Two names familiar to victory lane at Oswego Speedway, Shullick and Bond, kicked off the 2008 season at the lakeside oval with impressive wins. Dave Shullick Jr raced to his third consecutive winged supermodified feature win at Oswego and Mike Bond completely dominated the SBS 30 lap feature. Both race winners started from the 11th position en route to their opening day wins at Oswego.
Ohio drivers, both heat race winners, Moe Lilje and Jack Smith paced the 26 car supermodified field to Bobby Hayduk’s green flag. Lilje shot out to the lead, as he raced away from his inside starting spot. Shullick had fans attention early in the 40 lapper, as he raced his way from his 11th to seventh in the first three laps. Lilje held the top spot with Randy Burch, Jack Smith, Greg Furlong, Keith Gilliam, Randy Ritskes, Shullick, Kelly Miller, Charlie Schultz and Timmy Jedrzejek early on. Lilje lapped the speedway at 16.71 clips, as he built a 10 car length advantage over the heavy hitters in the field. Ritskes worked his way by Gilliam, and set sail for the top four. Lilje held his lead, while the quartet of Burch, Furlong, Ritskes and Shullick battled among themselves for position. Kelly Miller, running sixth, began to chop the distance down, and looked to make it a five car battle for second. Lap 14, Lilje came into traffic for the first time, and was bottled up for two laps, as the second place battle began to cut into his lead. Lap 14, the complexion of the race changed dramatically. As they raced around a lapped car, the top five cars of Burch, Ritskes and Furlong collided, with all three making heavy contact with the front straightaway wall. As Ritskes unbuckled from the disabled Soule 32, a fuel leak developed, with a spark igniting a blaze. Quick thinking track safety officials were all ready on the scene, and extinguished the flame as it appeared. None of the drivers were injured, but all three cars were severely damaged. After the lengthy clean up effort, racing resumed with a new top five. Lilje now lead team mate Shullick, with Kelly Miller third, Jedzrejek fourth and Schultz in fifth. Lap 18, as he raced along the front straightaway, Lilje’s 19 developed an engine malfunction, sidelining the leader of the race. Shullick took control from there. Jedzrejek and Schultz got by Miller, and tried to catch the high flying leader, who stopped clocks with 16.21 and 16.26 laps. Jedzrejek began to close the gap to Shullick, as he erased the .52 second lead in a handful of laps, racing to the back bumper of the 49 machine. Jedzrejek tried a couple of times to get by the Shullick machine, to no avail. A debris caution on lap 35 slowed the field. The debris proved to be second running Jedzrejek’s nose wing, and as Timmy later said, “I knew we were done after that. I was tightening up, and I just didn’t have anything for DJ after the nose wing came off.” With 5 to go, Shullick took off when the green flag came out, and raced away unchallenged the remainder of the race. Jedzrejek fell back, and finished almost 3 seconds behind, with Schultz third, sweeping the podium for the MSA regulars. “I just love coming here!,” the winner exclaimed in victory lane. “Moe was running really well, and he’s going to get his wins. My dad has five wins here, now I have three. Hopefully we can begin to catch up with him.”
“DJ is the King of the MSA right now,” second place finisher Jedzrejek said. “Second on opening day is a good way to start the season, we just have to find a way to chase DJ down a bit.” “We’re getting there,” a happy Schultz said in third. “Early it didn’t look like we were in good shape, but between our car coming in, and others falling out, we’ll take another third.”
SBS regulars Kenny Pierce and Shawn Walker started up front for the first feature race of the year. Walker darted out to the lead, as the field scattered behind looking for racing room. Dave Gruel, Tim Barbeau and Jack Patrick elected to use the high side of the speedway to work forward, while Mike Bond and Larry Muroski went to the low side. All eyes were on Bond from the get go, as the 26 was on a mission from the start. From starting spot 11, Bond went high and low to move up to fourth by lap 5. The next circuit, he blew by Pierce, Jack Patrick and Stan Gates to move up to second. Lap 6, he pulled side by side with Walker in turn four, and had the top spot by the time they drag raced along the grandstand straightaway. Bond’s first lap in the lead was clocked at 19.63, and he quickly distanced himself from the field. Bond’s team mate Rick Zeigler brought out the yellow flag on lap 10, as he made contact with the inside fourth turn wall. When racing resumed, Bond went back to work and checked out from the pack. At the halfway point, lap 15, Bond’s lead was up to 1.61 seconds, as he clocked in a 19.68 circuit. Rob Pullen began to make his presence felt, as the Deuce came around. He wheeled by Dave Gruel on lap 16 for fourth place, and grabbed third the next time by, disposing of Gates. Lap 20, As Pulled tried to keep moving up, contact with the second running Shawn Walker car sent the Pullen 2 to the outside turn two wall, ending his charge on the back of a tow truck. That caution flag wiped out the 4.47 second lead Bond had built. Following the dominating 26 car on this restart were Walker, Gates, Kevin Knopp, Josh Larochelle, Brian Sobus, Jack Patrick. Lou Levea Jr and Jason Spalding were the only other cars on the racing surface at this point of the feature. Walker fell back on the take off, as Bond blew away once again. Knopp and Sobus raced their way forward, but neither had enough to catch Mike Bond in the afternoon opener. As the scoreboard flashed “30”, Bond drove under the checkered flag more than 5 seconds ahead of Knopp and Sobus. “We started off the year right,” Bond said in the understatement of the day. “I’d like to thank the guys on the crew, they really turned all the wrenches right, and really put a good set up under me.”
The Garafolo SBS heat races were won by Larry Muroski, Shawn Walker and Stan Gates. In the SBS feature, the Hannibal IGA supermarket Express Lane Award and the Cutro Professional Inspections Up 'n Comer awards went to Lou LeVea Jr.; the Colosse Cheese Store Hard Charger was Brian Sobus; the Butler Disposal Service Hard Luck award went to Ken Pierce; the Whites Car Care 4th Place award went to Josh LaRochelle.
News and Notes…….28 supermodified and 20 SBS cars were on hand for opening day. In supermodified time trials, Timmy Jedrzejek set a new track record with a 15.542 lap, erasing Bentley Warren’s track record that has held up for 15 years. Supermodified heat race wins were taken by Moe Lilje, Jack Smith and Greg Furlong. Practice crashes were severe in the supermodified division as Craig Rayvals totally damaged his 94 car after the throttle hung on the back straightaway. Rayvals slammed the third turn wall with great force. Mike Casey severely damaged his 11 Saturday with a fourth turn wall shot, requiring Casey to be transported to a Syracuse hospital for observation. He returned to the track for Sunday’s action. Racing resumes this Saturday night at Oswego Speedway, with a regular night of action of qualifiers and a 30 lap SBS feature and 45 lap supermodified feature event. Gates open at 4:30pm with the first green flag at 6:30pm.
Finish SBS 30:
1)Mike Bond 26, 2)Kevin Knopp 04, 3)Brian Sobus 79, 4)Josh Larochelle 10, 5)Shawn Walker 68, 6)Jack Patrick 9, 7)Lou Levea Jr. 95, 8)Stan Gates 28, 9)Jason Simmons 91, 10)Rob Pullen 2, 11)Dave Gruel 18, 12)Ken Pierce 67, 13)Larry Muroski 38, 14)Tim Barbeau 50, 15)Barry Kingsley 23, 16)Krieg Heroth 46, 17)Rick Zeigler 25, 18)Bill Moore 7, 19)Guard Nearbin 1
Finish MSA-Oswego Wings 40:
1)Dave Shullick Jr 49, 2)Timmy Jedzrejek 8, 3)Charlie Schultz 7, 4)Denny Fisher 81, 5)Bob Bond 25, 6)Jack Smith 09, 7)Jason Spalding 23, 8)Bobby Dawson 28, 9)Shawn Muldoon 1, 10)Otto Sitterly 7, 11)Keith Gilliam 87, 12)Pat Lavery 2, 13)Stephen Gioia 9, 14)Bobby Magner 22, 15)Kelly Miller 16, 16)AJ Russell 70, 17)Moe Lilje 19, 18)Randy Burch 52, 19)Greg Furlong 72, 20)Randy Ritskes 32, 21)Joe Gosek 00, 22)Matt Palmer 21, 23)Robbie Summer 97, 24)Lou Levea 03, 25)Craig Reed 12