Jeseo Beats The Rain and The Modified Field for King of The Track Special
Story By:PHLL ALLAWAY / LEBANON VALLEY SPEEDWAY MEDIA Photos By:DAVE DALESANDRO / RACERSGUIDE.COM
West Lebanon NY.- July 17, 2016- On Saturday night, $5,000 was up for grabs as Rifenburg Construction presented the annual King of the Track feature. However, rains forced a hurry-up procedure. Chad Jeseo was just fine with that.
Jeseo earned the pole in his No. 25 and held off Mike King to get out in front. On the second lap of the race, there was contact exiting turn 4 as Brian Berger and Kyle Sheldon were balked. Mike Keeler ended up with a big dent in his right side, but everyone continued. No caution was thrown.
The stack-up allowed Jeseo to pull out a big lead. Brett Hearn, who started 15th, was able to make up a number of spots as a result. So was Andy Bachetti, who once again had a very fast car.
Jeseo continued to expand his advantage to nearly a straightaway over the rest of the field as Bachetti moved up. By lap 11, Bachetti was already fourth after starting 14th.
From there, Bachetti began making inroads. He took third from Olden Dwyer on lap 13. A few laps later, he ran down and passed King for second. Then, he zeroed in on Jeseo.
However, all the charging had taken a bit out of Bachetti’s tires. By the time he got to Jeseo, there simply wasn’t much left. On the other hand, Jeseo had saved a little bit and was able to exploit that. That extra oomph allowed Jeseo to hold off Bachetti for his second career Modified win.
After the race, Jeseo talked about his late-race strategy.
“With about ten [laps] to go, I saw that Bachetti had broke[n] into second and I knew we were going to have our hands full,” Jeseo said. “That’s when we really started picking the pace up. I saw [Bachetti] beneath me a couple of times, but the car was spot on.”
Behind Jeseo and Bachetti was King in a season-best third, just beating out Matt Pupello. Kyle Armstrong beat out Hearn for fifth.
In the Small Block Modifieds, the big story of the week was that officials added 50 pounds to Kenny Tremont, Jr.’s No. 115 as a result of his domination of the class (six wins in eight races). While Tremont did show speed on Saturday night, he was ultimately not a factor and finished eighth after starting 15th.
Brian Peterson started from the pole, but the real star of the race was Alan Houghtaling. Houghtaling quickly moved up from the third starting spot to take the lead away from Peterson on lap 2. From there, no one could do much with the Poughkeepsie native.
A caution was thrown on lap 6 when Joey Scarborough spun on the backstretch. That bunched the field up, but once the green was displayed, Houghtaling drove off into the distance. Meanwhile, J.R. Heffner was on the move. Starting 11th, Heffner methodically made his way forward. By lap 10, he had entered the top 5.
Matching Houghtaling’s lap times, Heffner passed Peter Carlotto for second on lap 18 and tried to run down Houghtaling. However, Alan would not be denied as he raced on to his first win of the year.
Behind Houghtaling and Heffner was Carlotto in a season-best third. Steve Hough and Peterson rounded out the top 5.
The Pro Stock race was the feature of the night. Joe LaFlamme started on pole, but Ray Hall, Jr. quickly took the lead away and claimed a decent advantage over the pack.
On lap 9, a big crash occurred on the frontstretch when LaFlamme and Paul LaRochelle collided. Victor Hopkins was also involved, while Tim McCarthy could not stop and piled in. Everyone was ok, but LaFlamme, LaRochelle and McCarthy were done.
Hall Jr.’s excellent came to an end after he suffered issues on his car with seven laps to go. That allowed Jay Corbin into the lead with Rick Duzlak giving chase. Duzlak ran down Corbin in the closing laps and staged a great side-by-side battle.
On the final lap, Duzlak got a great run off of turn 2 and was able to get past for the lead. Rob Yetman followed by and made a move off of turn 4 for the win. However, Duzlak was able to hold off the points leader to take his second win of the year. Right behind, Corbin finished third in a three-wide battle to the line over Nick Hilt and Daniel Sanchez.
The Sportsman feature saw Cody Ochs start on the pole and immediately end up in a battle for the lead with Rob Maxon. Following an early yellow, Maxon was able to make the move to take the lead on lap 6.
Points leader Jeff Watson quickly moved up from the 11th starting spot to contend. Once in second, Watson stalked Maxon for the lead. A series of incidents kept the field bunched up, but Watson was able to get the lead for good on lap 16. From there, Watson pulled away to take the win. Maxon finished second, followed by Frank Hoard, Jr., Chris Lynch and Kevin Ward.
In Pure Stock, Bill Deak, Jr., Jay Casey and Ray Hall, Sr. each won features.
Rifenburg Construction King of the Track Modified Feature Results (30 laps): 1) Chad Jeseo, 2) Andy Bachetti, 3) Mike King, 4) Matt Pupello, 5) Kyle Armstrong, 6) Brett Hearn, 7) Eddie Marshall, 8) Kenny Tremont, Jr., 9) J.R. Heffner, 10) Keith Flach, 11) Kolby Schroder, 12) Brian Berger, 13) John Ruchel, 14) Kyle Sheldon, 15) Elmo Reckner, 16) Steve Hough, 17) Mike Keeler, 18) Olden Dwyer, 19) Paul Gilardi, 20) Rob Pitcher, 21) Dave McFeeters, 22) Guy Sheldon
Small Block Modified Feature Results (24 laps): 1) Alan Houghtaling, 2) J.R. Heffner, 3) Peter Carlotto, 4) Steve Hough, 5) Brian Peterson, 6) Chad Pierce, 7) Demetrios Drellos, 8) Kenny Tremont, Jr., 9) Frank Harper, 10) Jason Herrington, 11) Ray Hall, Jr., 12) Brett Haas, 13) Frank Hoard, III, 14) Joey Scarborough, 15) Ricky Davis, 16) Kory Sandstedt, 17) Brian Sandstedt, 18) Olden Dwyer. DNS: Kim LaVoy, Kenny Aanonsen, Jr.
Sportsman Feature Results (20 laps): 1) Jeff Watson, 2) Rob Maxon, 3) Frank Hoard, Jr., 4) Chris Lynch, 5) Kevin Ward, 6) Whitey Slavin, 7) John Virgilio, 8) Hunter Bates, 9) Jack Speshock, 10) Jim Boardman, 11) Jake Scarborough, 12) Michael Sabia, 13) Mike Block, 14) Nikki Ouelette, 15) Christopher Delfino, 16) Brandon Daley, 17) John Miller, 18) Cody Ochs, 19) Angelo DiCarlo, 20) Ben Brownell, 21) Timothy Davis
Pro Stock Feature Results (20 laps): 1) Rick Duzlak, 2) Rob Yetman, 3) Jay Corbin, 4) Nick Hilt, 5) Daniel Sanchez, 6) Steven LaRochelle, 7) Jon Routhier, 8) Tom O’Connor, 9) Victor Hopkins, 10) Rich Crane, 11) Sean Corr, 12) Brian Keough, 13) Tom Dean, 14) Jeff Kelmel, 15) Ray Hall, Jr., 16) Rick Dempsey, 17) Paul LaRochelle, 18) Joe LaFlamme, 19) Tim McCarthy, 20) Rich Spencer. DNS: Chad Arsenault, Kyle Hosier, Chuck Towslee
Pure Stock Feature No. 1 Results (8 laps): 1) Bill Deak, Jr., 2) Chris Streeter, 3) Shawn Perez, 4) Karen Verhagen, 5) John Tisko, 6) Joe Wolcott, 7) Ray Royals, 8) Wuggie Burdick, 9) Edwin Thomason, 10) Bill Deak, Sr., 11) Dave Fachini. DNS: Kyle Cole (Driveshaft)
Pure Stock Feature No. 2 Results (8 laps): 1) Jay Casey, 2) Clifford Booth, 3) Bob Palmer, 4) Dom Denue, 5) Phil Sherman, 6) Mark Dwyer, 7) Zach Sorrentino, 8) Tim Thompson, 9) Vicky Meltz, 10) Nick Reilly, 11) Scott Morris
Pure Stock Feature No. 3 Results (12 laps): 1) Ray Hall, Sr., 2) Jason Meltz, 3) Al Relyea, 4) Jeff Kreutziger, 5) Zach Seyerlein, 6) Mike Arnold, 7) Chris Murphy, 8) Larry Perez, 9) Harold Robitaille, 10) Dan Cote, 11) Jeff Meltz, Sr., 12) Gary O’Brien, 13) Jeff Meltz, Jr., 14) Dave Stickles
