Defending Speed Queen Racing and Design Street Stock track champion Glen Gamblin refused to give up and it paid off with his narrow victory in the Street Stock Shootout Sunday night at the Kokomo Speedway.
“I’ll tell you what, that was a good race,” said Gamblin after officials conferred to determine who won between him and Lee Hobbs. “I really don’t think I could have got him if it wasn’t for the lapped traffic.”
With an extra 10 laps added on to the $500-to-win feature, the final lap was as entertaining a lap as the track has seen all season.
It appeared Hobbs had the event well in hand with just two laps to go and Gamblin a couple of car lengths behind him. After taking the white flag, backmarkers were directly in front of the leaders.
Coming off of turn four, Hobbs opted to go low while Gamblin had a great run up high, splitting a couple cars while charging to the checkered flag. Hobbs got tangled up with a lapped car while Gamblin squirted by up high to win by mere inches.
“Second place is the first loser,” Gamblin continued. “I wasn’t going to settle for second.”
Hobbs was second and Landon Miller third. Brandon Roundtree and Jesse Simmons rounded out the top five. Kaleb Nutter was sixth.
For the second time in as many weeks, West Terre Haute sprint car driver Blake Fitzpatrick emerged victorious.
Fitzpatrick got by series points leader Chris Windom on the second lap and paced the field the rest of the way. The win, however, didn’t come without its anxious moments.
In the early going, Windom got underneath Fitzpatrick while vying for the top spot and Fitzpatrick’s No. 10F bicycled hard in turn four. Then, on the 19th lap, Windom again got a good run on the inside of Fitzpatrick, who bobbled a bit off turn two. The pair made contact with Windom’s car eliminated from the event.
On the restart, Fitzpatrick had to hold off the charges of Dave Darland and Caleb Armstrong to secure his win.
“I feel bad that I got into Chris,” said Fitzpatrick. “I saw him stick his nose under me a couple of times and I got a little excited. This was a pretty good race and a good one to win. I can’t thank my crew for all the hard work they do getting the car ready to come back out and race each weekend.”
Darland was second and Armstrong third. Thomas Meseraul claimed fourth while Shane Cottle worked his way to fifth after starting 19th. Josh Spencer was sixth, Jon Stanbrough seventh, Justin Grant eighth, J.J. Hughes ninth and Wes McIntire 10th. Kokomo drivers Jamie Frederickson and Conner Donelson were 11th and 12th, respectively.
Jason Shrout made it two in a row and four overall with a late-race pass of Jason Larrison to win the Thunder Car feature.
Larrison started on the pole and led the opening eight laps before Shrout worked his way past on the ninth circuit. From there Shrout had only to deal with lapped traffic in the impressive win.
Larrison was second, Josh Hesson third and Gerald Armfield fourth. Nick Glassburn completed the top five. Jeremy Van Ness was sixth, Paul Whitaker seventh and Frank Downs Jr. eighth.
The track returns to action Sunday night with its weekly program along with the U.M.P. Modifieds.
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