By KEN BRUCE
Mike Gular continued to ride his early season wave in 2023 winning his third race of the year Friday night at Big Diamond Speedway. Gular and the Terry Fastnacht owned No. 2A team struggled much of 2022 as the team tried to do the Super DIRTcar Series that proved to be too time consuming and in turn hurt their weekly efforts. A decision was made in the off season to only commit to Friday nights at Big Diamond and the Short Track Super Series South region. On Saturday nights the team will pick and choose where and when they race if they indeed want to race at all. This approach has served the team well so far in 2023 as they are more prepared to race when they do race, and the results show with three wins in the month of April and having been in contention for other wins.
Friday night at Big Diamond, Gular was on the march early from his ninth starting spot entering the top five within the first five laps. Gular and Brett Kressley had a personal battle of their own within the top five as they made their way towards the front. Kressley and Gular continued to make their way through the cars in front of them and found themselves running second and third after getting by Nick Rochinski. Corey Renninger was the leader, and the duo quickly ran him down. Kressley worked the inside of Renninger and when Renninger moved down to block Kressley’s pass, Gular saw his opportunity and went to the outside going into turn one and made his way around both for the race lead. Gular went on to hold off Kressley throughout the remaining laps to win his first Big Diamond feature since July of 2021.
“The race just kind of played out in our favor tonight,” said a very happy Gular in the tech shed after the race. “They were starting to walk away from me, so I decided to move my line around a little bit and that made a big difference in the way I was able to get through the corners. Honestly, that’s how close everybody is here. We had a good car but if I wouldn’t have moved my line around, we wouldn’t have won it.”
Running third late in the race, Gular knew he had to make a move and make it quick if he wanted to get the victory.
“Sitting in third like I was, you can kind of see where you are losing ground and I have lost a bunch of races like that,” explained Gular. “Running behind them I could see they were getting jammed up on the bottom and I just figured it best to go where they were not going and was able to get a good run down the frontstretch and into turn one on the outside and was able to make it stick. I don’t know how close Brett was there at the end, but it doesn’t matter now, I guess. Three wins in April and we just have to keep it going.”
Career Best Second-Place Finish for Renninger
Corey Renninger is what I like to call a local weekend warrior. He shows up every week at Big Diamond and despite all of the headaches and heartaches, he is there unloading his modified. Renninger has shown speed at times, but something always seems to go wrong for the young driver.
Friday night, Renninger drove the race of his modified career. Starting from the pole after original pole sitter Wayne Witmer chose to start at the rear. Renninger took off and left the field in his dust. Renninger would go on to lead the first 20 laps before Mike Gular would go by on the outside to take the lead. Brett Kressley would also muscle by Renninger dropping him back to third and that’s where he would ultimately finish the race. For Renninger that was his best ever finish in the modified division.
“Yeah man, this is fantastic,” said a more than happy Renninger standing next to his Modified. “We have really been struggling, everything has been up and down, and we don’t usually do good in the beginning of the year ever and we got lucky with this one. We had a good draw, I have a great family, a great crew and amazing sponsors. This car is awesome, my dad did right in buying this one.”
As mentioned before, Renninger led the first 20 laps and wondered if his car would just hold on a little more if he could have won the race.
“If we wouldn’t have got loose there at the end, I might’ve been able to hold them off for the win,” mentioned Renninger. “The last 10 laps it started to get loose, and we developed a miss in the motor. I can’t thank these guys enough for sticking with me. It hasn’t always been easy, that’s for sure, and hopefully there is more to come out of this. Being here in the tech shed is a good thing and no offense, but these other two guys in here (Gular and Kressley) have a lot more money in their cars than me. To get beat by Mike and Brett is nothing to feel bad about, they have championships, and I am just in my third year in the modifieds.”
Big Diamond Nuggets:
After the first two weeks of big money races, this was the first regular event of the year with 29 Modifieds signed in. Heat races were won by Brett Kressley, Wayne Witmer and Corey Renninger…
Due to a work commitment, Shawn Fitzpatrick was not able to race Friday night, so Ryan Watt jumped behind the wheel of the black T102 and drove it to a 10th place finish after starting 21st…
Frank Cozze has to be the tough luck driver of the year so far at Big Diamond. On opening night Cozze backed his No. 44 hard into the third turn wall with the end result of the team having to put a new rear clip on his Modified. The following Friday night, Cozze was involved in a heat race crash not of his doing resulting in his car almost going over and ending their night. This past Friday night Cozze had fuel pressure problems in warmups and never made it out for his heat and consi. To soften the blow, Cozze was the recipient of The Big Diamond Dog Pound Hard Luck Award for the night worth $200…
After two strong top five finishes, Eddie Strada was a no show on Friday night…
Bad night for the two all-time feature winners and the drivers who won the first two shows, Craig Von Dohren and Duane Howard. Von Dohren was surprisingly non-competitive in the feature, relegating him to a ninth-place finish. For Howard it was even worse. Howard spun in the middle of the race to avoid contact with another car, then after being in the back pulled in with around five laps to go to save the motor…
Tough luck for Crate Sportsman driver Paulie Hartwig III. Hartwig dominated the Crate feature only to be caught up with a lapped car after taking the white flag causing front end damage to his No. 73 forcing him to a stop. Hartwig has shown very good speed in the former Danny Bouc No. 6 and it is just a matter of time before he is in victory lane…
Aleia Geisler was back behind the wheel of her No. 44 Modified after taking the week off last Friday to allow Ryan Grim to drive…
It is just a matter of time before we see Louden Reimert and Jeff Strunk in victory lane at Big Diamond. Both drivers have shown speed in every feature and just need the race to play to them to win…
Craig Von Dohren is the current Quandel Concrete Modified points leader with a two-point lead over Mike Gular followed by Jeff Strunk, Louden Reimert and Rick Laubach…
I can be reached for any comments and questions via email at dirtracefan25@hotmail.com and on Twitter @dirtracefan25
