By Brett Rose
HAGERSTOWN, MD – Justin Weaver may have started on the pole position, but he didn’t lead every lap and had to battle his way to victory to take the honors in winning the very competitive Late Model Sportsman portion of the Hub City 100.
The 3-time LMS track champion from Williamsport, Maryland had to battle Bunker Hill, West Virginia’s Andy Anderson early and often as Anderson took the lead at the start and the second lap.
On the third circuit, Weaver drove his familiar No.2j back around Anderson’s Bruce Kane owned No.25 to lead before a caution for the broken driveshaft of Dan Zechman brought the first of two immediate caution flags.
The next caution happened on the restart as a five car pileup brought the field back on the yellow flag.
Once the feature resumed, Anderson passed Weaver to regain the lead coming off the second corner to lead the fourth lap. Anderson held off Weaver until near the halfway point before the pair swapped the lead at laps 15 and 16.
As they approached traffic, they stayed side-by-side for a few more laps before Weaver nosed past Anderson to lead the twentieth lap. Weaver was then able to place a distance of a quarter straightaway over Anderson, and maintained that distance through heavier traffic until the checkered flag flew at Lap 35.
The win was worth $2,000 and was Weaver’s 28th LMS career win.
“Yeah, he (Anderson) was pretty good there in the beginning, and I knew we had a good piece. I didn’t know if I had a good enough piece to get back by him, but we kept working that bottom…..It just all worked out. I think Andy wore his stuff out there at the end, and we just had a good piece at the end”, Weaver stated in victory lane.
Finishing behind Anderson in third was Dillan Stake, while Spike Moore and Marvin Winters made up the top five.
The 25 lap Pure Stock featured numerous battles for the lead with several lead changes amongst a few drivers. But it began with a quick caution for the spun car of Wayne Hawbaker that setup a complete restart.
That restart came at a cost to eight competitors in a massive pileup coming to the green flag that led to red flag and lengthy delay to clear the wreckage. All those involved were uninjured.
Craig Parrill lead the way for five laps before yielding the position to Jasen Geesaman. Geesaman was strong as Parrill faded back, while Rob Nichols entered the picture. Nichols battled past Parrill on Lap 9 into second place, then Jeremy Tinsman made his presence known.
Tinsman worked his way around Michael Warrenfeltz and Geesaman into second, and was hounding Nichols for the lead before Parrill stopped on the track in turn four to bring out the caution on Lap 17.
On the restart, Nichols passed Geesaman to lead Lap 18, and another caution flag waved. Geeseman then lost a few spots as this put Tinsman on the hunt for Nichols.
With just three laps to go, Tinsman passed Nichols, then Nichols returned the favor racing door-to-door to reclaim the lead briefly before breaking with two laps remaining.
This put Jason Stoner on Tinsman the final restart with a side by side battle to the finish with Tinsman taking the win by just a car length in a thrilling finish.
Warrenfeltz held on to third, while Joshua Bloom quietly came from mid-pack to take fourth, and Hawbaker made up for his earlier miscue to finish fifth.
The Hobby Stock nightcap will be best remembered for the finish as two young drivers battled for the same piece of real estate coming to the checkered flag reminiscent of Ricky Craven and Kurt Busch in 2003 at Darlington Raceway.
Last week’s winner Brady Daniels took the lead from Tom Caravello on the fifth lap, and led at the tenth lap when a caution flag setup the last five laps and a wild finish.
Codey Breeden, driving a borrowed car moved into second, and began his chase of Daniels. With a lap to go, Breeden closed in Daniels’ bumper. Coming to the checkered flag, Breeden got underneath Daniels off of turn four, and made contact enough that squeezed Daniels into the outside wall and enough to squeak by to claim his first career win.
Cody Sumption, Sam Caravello, and Kevin Boyer completed the top five.
Notes: Another great turnout of entries in the pit area for the Hub City 100 showed up as there were 53 Late Model Sportsman, 29 Pure Stocks, and 24 Hobby Stocks in action.
Weaver set fast time with a lap of 19.380 seconds in LMS time trials. Unofficially, practice times in hot laps eclipsed the official track record lap times in the LMS and PS divisions.
It was a typical “full moon” night that was long, but saw plenty of action. However, because of an impending curfew time, track officials made the decision to cut the laps of the LMS and HS features to 35 and 15 laps from 50 and 25 laps, respectively.
Feature Results
Late Model Sportsman – 1. 2J-Justin Weaver[1]; 2. 25-Andy Anderson[2]; 3. D19-Dillan Stake[4]; 4. 48W-Greg Moore[3]; 5. 88-Marvin Winters[8]; 6. 74-Derick Quade[5]; 7. 21-Chad Myers[19]; 8. 23-Tyler Emory[7]; 9. 33K-Devin Hart[9]; 10. 82-Andy Fries[16]; 11. 86-Scott Palmer[10]; 12. 43-Cody Kershner[11]; 13. 44-Shawn Shoemaker[17]; 14. 6D-Wayne Dillman[21]; 15. 08-Keith Koontz[12]; 16. 92-Walter Crouch[22]; 17. 15K-Bruce Kane[18]; 18. 72D-Dale Murphy[24]; 19. 5X-Brad Omps[23]; 20. 88X-Devin Weyandt[6]; 21. 48-Donnie Farlling[14]; 22. 8-James Lichliter[13]; 23. 2-Dan Zechman[15]; 24. 33T-Trent Brenneman[20]
Pure Stock – 8-Jeremy Tinsman[8]; 2. 21-Jason Stoner[3]; 3. 55-Michael Warrenfeltz[1]; 4. 00-Joshua Bloom[7]; 5. 6-Wayne Hawbaker[18]; 6. 28-Ethan Ours[19]; 7. 83-Bryan Kerns[21]; 8. 11-Dylan Rutherford[11]; 9. 3J-Jerry Jenkins Jr[14]; 10. 54-Delmer Grady[24]; 11. 7N-Rob Nichols[9]; 12. 81-Jasen Geesaman[4]; 13. 3W-Branson Woodward[5]; 14. 34C-Craig Parrill[2]; 15. 47-Anastasios Loizos[23]; 16. 129X-Jimmy Combs[6]; 17. 21W-Will Walls[13]; 18. 65-Dillon Wilson[10]; 19. S7-Kory Sites[12]; 20. 22-Jamey Swank[16]; 21. 19-Danny Atherton[15]; 22. 214-Kyle Sizemore[20]; 23. 2-Randy Zechman[17]; 24. 69-Dwayne Snyder[22]
Hobby Stock – 1. 03-Codey Breeden[6]; 2. 76-Brady Daniels[3]; 3. 20-Cody Sumption[9]; 4. 41-Sam Caravello[4]; 5. 22-Kevin Boyer[5]; 6. 100-Dalton Dillman[12]; 7. 38M-Matt Mellott[13]; 8. 15-Scot Sipes[15]; 9. 17-Randy Linaburg[2]; 10. 04-Dakota Moreland[18]; 11. ZR1-Zack Reid[16]; 12. 45-John Catlett[19]; 13. 28-Brad Umbrell[14]; 14. 62-Dylan Beavers[11]; 15. 141-Tom Caravello[1]; 16. 75-Justin Rosenberger[8]; 17. 00-Charles Noblitt[10]; 18. 19-Mike Fuller[7]; 19. (DNS) 12LC-Laura Chamberlain; 20. (DNS) 5-Charlie Clise; 21. (DNS) 64-William Crook; 22. (DNS) 51-Seth Jones; 23. (DNS) 03-Craig Kline; 24. (DNS) 0-Jamie Mills
