The Hoosier Race Report: The Art of Perseverance

By Danny Burton

Danny Burton’s Hoosier Race Report appears courtesy of OpenWheelRacers.com

Columbus, IN… One of the joys of life is overcoming whatever obstacles that will no doubt come your way as you live. Watching people do the same is very gratifying too. Take real racers, for example. Last year saw Shane Cottle having to deal with various and sundry setbacks, most especially race -related injuries, to still have a very decent year in the Edison 10E sprint car. And this past Friday night at Gas City/I-69 Speedway, on the opening night of USAC’s Border Wars, Mr. Cottle would get himself his first USAC feature win on the quarter mile bullring.

37 sprint cars were on hand for this, USAC’s fifth sprint show of the year. Super fan Steve Turner (all the way from, Bloomington… Illinois) joined Keith, Tim, and myself in the turn three pit bleachers to catch some mud thrown our way during hot laps and qualifying. Ted (not Tracy) Hines was the surprise fast timer as he clicked off a 12.644.

The first of four heats could have been called the Keith Kunz Show, as the Columbus, Indiana sprint car wizard had his three cars run one-two-three. Darren Hagen won with Bryan Clauson, Cory Kruseman, and Critter Malone trailing, the Critter coming from the rear after an early spin. The second heat winner was Billy Puterbaugh, Jr. and Bart Grider was second. Scotty Weir came from the tail after a caution flag to take third; Derek O’Dell also transferred to the feature. With a loaded third heat, this race quickly became a game of high speed musical chairs with Brady Short beating Jon Stanbrough, Marc Arnold, and Jerry Coons Jr. to the checkered. The music stopped and Dave Darland was headed to the B Main. Josh Wise showed good patience in taking the fourth heat. Corey Smith was second, John Wolfe (taking a vacation day from work) was third, and Gas City hot runner Brandon Petty was fourth.

The B Main looked like your typical feature event with Shane Cottle winning over pole sitter Ted Hines, Josh Spencer, Bud Kaeding, Dave Darland, and Levi Jones. Mat Neely and Jay Drake took the provisionals.

Coons and Grider led ‘em to the green with Kruseman, Cottle, Stanbrough, Hines, Spencer, Malone, Darland, and Wolfe all soon to be hot on their trail. The so-called smart money would have had Coons taking the early lead at least, but the “Bartman” confounded the smart money people by not only taking the early lead but keeping it for the first 13 laps of the race before fading, then dropping out. Behind him Cottle slowly moved up from his fourth starting spot, taking the lead on lap 14. Lapped traffic became a factor midway through the race and lapped cars were spaced in between the leaders at the race’s first yellow flag on lap 25. By then Cottle was trailed by Coons, Grider, Malone, Kruseman, Stanbrough, Wolfe, Clauson, and Weir. Only a lap was run after the yellow before Marc Arnold did a slow rollover in turn four, collecting Hines in the process. At about the same time Clauson spun into the infield. On the race’s final re-start no one had anything for Cottle, but Stanbrough was making a late race charge. Had the race been 35 laps, well, who knows? No matter, Cottle had his first USAC win and was the fifth winner in five USAC features for the year. Following Stanbrough was Coons, Kruseman, Malone, Jones (from 19th), Wolfe, Weir, Neely (from provisional land, 23rd), and Spencer.

The next race at Gas City will be May 5, which will be a HARF Night, which means HARF members get 50% off their admission. You cannot beat that, gang. Part two of Border Wars would be the next night at Eldora.

New Weston, Ohio… Up in the northeastern part of Indiana lives a little boy who has no way of knowing what an idyllic life he leads. His parents take very good care of him and he has a large family to support and love him too. And to beat it all, he is fast becoming quite the race fan. So on Saturday he gathered his mom and grandparents (his dad was off turkey hunting, the feathered kind) and headed for Eldora.

Danny Burton and Modified Feature Winner Chad Ruhlman at Eldora Speedway, April 28, 2006. (Jim Morrison Photo)

Slowly but surely he is learning what a sprint car looks like and a modified too. Soon he will be able to recognize all the others too, I’m sure. So he spent the evening watching, playing with the cars his mom had brought, eating and bantering with the friends who had joined us, John, Julie, Jerry, and Steve. And seeing it was a Hoosier Auto Race Fans’ night (along with the Dayton Auto Race Fans), and seeing that John had given me the shirts, I decided to take the (not so) little guy with me to induct sprint feature winner Rob Chaney into HARF. He did so well, he accompanied me to present Eldora Stock Car winner Kevin Gossard his HARF membership. His mom and grandmother hijacked him off to the car so I was alone in presenting modified feature winner Chad Ruhlman his HARF membership. It was interesting to see that all three winners are not officially Hoosiers. No matter, we are glad to have them.

Elsewhere around Indiana, Dickie Gaines won at Bloomington with an impressive 48 cars on hand. Shadyhill, Putnamville, Lawrenceburg, Twin Cities, and Kokomo were all rained out. As mentioned Rob Chaney won at Tony’s place (Eldora). Rob made it six winners in six races so far in USAC. Jerry Coons Jr. is the 2005 Border Wars Champ. Also at Eldora Dickie Gaines, Jr. and Jay Drake were both hurt in a scary looking crash on lap seven of the feature. Dickie has a fractured arm and pelvis. Jay has a bruised back. USAC’s next sprint car action will be way east of here, at Lernerville Speedway in Pennsylvania on May 5 and Canandiagua Speedway in New York on May 6.

Turning down that invitation to take some vitamins endorsed by Barry Bonds, I’m…

Danny Burton

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