaper (in circulation), El Pais, will run "Lorenzo wins Catalunya home MotoGP duel" in the sports section on Monday. The Factory Yamaha rider fought hard nearly for the entire race with fellow home hero Dani Pedrosa, who blasted from the second row to first place leading into the first corner at the start of the race.

American Ben Spies rode an awesome race, briefly getting into the lead on lap three, only to run wide and fall after getting on the grass. He quickly rejoined the race and charged all the way from last to tenth place.

Pedrosa leads at the start

On lap 7 Lorenzo executed Spies' botched pass of a couple of laps earlier to perfection, but a relentless Pedrosa stayed with Lorenzo and around the half way mark, used the slipstream to regain the lead. With five laps to go, Lorenzo, riding on softer rear tire, was able to catch up to Pedrosa (who was on a harder tire), but then suddenly Pedrosa's Honda made a wheelie and forced the Spaniard to back off to bring the front wheel back down. He went on to run slightly wide in the next corner and the rest is as they say "history".

Lorzenzo finished first, his third in five races, Pedrosa came in second, and Andrea Dovizioso took third riding for Yamaha. He held off the fast charging event pole sitter and World Champion Casey Stoner who finished fourth, who suffered from the cooler race conditions.

Rossi's during his pre-race ritual 

Valentino Rossi, who finished 2nd at the last race, was humbled today on the slower Ducati, crossing the finish line 17.6 seconds behind the race winner. Still trying to make the Ducati handle better, he tested an aluminum swing-arm on Friday, and now will have two more days of testing with the new A-arm and some set-up ideas. Hopefully they will make the Ducati a bit faster, for we all would like to see Rossi battling with the front runners again.

Interesting post race quote, by Dani Pedrosa:

"These bikes have traction control and wheelie control, but they are not magic. We have everything said to the limit, to help but not stop [wheelies], because if we have all the controls set to never make a wheelie the bike would not be fast enough."

Next race will be the British GP at Silverstone on June 17 next. For more info, please click here.

NASCAR, at Dover, Del.:

Jimmie in victory lane

Jimmie Johnson and Hendrick Motorsports are back! Jimmie drove away from Kevin Harvick and Matt Kenseth after a restart with 31 laps to go and never looked back.
Johnson led 289 laps of the 400, and with this win records his 57th career victory, eight most all-time and tying him for the most wins at Dover with legends Richard Petty and Bobby Allison.

The Dover Monster Mile mascot

As usual there were some large wrecks at the all concrete short track.

"The way the cautions fell [Sunday], it allowed us to really flex our muscle and bring home the win. I'm proud of the effort. It was a brand new race car we brought to the track. We pulled it off the truck, and it was awesome all weekend long," said Jimmie Johnson.

Though Johnson won handily, his car might not have been the fastest. The No. 24 of teammate Jeff Gordon was at least its equal, but Gordon had to pit on lap 250 because of a loose wheel.

Below there is a video of the latter part of the race and the finish.



Results of the FedEx 400 benefiting Autism Speaks:
1. Jimmie Johnson, 2. Kevin Harvick, 3. Matt Kenseth, 4. Dale Earnhardt Jr., 5. Clint Boyer.

The next race is the Pocono 400 on June 10.


NHRA, at E-town:
E-town, aka Old Bridge Township Raceway park, was the place to be for the NHRA guys this past weekend.

A Steve Torrence burn out.

In Top Fuel (T/F), Steve Torrence beat in Tony Schumacher and Spencer Massey in earlier rounds with his quicker reaction time, but in the final round he used sheer horsepower advantage to win over Brandon Bernstein at the finish line. He won with a 3.800 at 323.66 mph.

Torrence on his win, "It's really a little surreal coming out and having success in a short time."

And Massey failed to back up the T/F best low e.t. of the event as a national record.

In Funny Car (F/C), Johnny Grey claimed his first win of the season and second of his career by beating Ron Capps with a 4.078 at 314.39 mph.

Anderson, KB celebrate 100th win

In Pro Stock (P/S), KB Racing debuted the first of their new Rick Jones' build Camaro's with high hopes and quickly surpassed these, when it made it all the way to the finals. It would race none other than the car it was replacing, with teammate Jason Line behind the steering wheel. In an emotionally charged race, Greg Anderson, in the new car, raced to his fourth victory of the season with a 6.56 at 212.03 mph, that bested teammate Jason Line, when his engine broke a valve spring that cost him about two-hundredths.
And to top it off, car owner Ken Black, who is recovering from illness, jetted all the way from Las Vegas to be with his boys for their 100th win. Great stuff!

In Pro Bike, Eddie Krawic won for the first time at the track where he once worked as a track manager,  an emotional victory for sure. He beat Hector Arana Sr. when he red lighted at the start of the final round of eliminations. It is Krawic's 14th career victory on the Screamin' Eagle Vance & Hines Harley-Davidson.

For information on this race, please click here.

The next race will be run at "Thunder Valley" on June 15-17.

Thanks for reading.

Source: ADRL, Crashnet, MotoGP, Fox, NHRA, NASCAR, Wikipedia