Pocket Rocket blasts to Pabst Shootout win

Kaszubinski and Catanzano also claim victories

LAFARGEVILLE, NY: It took a white, but it was worth it. The Can Am Motorsports Park played host Thursday night to the 22nd Annual Pabst Shootout for the 358 modifieds, the Empire Super Sprints and the IMCA modifieds. For the second straight year, there was another competitor, Mother Nature, and she made her presence known on a couple of occasions.

There were four 358 heats, three ESS heats and three IMCA heats, plus a modified consy and IMCA B main, ESS B main all to whittle down the field to 24 cars for the respective features. The first feature on the track was the IMCA modified feature. Track owner John Wight doubled his regular Saturday night purse in an attempt to lure more IMCA cars to Can Am. 24 of the 30 cars made the feature, and it didn’t take long for action to start as pole sitters Ken Klinkowsky and Joe Locorini got together in turn four of the first lap. At this point, there were sprinkles of Mother Nature in the air once again, and on the 5th lap the race was cautioned while the track was run in again. Once racing resumed, it was Neil Edgar and Kevin Battelle in command with Cory Fachini and George Catanzano all in contention. Former point leader Kevin Battelle has been struggling as of late, and his bad luck continued as he broke on the 17th lap. On the restart, Neil Edgar had problems on the front stretch putting him out of the race. The last eight laps was an exciting two-car race as Catanzano and Fachini were side-by-side fighting for the win. At the checkers, it was the Z1 of Catanzano winning over Fachini with the veteran Doug Carlyle in with a fine third place showing with Larry Bezner fourth, Jake Rabetoy fifth and former track regular Steve Bidwell sixth.

It was then time for the 40 lap Pabst Shootout for the 358 modifieds. Once again, 24 cars answered the call with the poles going to Billy Gill and Doug Fuller. The race was only two laps old when Joel Doiron had rear-end problems in the Connie Legue #1 and had to retire. On the restart, George “Boomer” McIntyre had problems and slowed in turn one taking a trip to the pits on the hook. Two more laps were run when invader Matt Sheppard looped his car in turn four. On the restart, it was the Pocket Rocket, Danny O’Brien taking the lead from Gill with Jason Barney, Pierre Dagenais, Lee Gill, Frankie Caprara and Ben Tucker in hot pursuit. On the 6th lap, Danny ran a lap of 19.7 on the multi-groove tacky Can Am oval. At the same time, Frankie “Flatfoot” Caprara was taking to the cushion to start picking off cars. At the halfway flags of starter Steve Rickett, the running order was O’Brien, B. Gill, Barney, Caprara, L. Gill, Dagenais, Ryan Baye, Ben Tucker, Billy Wilcox and Jimmy Phelps. By the 24th lap, Caprara had flatfooted it into second spot and was looking for the Pocket Rocket. Billy Wilcox’s night came to an end on the 34th lap when he pulled his Olsen into the pits. The race was green the rest of the way with O’Brien holding off Caprara to become only the second three-time winner of the Pabst Shootout, Steve Paine being the other, with Caprara in with a strong second place finish followed by Bill Gill in his Teo, the steady Racin Jason Barney in with another top five in fourth, and Lee Gill rounding out the top five. The win was worth $2,000 to Danny and is his third win of the year at Can Am.

Last out came the ESS sprinters for their 20 lap A main. Dan Kaszubinski was looking for a three peat. He was fast all night, both in his heat and in the Dash, and started mid pack and made some moves that made it look like he was hot out of a cannon. He really loves the wide, fast Can Am track, and he was not afraid to go upstairs to pass other cars. The race started bad for Lance Young as he got sideways in turn two and collected young Shawn Felt from Clayton, NY performing in front of his home crowd. Both suffered enough damage to put them out of the race. Scott Holcomb was the early race leader, but Kaz was coming and by the halfway point had worked himself into second place followed by John Karklin, Jr., Ryan Coniam and Dale Planck. Planck had won the Dash earlier and was familiar with the Can Am track, so he was also making his way to the front. On the 11th lap, the inevitable happened as Kaszubinski overtook Holcomb for the lead and went on for the win. Planck worked his way up to a great second place finish with Coniam and Holcomb in a photo finish for third, with Mike Woodring rounding out the top five.

Notes: Car counts were 29 358s, 30 IMCA mods and 32 ESS sprinters… Local favorite Rick Wilson was a DNQ for the A main. Rick also flipped in his heat. Not a good night for the Joyceville Jet… Sportsman driver Scott MacCue qualified for the Pabst Shootout and ran a solid race… Good to see former runners Steve Bidwell and Cory Fachini back at Can Am… Great crowd on hand despite the cloudy showery weather.