Lawrenceburg, Indiana…….Thomas Meseraull made it back-to-back AMSOIL National Sprint Car wins with Saturday night’s Lawrenceburg Speedway “Fall Nationals.” The San Jose, California native picked up ten grand with a dominant drive to victory by 2.899 seconds aboard the Marion Underground Construction – Zeller Construction #66 DRC/Dynotech.
“I’ve had a tough couple weeks in other cars since we won Eldora, so it feels good to be back in the Amati Racing #66 and beat all these guys who are at the top of the game. I have so many laps here, and thanks to Todd Keen for letting me race here so much, that it felt good to be back at the Burg. (Crew chief) Donnie Gentry was not afraid to get it tight enough, and it was money from the start. It’s surreal; I’ve been coming to USAC shows for a few years and getting beat, and now I feel like I should be up there and I’ve got a car capable of winning these races,” Meseraull said.
Brady Bacon took the lead from outside the front-row as Meseraull snuck past polesitter Scotty Weir off turn-two to take second. Meseraull slid past Bacon on lap two and brought Kevin Thomas, Jr. with him on lap two, but Dave Darland slowed to a stop on the backstretch to bring out a caution. Bacon reverted to the lead.
Meseraull did not waste time, as he entered turn-one on the restart with a slidejob for the lead, and he rocketed away from the field. Thomas also moved past Bacon and tried to keep Meseraull in sight while setting a blistering pace into lapped traffic.
ProSource “Fast Qualifier” C.J. Leary, who received an extra $1,000 from the Lawrenceburg safety team in memory of Bill Hall, was also on the move and finally cleared Bacon for third on lap fourteen. He tried to join the top duo as they carved through traffic over the last half of the race.
As the track started to take rubber through turns three and four, Thomas closed slightly on the leader but could never get close enough to take a shot at Meseraull, who continually put lapped cars behind him, eventually lapping up to 13th.
Thomas was unchallenged behind him and came home second in the Griffin’s Propane – Bakken Concrete #17RW Maxim/Fisher.
“It’s such a confidence booster to be running so well of late. Mike Dutcher, A.J. Bray, and Charlie Fisher all got together and have us in a really good spot right now. We were in striking distance again tonight, but just needed things to fall our way a little better. He was able to clear another lapped car every time I got him in sight, so he was tough to catch. We just ran out of laps on that one,” Thomas said.
Leary wound up third in the Leary Construction Company – Green Tech Lubricants #30 DRC/Claxton.
“Meseraull got to the lead so fast, so it was tough to keep pace with him starting from sixth. We were good as the race went on and turned our fastest lap late in the race after some rubber came in, but we would have needed a yellow to get a shot at them. It would have been hairy to make something happen with them, but I’d have liked to get a shot. We’ve got some momentum again before we go out west, so hopefully we can get a win out there again this year,” Leary said.
Bacon came home fourth in the Hoffman Auto Racing – Mean Green #69 Triple X/Williams Mopar, and Chris Windom charged from 14th to finish fifth in the Rick Pollock – Bates Commodities #21x Maxim/Advanced.
Robert Ballou picked up the B&W Auto Mart “Hard Charger” while holding onto his National point lead while going from 21st to finish tenth.
Brady Bacon won the Indy Race Parts/Spike Products bonus as the highest average finisher between Saturday night’s event and the World of Outlaws event on Friday. Shane Stewart, the only full-time WoO competitor to attempt Saturday's USAC event, saw his night end early after a flip in qualifying. He was unhurt.
AMSOIL USAC SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE RESULTS: October 17, 2015 – Lawrenceburg, Indiana – Lawrenceburg Speedway – “City of Lawrenceburg Fall Nationals”
QUALIFYING: 1. C.J. Leary, 30, Leary-13.898; 2. Tony DiMattia, 2x, DiMattia-13.942; 3. Kyle Robbins, 17R, Robbins-13.963; 4. Dave Darland, 71p, Phillips/Curb-Agajanian-13.969; 5. Kyle Cummins, 3R, Byram-13.990; 6. Chad Boespflug, 20N, Nolen-14.082; 7. Thomas Meseraull, 66, Amati-14.138; 8. Tracy Hines, 4, THR-14.142; 9. Kevin Thomas Jr., 17RW, Dutcher-14.153; 10. Brady Bacon, 69, Dynamics-14.161; 11. Scotty Weir, 18x, Keen-14.173; 12. Chase Stockon, 32, 32 TBI-14.188; 13. Kody Swanson, 21k, Wolters-14.192; 14. Jerry Coons Jr., 10E, Edison-14.192; 15. Jarett Andretti, 18, Andretti-14.247; 16. Jon Stanbrough, 81, Stanbrough-14.280; 17. Chris Windom, 21x, Pollock-14.285; 18. Aaron Farney, 15F, Farney-14.310; 19. Logan Jarrett, 29, Jarrett-14.337; 20. Justin Grant, 5, Baldwin-14.354; 21. Max McGhee, 17, McGhee-14.422; 22. Dustin Ingle, 2D, Ingle-14.434; 23. Lee Dakus, 75, Dakus-14.434; 24. Robert Ballou, 12, Ballou-14.496; 25. Casey Shuman, 4J. Ottinger-14.520; 26. Garrett Abrams, 32a, Abrams-14.645; 27. Brandon Mattox, 04, Burton-14.852; 28. Terry Babb, 17L, KCBJ-14.960; 29. Dallas Hewitt, 21s, Swanson-15.076; 30. Beau Stewart, 99, Brown-15.182; 31. Cody Gardner, 46, Gardner-15.244; 32. Riley VanHise, 96, VanHise-15.817; 33. Robert Bell, 71, Bell-15.907; 34. Shane Stewart, 2, Larson/Marks-NT.
FIRST HEAT: (8 laps) 1. Windom, 2. Thomas, 3. McGhee, 4. Leary, 5. Cummins, 6. Swanson, 7. Hewitt, 8. Shuman, 9. Bell. 2:01.47
SECOND HEAT: (8 laps) 1. Bacon, 2. Farney, 3. Coons, 4. Ingle, 5. DiMattia, 6. Boespflug, 7. Abrams, 8. B.Stewart. 2:00.77
THIRD HEAT: (8 laps) 1. Jarrett, 2. Weir, 3. Meseraull, 4. Andretti, 5. Robbins, 6. Dakus, 7. Mattox, 8. Gardner. 2:04.03
FOURTH HEAT: (8 laps) 1. Ballou, 2. Darland, 3. Grant, 4. Stockon, 5. Stanbrough, 6. Hines, 7. Babb, 8. VanHise. NT
SEMI: (12 laps) 1. Swanson, 2. Cummins, 3. Stanbrough, 4. Boespflug, 5. Hines, 6. Abrams, 7. Shuman, 8. VanHise, 9. DiMattia, 10. B.Stewart, 11. Babb, 12. Mattox, 13. Bell, 14. Dakus, 15. Gardner, 16. Hewitt, 17. Robbins. NT
FEATURE: (30 laps) 1. Thomas Meseraull, 2. Kevin Thomas Jr., 3. C.J. Leary, 4. Brady Bacon, 5. Chris Windom, 6. Kody Swanson, 7. Chase Stockon, 8. Scotty Weir, 9. Jon Stanbrough, 10. Robert Ballou, 11. Tracy Hines, 12. Chad Boespflug, 13. Justin Grant, 14. Jarett Andretti, 15. Dave Darland, 16. Aaron Farney, 17. Max McGhee, 18. Jerry Coons Jr., 19. Dustin Ingle, 20. Logan Jarrett, 21. Garrett Abrams, 22. Kyle Cummins. NT
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**Shane Stewart flipped during qualifying.
FEATURE LAP LEADERS: Lap 1 Bacon, Laps 2-30 Meseraull.
NEW AMSOIL NATIONAL SPRINT POINTS: 1-Ballou-1,902, 2-Stockon-1,883, 3-Darland-1,859, 4-Bacon-1,732, 5-Stanbrough-1,605, 6-Thomas-1,535, 7-Windom-1,404, 8-Leary-1,312, 9-Hines-1,197, 10-Grant-1,116
NEXT AMSOIL NATIONAL SPRINT RACE: November 12-14 – Perris (CA) Auto Speedway – 20th Budweiser “Oval Nationals” presented by All Coast Construction
