By Bill Foley
For the second consecutive week Modified racing in the Sunshine State has been rained out.
Last week it was All Tech and a tremendous downpour.
This week it was a steady drizzle which was hard enough to not be able to race.
The longer it lingered the later the finishing time would have been.
Finally, mercifully, DIRTcar officials pulled the plug. Friday night was done. It never happened. Tim McCreadie really didn’t have second fastest time in his group and didn’t actually win his heat because what was done wasn’t recognized.
So going into the final night the Modified fans they will be cheering for TMac who currently has a 25 point lead over Hudson O’Neal in the race for the Golden Gater. It all comes down to Saturday night.
Forty Modifieds entered Friday action as Stewart Friesen and Dexter Stacey. Stacey was entered, but his hauler was parked and loaded in the pits. Kyle Dingwall also wasn’t in competition, but he wasn’t listed in the entry list.
In time trials the only slow down was Andrew Smith who jumped the cushion in the first turn and was able to keep it off of the wall.
The quickest ten in Group A, which would provide the first two heats field, were Max McLaughlin, Erick Rudolph, Alex Payne, Brian Berger, Corbin Millar, Kyle Coffey, Danny Johnson, Matt Sheppard and Danny Creeden.
Group B was topped by Demetrios Drellos followed by Larry Wight, Mat Williamson, Jimmy Phelps, Justin Stone, Michael Parent, Peter Brittan, Marc Johnson, Andrew Smith and Jordan McCreadie.
Max’a 17.971 was the fastest time of the night.
Started raining at 7:21 p.m. and they waited about two hours. At one time as the equipment headed for the track the rains came again.
Pit Stops
Ryan Arbuthnot talked about his run from behind to win the consi on Thursday night. He said, “I had to run hard. I held my breath through the 10 laps. I’ve run high before, but not usually at a track that is this fast.”
Darren Smith’s team had brought an extra motor with them and they were ready to go on Friday night.
Kyle Dingwall wasn’t on the track Friday night, but the team car to Corbin Millar also had a Big Block. There was some thought it might have been a Small Block.
Talking with Jimmy Phelps during rain delay and he indicated he’s back in the promoter’s seat again. Expect the Weedsport schedule to be released soon.
Will Thomas ran well here in 2019, but the Western Pennsylvania driver is back. The graphics on his number are really interesting as inside the number nine are photos of his four year old son Willy. Pretty neat.
Ronnie Davis III told a story while hanging out in the rain on Friday night. It was well documented that his dad had problems with the hauler getting to Volusia. However, Ronnie flew in and his residence (the toter) wasn’t here. So he landed in Orlando late at night on Tuesday and had to book a hotel room. He got in his rental and turned on the GPS to discover his hotel was over three hours away. It seems is inadvertantly booked a room in Miami. Ronnie said,”Fortunately, they let me cancel the room. I found a place at two o’clock in the morning and they said the TV didn’t work. I didn’t care. Good news is they didn’t charge me to cancel the Miami room.” He noted dad no longer stressed over hauler, but stressed that the 32R isn’t as fast as they need it to be.
