MATT SHEPPARD RETURNS TO VICTORY LANE
5/1/2021 - MATT SHEPPARD RETURNS TO VICTORY LANE
The United Rentals DIRTcar Big Block Modifieds were back in action Saturday night at The Legendary House Of Power. This was the first time back since April 3rd for the Big Blocks and this time it was a part of the Joey Falanga Memorial Big Block Derby. The night kicked off with the Frank Stevens & Sons Roofing Hot Lap Hero Bonus. “With great risk comes great reward.” The Hot Lap Hero Bonus would have the fastest Big Block driver in Hot Laps pull a pill to invert heat race lineups. The fastest driver would end up being defending Track Champion Matt Sheppard. Sheppard would pull a four car invert for heats with wins for the night collected by Anthony Perrego, Tyler Jashembowski, and Billy Decker.
After a top 12 redraw, “Mad Max” and “The Highside Hustler”, Max McLaughlin and Tyler Boniface would start front row. At the wave of the green McLaughlin would find himself out to the lead with Boniface in tow. Boniface kept reeling in McLaughlin as the laps clicked by, but the Sweeteners Plus 32C was too in sync to allow Boniface to grab an advantage. Behind the duo, former track champions Anthony Perrego and Matt Sheppard were working hard to take over the top spots. Sheppard was able to get by the #69 of Boniface for second and Perrego managed to get by “Batman” Peter Britten for fourth.
The only driver eligible for the Wicked Truck Worx Back To Back Bonus was “The Waldwick Warrior” Tommy Meier. The opening night winner who started 15th, began to come alive near halfway utilizing the outside lane. As Meier began to get on by drivers in the top ten, up front “Super Matt” Matt Sheppard closed in on McLaughlin for the lead while Perrego was battling hard for third against Boniface. As Max clung to his lead, a late race caution for “The Sensational One” Jimmy Horton would restack the field. On the restart, Max would bring the field to the green but it was Sheppard who would shoot off like a cannon down the backstretch and take over the lead. Perrego would take advantage of the caution and work his way on by the #32c of McLaughlin as well. As the few laps remaining came to conclusion, Sheppard was just too powerful to be dethroned for the Big Block Derby.
41 drivers were in contention for making the 20 lap Arkel Motors Sportsman feature event. The event, like the night, was in memory of former Sportsman star Joey Falanga. Multiple sponsors joined on board for the Sportsman portion of the night totaling out to be $1,500 to the winner of the feature event. Tighe Sherlock, Joey Bruning, Troy Arnold, and Bobby Flood collected the heat wins for the night along with Tyler Peet and Kevin Stevens grabbing the wins in the two last chance qualifiers.
Troy Arnold and Everett Haubrich made up row one for the feature event. At the initial start, Arnold would take command out front, but a couple of cautions would be displayed for minor incidents. On a restart, Arnold still was your leader but Tighe Sherlock would get around the #717 of Haubrich for second. After Sherlock secured second position, April 10th winner Joey Bruning would make his way on by both Haubrich and Sherlock and take over the rights to second place. Bruning wouldn’t stop there, as he hunted down Troy Arnold who was maintaining his lead. After another caution, Arnolds lead was diminished and Bruning would pull alongside the #73J. As the race restarted, Troy held on, but was out matched by Bruning. Another caution would plague the event, but was to be expected with how many different lanes of racing the Sportsman field were using. At one point, a 5 wide clean battle was displayed in the apex of turns 3 and 4. Jared LaBagh, Brian Krummel, Jake Bedell, Jeff Hulseapple, and Tanner VanDoren were some of all that were charging hard to get up front.
A couple more cautions arrayed, allowing Troy Arnold to try and gain his lead back. However Bruning was strong and kept out front. Brian Krummel took advantage of a late race restart and made his way into second bringing along Hulseapple and LaBagh. A final caution would come out, but Joey Bruning was right back to his familiar place; at the top of the podium.
The 15 lap Northeast Autoparts Group Street Stock feature had former champion Charlie Donald and Sussex NJ driver Ryan Modiano on the front row. As the first lap clicked in, new comer to the division the #110 of Ben Richard found himself around on the backstretch and Wayne Taylor in trouble in turn 3. At the restart, it was Donald out front with Modiano in tow. Defending champ Bobby Sleight Jr. made his way into second on by the #07 of Modiano. Walt Henry, who started last was into the top five in a few short laps. After Sleight got out front, his lead began to expand, and within the remaining laps Sleight had no challenge for the top spot. Vigiletti, Henry, Donald, and Modiano supplied some of the night's strongest action with continuous passing and switching of the top 5.
UNITED RENTALS DIRTCAR MODIFIED FINISH:
Pos Competitor Total Time Diff Laps Best Lap Best Lap No. Best Speed
1 9S Matt Sheppard 16:19.723 0.000 30 22.414 8 100.384 mi/h
2 44P Anthony Perrego 16:21.849 2.126 30 22.638 8 99.39 mi/h
3 32C Max McLaughlin 16:24.265 4.542 30 22.411 2 100.397 mi/h
4 33.3 Tommy Meier 16:24.477 4.754 30 22.745 5 98.923 mi/h
5 21A Peter Britten 16:24.937 5.214 30 22.968 3 97.962 mi/h
6 4V Billy VanInwegen 16:26.923 7.200 30 23.126 26 97.293 mi/h
7 69T Tyler Boniface 16:27.952 8.229 30 22.529 2 99.871 mi/h
8 91 Billy Decker 16:28.998 9.275 30 22.908 2 98.219 mi/h
9 33H Matt Hitchcock 16:30.596 10.873 30 23.155 12 97.171 mi/h
10 3D Tyler Dippel 16:31.354 11.631 30 23.306 6 96.542 mi/h
11 21M Bob McGannon 16:31.620 11.897 30 23.324 25 96.467 mi/h
12 88T Tyler Jashembowski 16:33.092 13.369 30 23.113 6 97.348 mi/h
13 93X Craig Mitchell 16:34.097 14.374 30 23.308 5 96.533 mi/h
14 4* Kevin Root 16:35.214 15.491 30 23.611 7 95.295 mi/h
15 43F Keith Flach 16:34.649 1 lap 29 23.627 9 95.23 mi/h
16 4SL Bobby Hentschel 16:36.721 1 lap 29 23.482 7 95.818 mi/h
17 78 Zach Vavricka 16:40.652 1 lap 29 23.835 9 94.399 mi/h
18 10 Rich Eurich 16:44.108 1 lap 29 23.990 8 93.789 mi/h
19 28H Ric Hill 15:30.821 3 laps 27 23.491 7 95.781 mi/h
20 244 Chris Whitehead 15:03.539 5 laps 25 23.722 16 94.849 mi/h
21 J17 Jeff Heotzler 8:33.817 9 laps 21 23.379 7 96.24 mi/h
22 55 Allison Ricci 13:24.010 9 laps 21 23.610 9 95.299 mi/h
23 43 Jimmy Horton 7:39.411 11 laps 19 23.637 7 95.19 mi/h
ARKEL MOTORS SPORTSMAN FINISH:
Pos Competitor Total Time Diff Laps Best Lap Best Lap No. Best Speed
1 24B Joe Bruning 26:09.239 0.000 20 23.366 9 96.294 mi/h
2 12C Brian Krummel 26:09.658 0.419 20 23.494 13 95.769 mi/h
3 1X Jeff Hulseapple 26:10.976 1.737 20 23.553 6 95.529 mi/h
4 38 Jared Labagh 26:14.871 5.632 20 23.522 16 95.655 mi/h
5 395 Jake Bedell 26:15.662 6.423 20 23.953 11 93.934 mi/h
6 6V Tanner VanDoren 26:16.276 7.037 20 23.730 14 94.817 mi/h
7 21 Jamie Yannone 26:17.098 7.859 20 23.922 12 94.056 mi/h
8 21Jr Gary Edward Jr 26:18.038 8.799 20 23.876 14 94.237 mi/h
9 5L Charlie Loiodice 26:18.964 9.725 20 23.883 13 94.209 mi/h
10 1T Tighe Sherlock 26:19.126 9.887 20 24.096 5 93.376 mi/h
11 97C Cody Higbie 26:19.500 10.261 20 23.947 19 93.957 mi/h
12 73J Troy Arnold 26:21.900 12.661 20 23.648 2 95.145 mi/h
13 38S Kevin Stevens 26:22.243 13.004 20 24.266 14 92.722 mi/h
14 91 Bobby Flood 26:22.419 13.180 20 24.182 14 93.044 mi/h
15 717 Everett Haubrich 26:24.293 15.054 20 24.484 17 91.897 mi/h
16 2 Anthony Falanga 26:24.758 15.519 20 24.268 5 92.715 mi/h
17 25J Jason Armstrong 26:26.761 17.522 20 24.542 20 91.68 mi/h
18 15M Daniel Morgiewicz 26:28.897 19.658 20 24.731 15 90.979 mi/h
19 15S Dylan Smith 26:30.872 21.633 20 24.846 15 90.558 mi/h
20 J73 Joe Conklin 26:31.236 21.997 20 24.720 6 91.019 mi/h
21 270 Marshal Jones 25:19.312 3 laps 17 25.122 5 89.563 mi/h
22 12P Tyler Peet 24:48.591 4 laps 16 24.367 12 92.338 mi/h
23 97B John Bockhorn 26:33.110 4 laps 16 24.912 10 90.318 mi/h
24 20B Joe Bonetti 26:34.373 6 laps 14 24.704 9 91.078 mi/h
25 5 Ryan Neiger 26:31.735 7 laps 13 23.983 6 93.816 mi/h
26 18W Bobby Waters 16:20.155 11 laps 9 24.762 6 90.865 mi/h
27 49 Aiden Elliot 16:21.414 11 laps 9 24.729 5 90.986 mi/h
28 10R Ryan Walther 16:23.548 11 laps 9 24.918 5 90.296 mi/h
NORTHEAST PARTS GROUP STREET STOCK FINISH:
Pos Competitor Total Time Diff Laps Best Lap Best Lap No. Best Speed
1 8 Bobby Sleight Jr 10:45.378 0.000 15 29.244 11 76.939 mi/h
2 1V Mike Vigiletti 10:46.357 0.979 15 28.963 13 77.685 mi/h
3 171 Walt Henry 10:48.937 3.559 15 29.414 10 76.494 mi/h
4 07 Ryan Modiano 10:52.082 6.704 15 29.680 6 75.809 mi/h
5 32 Charlie Donald 10:52.249 6.871 15 30.015 10 74.963 mi/h
6 49 Ron Constable 10:54.670 9.292 15 29.821 6 75.45 mi/h
7 45 Jim Hajkowski 10:55.518 10.140 15 29.982 4 75.045 mi/h
8 78H Danny Hedges 10:57.947 12.569 15 29.840 9 75.402 mi/h
9 46 Dillon Gannon 10:58.524 13.146 15 30.107 7 74.733 mi/h
10 414 Wayne Taylor 10:58.733 13.355 15 29.683 9 75.801 mi/h
11 33 Kyle Pepin 9:01.804 4 laps 11 30.653 10 73.402 mi/h
12 110 Ben Richard 1.240 15 laps - 0.000 - -
13 J30 Jared Palmer 0.000 0.000 - 0.000 - -