By: Jamie Maudsley | APC Racing Series
The Qwick Wick Super Stocks were at Delaware Speedway Friday night for their final 50-lapper of the season as part of the Pinty’s Fall Brawl at the legendary ½-mile playground of speed.
With home track points included, it put Trevor Collver, of Lucan, in the points lead heading into the final stage of the season, with Lane Zardo, of Brampton, and Ray Moneau, of Windsor, in second and third, just six and nine points behind Collver. Dwayne Baker, of Stayer, and Pete Vanderwyst, of St. Thomas, filled out the top-five spots and were still mathematically in the title hunt heading into qualifying.
The race for the pole, and some bonus championship points, were on the line for qualifying, and it was Todd Davenport, of Allenford, in the third group who was able to put up the first seriously quick time, with a lap of 20.536 seconds, with Carson Nagy, of Mt. Hope, less than 2/100ths of a second back.
The fourth group to hit the track, Nic Ramsay, of St. Thomas went to the top of the board, stopping the clock with a lap of 20.402 seconds, followed closely by Gerrit Tiemersma, of Newmarket, who ran a 20.406 second lap, and Jason Parker, of Port Elgin, who timed in third at 20.408 seconds heading into the final group of the night.
Zardo was able to best Collver by a little over 1/10th of a second with a time of 20.014 seconds, with Collver timing in second at 20.155 seconds. Vanderwyst was third, with Ramsay fourth. Tiemersma timed in fifth, while Parker held on to sixth. Shawn Chenoweth, of Drumbo, was seventh, while Morneau was eighth. Ryan Dyson, of Aylmer, and Andrew Ferreira, of Strathroy, rounded out the top-ten, and would all be involved in the top-ten invert. Zardo was able to use the pole winning run to trim Collver’s lead to five heading into the final 50-lapper of the year.
Following the invert, Tiemersma was on the front row with Dyson beside him. Row two contained Parker and Ramsay, with Vanderwyst and Morneau in row three. Zardo, Collver, Ferreira, and Chenoweth, rounded out the top-ten starters, with 50 laps left in the season to decide the championship.
Tiemersma led the opening lap by a nose with Dyson tucking in to line behind in the in early stages, before Dyson struck on lap 6, taking control. The first yellow of the night came out on lap 7 when Mike Weeda, of Bolton, made hard contact with the turn two wall in an incident involving multiple drivers, as Kevin Trevellin, of Windsor, and Paul Pepper, of North Bay, were also involved. This negated the pass from Dyson for the top spot.
Tiemersma was able to hold serve on the restart again, until a yellow flew on lap 14 for debris on the speedway, with Dyson still running second, and Vanderwyst, Zardo, and Ferreira, rounding out the top-five.
Shortly after the green Dyson continued his assault on Tiemersma, getting to the inside of the leader a few times, before finally taking the lead on lap 23, and with Tiemersma caught on the outside, Vanderwryst, and Ferriera also getting past.
The championship combatants, Zardo and Collver were the next to try to get past Tiemersma. Zardo cleared him, while Collver and Tiemersma made contact, with Tiemersma going around. Collver was penalized, and both him and Tiemersma would restart at the back of the pack, moving Chenoweth into the top-five.
Dyson was able to get the jump when the green flew, but it was Chenoweth on the move, climbing to second with 20 laps to go, with Ramsay, Zardo, and Vanderwyst occupying the top-five, while Collver had climbed to 16th, and all the championship points he could muster.
On lap 32, Davenport went around off turn four to bring out the next yellow of the evening, as Collver was penalized for the incident and sent to the back of the pack again with less than 20 to go.
Chenoweth was unable to hang tough on the outside and would be shuffled back on the restart, allowing Ramsay and Vanderwyst to climb to the silver and bronze medal positions, before Morneau spun in turn three, to bring out the races fifth yellow flag
On the restart, Dyson was able to grab the lead, but entering in turn three he was hit by Ramsay and turned around in turn four to bring out caution flag number six, putting Vanderwyst and Zardo on the front row, with Chenoweth, Ethan Constable, of Barrie, and Parker in the top-five. For Constable, he had climbed from his 15th-place starting position.
A lap 36 restart saw Vanderwyst poke his nose out front momentarily, but Zardo was quick to jet out front and take control for the first time of the evening. Just a lap later, Chenoweth was turned around by Constable in turn two, sending the pair to the back of the pack for the restart with 14 laps to go.
Vanderwyst led lap 37, but Zardo was able to keep control on the bottom taking control again, with Parker, Tiemersma, and Ferreira falling into line behind the front duo.
Tiemersma was able to snatch third with five laps to go, but was no match for the race and Qwick Wick championship winner Zardo. Vanderwyst brought his car home a season high second, using the finish to rally to fifth in point, while Tiemersma rallied from the back of the pack to finish third. Parker wound up fourth, with Ferriera in fifth.
Collver wound up just a few points behind in the championship race, with a sixth-place result, while Dyson wound up seventh. Nagy brought it home eighths, with Baker ninth, and Chenoweth tenth.
Vanderwyst used the finish to move to third in the championship points.
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