Deery Brothers Summer Series Knoxville tilt falls to Ray Guss Jr.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
By Bob Wilson
KNOXVILLE, Iowa (July 28) Deery Brothers Late Model Summer Series points leader, Ray Guss Jr. captured the 11th race in the series at Knoxville Raceway Wednesday night. The event was in conjunction with the Harris Clash for Sport Modifieds and was rescheduled from July 8.
The Guss win came in the track’s 50th late model race in this track’s history dating back to 1954.
The 35-lap feature race had a difficult time getting started as the 24-car starting field was whittled to twenty after three tries at the green. Once it finally went green, front row starter Jay Stewart took command. Only one lap was completed when second row starter TJ Criss spun low on the track in turn four and collected Kevin Blum. Both cars sustained heavy damage and could not restart.
Again, Stewart led the field back to green and led one lap before being overtaken by Jeff Geunrich. He was then chased by Guss Jr. who had started in the third row. The best going was to be found on the bottom of the big half-mile oval and Stewart had that line.
By lap seven Jeff Aikey, who had started 19th, had roared into sixth with Geunrich still leading the race. Three laps later the situation changed for Geunrich as Guss Jr. grabbed the top spot as he excelled out of turn two on the high side and raced down the backstretch. It was a lead he would never relinquish.
Lap traffic came into play on the sixteenth circuit and two laps later at the half-way point Guss enjoyed a near-chute advantage over Geunrich. That lead quickly dissolved when the yellow was displayed for a spun car. The restart quickly turned to red on the next go around when Charlie McKenna spectacularly barrel-rolled five times in turn one after he hit the berm.
The race would then go green for the rest of the way as Guss again pulled away. He hit lap traffic again on the 30th lap but picked off the back markers one at a time to keep cars between himself and second running Darrin Miller. As the race was coming to an end Miller began to make up some of the distance but finished ten car lengths short at the end. The win paid Guss $1,200 as he was trailed by Miller, Aikey, Jerimiah Hurst and Brian Harris. Andy Eckrich, Geunrich, Jeff Most, Todd Cooney and Nate Beuseling completed the top ten.
The 20-lap Sport Mod A Main win went to Jared Timmerman. Timmerman found himself challenged by 14-year-old Ceyden Carter for almost all of the ten-mile distance with Carter taking that top spot on lap ten and holding it to the half-way point.
Lap eleven saw Timmerman get a good run off the bottom in turns one and two to take the lead while Carter roared around the top. It would stay that way until Carter spun on the low side coming out of turn three on the 19th lap. He was in turn t-boned by eighth running Adam Ackerman. Both cars sustained heavy damage and could not restart.
The green-white-checkered flags saw the Timmerman machine fly across the finish line first by no more than a car length. Dylon Book took second, Nate Chodur was third, Jeremy Embrey claimed fourth and Jim Gillenwater finished fifth.
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