McCarl and Garner take Knoxville wins as the Big Shows loom
Saturday, August 1, 2009
By Bob Wilson
KNOXVILLE, Iowa (August 1) Terry McCarl and Clint Garner took feature event wins at Knoxville Raceway Saturday night. For McCarl, it was his career win number 45 here and it was Garner’s fifth at this legendary speedway.
McCarl, who is prepping for a run at the 49th annual Knoxville Nationals in two weeks, led the event from beginning to end. His pole position start was helpful but did not mean that the win would be a certainty.
At the outset, McCarl was challenged by fellow front row starter and current Knoxville Raceway points leader Johnny Herrera. When five laps were in the book, McCarl had created a near-straightaway lead on the big half-mile oval. Herrera was fending off the moves of Brian Brown and Dusty Zomer in fourth. Four laps later McCarl entered lap traffic but Herrera was unable to make any headway in paring down the lead of the fleet Big Game sponsored car in front of him. Lap twelve saw a yellow fly for a stopped Skip Jackson.
On the ensuing restart, Herrera seemed to have trouble handling his sprinter and jumped the cushion in turn two allowing Brown and Alley to get by. Herrera came on around as several more cars passed him and he finally stopped in turn four with a flat right rear tire. He was unable to continue and finished 23rd.
When the race resumed, McCarl again picked up the pace as Brown stayed right with him as did Alley. A little further back Dusty Zomer had his hands full with Kerry Madsen. Two drivers making hard charges in these final stages were Don Droud Jr. and Wayne Johnson.
In the end, McCarl took the race by a ten-car length margin over Brown with Alley, Zomer and Madsen following. Completing the top ten were Droud, Johnson, Shane Stewart, Randy Hannagan and Gary Brazier.
In the 360 feature, Clint Garner warmed up for the 19th annual 360 Nationals to be staged here next week. Garner, a front row starter chased pole sitter Ryan Roberts for two laps before passing him on the third go around. On a track that remained “racey” all night long, the leader did not pull away from his challengers during this 15-mile jaunt.
Lap six saw Jonathon Cornell replace Roberts in the runner-up spot as he began to chase down the Garner machine which was running the high cushion. Slowly Cornell closed the gap until lap eleven when he took the point as he followed his line on the low side of turns three and four. Immediately Garner picked up his pace and recaptured the lead on the next circuit. He held that spot to the end to place his sprinter five car lengths ahead of Cornell at the finish. Roberts was third, Dennis Moore Jr. took fourth and Brett Mather was fifth. Dustin Selvage, Johnny Anderson, Jon Agan, Gregg Bakker and Randy Martin (from 17th) completed the top ten finishers.
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