Schatz wins Knoxville WoO Spring Opener
Saturday, May 2, 2009
By Bob Wilson
KNOXVILLE, IA (May2) - Defending Knoxville Nationals champion Donny Schatz claimed the World of Outlaws (WoO) Spring Opener at Knoxville Raceway Saturday night at this central Iowa racing facility. It marked the 56th year of continuous weekly racing here.
The 25-lap feature event saw Knoxville regular Brian Brown shoot to the front when the race flagged green. Brown started on the pole but had to hold off the immediate challenge for the lead from his uncle, Danny Lasoski who started right beside him. Terry McCarl took that runner-up spot on the next lap as Schatz steered from seventh to fourth. It was evident that Schatz’s starting position would not be a factor in this 13 mile race.
Lap five saw the first of only two yellows which slowed the event as a car had come to a stop on the track. All eyes were on the first turn of the restart as Brown took to the high cushion and McCarl dove to the bottom. Brown managed to avoid the slider and keep the lead as Schatz kept a very close third.
As the early stages of this race played out, Brown continued to lead and in fact pulled to a 15 car-length lead over McCarl who was being hounded by Schatz. At this juncture too, Steve Kinser slid Lasoski to take fourth.
With a dozen laps in the books, Brown entered lap traffic. He tried to run the top when he could as did McCarl. Schatz, however, placed his J & J on the bottom to keep pace. As the laps counted down the top three runners began encountering more and more traffic and this played into the hands of McCarl as he finally made a pass of the Brown machine to take the lead on the 15th circuit.
Brown stayed close to the leader but he was eventually passed by Schatz on lap 17. This move then set up Schatz in his bid to run down McCarl as he tried unsuccessfully to get by the leader several times.
The magic lap occurred on the 21st go around as Schatz finally made the pass for the lead coming out of turn four on the high side after the lengthy battle with McCarl. Then, just as Schatz took the white flag, the final yellow or the race was displayed for a stopped car.
Again, all eyes focused on turns one and two on the restart but no positions changed for the top five runners. Eventually Kinser made a pass of Brown on the final lap, but Schatz had too much for everyone on this night and he carried home the $10,000 to win for the Tony Stewart owned sprinter.
Completing the top five were McCarl, Kinser, Brown and Haudenschild. Lasoski, Jason Johnson, Jason Sides, Craig Dollansky (from 22nd) and Jason Meyers formed the top ten finishers.
Seven cars broke into the 14 seconds bracket during qualifying time trials, fastest of which was Schatz at 14.592. That quick lap was only .185 off the one-lap track record here.
In the companion 360 sprint feature, a virtual unknown captured the 15-lap feature as 19-year-old Matt Covington led every circuit to claim the season opener in that division. It was his first feature win ever.
Covington, who started outside row two, took a chance and dove to the bottom in turn one as the race began and powered down the backstretch with the lead. With just two laps in the books, the red came out for Darren Long who took a tumble down the front chute.
Matt Sutton trailed the leader for the first eight laps until he was passed on lap nine in turns one and two by Clint Garner, a fifth row starter. Garner had staged a great battle with Gregg Bakker (last year’s season opener winner) through most of the front portion of the race. Garner’s heroics were too late as Covington had checked out on the field and by the end of the race had built a twenty car-length margin when he swept under the checkered flags. Garner kept second, Bakker took third, Ryan Roberts was fourth and Jon Agan rounded out the top five.
Forty-seven 410 teams contested the WoO events and fifty-seven cars faced-off in the 360 portion of the race card.
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