DOUBLE FEATURES AT CORNWALL
It was a great night of racing at Cornwall Motor Speedway. Doulbe features were the order of the night, with a total of 87 cars and 248 laps as the rescheduling of events continued. The night started with features that were originally scheduled for July 2nd. In the 1st Modified feature, Danny O'Brien (Kingston, Ontario) won his 3rd feature of the season at the quarter-mile DIRT oval by holding off a strong challenge from veteran driver, Dave Heaslip (Smiths Falls, Ontario). O'Brien took the lead for good when he passsed Peter Mantha on the restart of a caution on lap 22. Heaslip followed O'Brien and Mantha was relegated to 3rd. There was also a good battle for 4th through 7th with Rick Cauvier (Mountain, Ontario) coming in just ahead of Kevin Fetterly (Massena, New York). Joel Doiron (Alexandria, Ontario) came in 6th with Mark Hitchcock (Kingston, Ontario) not too far behind for 7th. Marc Therrien won the first of two features in the first Late Model feature. The Alexandria driver took advantage of a caution with four laps to go to vault into the lead on the restart. Cornwall driver, Cliff Merpaw Jr (2nd) and 18-year old Mitch Jock (Akwesasne) rounded out the top 3. Robin Laframboise won the first Duke feature with Steve Mullin taking home the checkered flag in the Rookie feature.
The 2nd set of features proved to be just as exciting, if not more so, than the 1st set, with 25 cars lined up for the start of the 30-lap race for the Modifieds.. Bill "Moon" Mullin (Iroquois, Ontario) won that feature. For Mullin, it was his first feature win of the season at Cornwall, breaking the two race streak by O'Brien. It wasn't a cakewalk for the crowd favorite Mullin, who had the fend off a charging Dave Heaslip and Pierre Dagenais (Gatineau, Quebec). Heaslip fought with Mullin for the lead for the final 16 laps of the race but couldn't gain any ground. Dagenais finished 3rd but not without a late fight from Danny O'Brien who was able to work his way to a 4th place finish despite being at the back of the pack as late as lap 8. Laurent Ladouceur rounded out the top 5. Both Mullin and O'Brien pick up valuable points for the Doiron Engineering Cup. Both features counted in the 4 race series for a $3,000 first place prize. The fourth and final race in the series is scheduled for August 13th. Marc Therrien won his 2nd straight Late Model feature in convincing fashion. He was a straight-away ahead of Dave Bissonette (Alexandria, Ontario) and Darryl Steele (Renfrew, Ontario). Bissonette finished 2nd by a nose. Stephane Lemire (Drummondville, Quebec) won the late Duke feature with the Rookie checkered flag going to Mark Radbourne (Cornwall, Ontario). Marcel Baron, who runs in the Duke Stock on a weekly basis, won the demolition derby that was held at the end of the night.
Coming up on Sunday, August 6th, the J.R. Fuels/Bear's Den Holiday Classic comes to Cornwall Motor Speedway. A 50-lap feature awaits the Modified drivers with a full program for all support classes. It's a Syracuse qualifier for the Modifieds. Racing gets underway at 7pm. Gates open at 5:30pm.