STEVE POIRIER IN VICTORY LANE AT EDELWEISS SPEEDWAY
Edelweiss Speedway played host to the first leg of the Canadian DIRT Challenge Wednesday night and for the second year in a row Steve Poirier captured top honours in the feature for modified 358 before another large crowd of excited fans.
The young driver out of St-Mathieu de Beloeil left from post 17 on the starting grid but managed to gain ground rapidly by dodging several mishaps and fender benders and taking advantage of a dozen caution flags all along the 100 lapper. A very hot Pierre Dagenais who inherited the pole position led the 26-car field through the first 65 laps and seemed unbeatable after surviving nine restarts until his car heated up which forced him to retire to pit lane. That gave way to runner up Dave Heaslip whom was waiting for the big break to happen but the pacesetting position didn’t last long for next time around Heaslip’s car was badly damaged after being rear ended which sent the Smiths Falls driver to pit lane also forcing him to retire for the night. That took care of another local favourite in this race. ‘’The track was a bit slippery tonight and my car was not running very well at first but I had to cope with that and suddenly everything started to go well for me near the end. There was a few accidents which I was lucky enough not to be part of and there was a bit of rough riding but otherwise it was a very good race.’’ said Poirier from the winners circle.
It was finally Kayle Robidoux out of St-Constant who crossed the finish stripe behind Poirier in the runner up spot while Kingston’s Dave Hitchcock ended third. Second generation driver Lee Ladouceur was fourth while Brian McDonald of Cornwall rounded out the fast five. Dagenais, Peter Mantha and Stephane Lafrance were the qualifying heat winners.
There also was a full program on hand Wednesday night at the Val des Monts oval and who else than Stephane Lebrun won the feature in the Pro Stock. The Gatineau driver registered his fifth win this year and took a serious option on the driver’s championship race. Cornwall Speedway Promoter Ron Morin was runner up while Mont-Laurier’s Alain Coursol completed the podium. Todd Raabe and Joey Ladouceur at the helm of Mathieu Beaudoin’s race car were fourth and fifth respectively. Lebrun and Raabe won the qualifying preliminaries.
Dominic Gauvreau won another Semi Pro feature by taking the measure of Bruno Richard ending in second place and of Serge Lagace in third place. Greg Ogilvie in fourth and Richard Brady in fifth rounded out the top five. Gauvreau and Lagace won checkered flags in the qualifying heats.
In the four cylinders, Brian Rochon broke the ice by capturing the feature over Nico Leblanc as runner up and over Erin Joyce of Wakefield as third best. Carl Soucy and Martin Levesque in fourth and fifth place respectively rounded out the top five while Pat Legault and Donald Meunier won the preliminaries.
Next program of exciting races at Edelweiss Speedway is slated on Friday July 2nd where a full and regular program featuring the Semi Pro series plus an Enduro practice for 4-6 and 8 cylinders. The green flag drops at 7:45.