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DeCaire Wins a TBARA Thriller at DeSoto
SCOTT LOCKWOOD
Florida Short Track Report
EAST MANATEE - Fast action and bent sheet metal were aplenty as the TBARA
headed up the action at DeSoto Super Speedway Saturday night.
The TBARA got things going immediately, as their three 8-lap heat races lead off
the nights program. Larry J. Brazil Jr. got things going with a win in the first heat,
leading every lap from the outside pole. In the second, Troy DeCaire showed a
sign of things to come, charging from his sixth starting position to the lead in just
under three laps and pulling away from the lead. Steven Bradley took heat 3 from
the pole.
As the TBARA cars took to the track for their prerace warm-up right before the
feature, Keith Butler’s right wheel broke and came off the car, sending Butler hard
into the turn 2 wall. While the car came away with heavy damage to the
suspension on the left side, Butler, although a little shaken from the impact, was
uninjured.
After a cleanup of about 15 minutes, the feature finally got underway with Bradley
and outside pole sitter Wendy Mathis going side by side through the first two
corners. Bradley pulled away going into turn 3, and would lead for the next several
laps. DeCaire, starting 10th, was already into the top 5 by the end of the second
lap.
The caution flew on lap 3 when the cars of Tommy Nichols, Wayne Reutimann Sr.
and Danny Martin Jr. got together coming out of the second corner. Reutimann
needed a push to get going and rejoined the fray, but the damage put Nichols and
Martin out of the race. Attrition ended up being a big factor, as the cars of Ben
Fritz, Brian Gingras, Bill Pettijon and last week’s winner Shane Butler all found
themselves in the infield by the halfway point of the race.
Bradley got away from the pack on the restart, but it didn’t take long for DeCaire
and Dave Steele to get into second and third. Bradley’s lead was erased on the
tenth lap Steve Heisler got into the wall in the third turn. On the ensuing restart,
Bradley took off, but DeCaire and Steele followed closely. You could almost throw
a blanket over the three cars for the next 11 laps - all while they still pulled away
from the rest of the pack.
Just past the halfway point, Bradley began smoking the right rear tire coming out of
the corner. On lap 21, DeCaire took advantage of Bradley’s handling issues with a
power move on the outside to take the lead coming out of turn 2. Steele quickly
followed, and Bradley faded in third, where he would eventually finish.
The final nine laps were a game of cat and mouse between DeCaire and Steele,
with both cars running nearly identical lap times around the 3/8 mile oval. Over the
final laps, lapped traffic became a factor, allowing Steele to close on the final lap.
However, a slower car got in front of Steele coming out of the final corner, and
DeCaire cruised to the win, his second of the year at DSS.
“I grew up a huge Dave Steele fan, I mean, he’s my hero,” DeCaire said
afterwards. “For us to go wheel to wheel and actually beat him is definitely going to
be one of my career highlights. I lost one here last year to him on the white flag,
and I’m just really excited to run wheel to wheel with someone I grew up idolizing.”
For Steele, another lap may have made a difference.
“We were just hoping for a little lapped traffic, and maybe he’d hesitate a little bit,”
Steele said. “We got a little, but he did a good job of getting through it so we really
couldn’t capitalize.”
With his win, DeCaire expanded his points lead over Keith Butler in the TBARA
season championship chase. After Steele, Bradley was third, Wendy Mathis came
home a solid fourth and Brazil fifth.
Also on the schedule was a 50-lap shootout for the Manatee Lumber Pure Stocks.
Tyler Lau set fast time in qualifying, but would have to start third thanks to a role of
the dice that inverted the top three.
In the race, outside polesitter Robert Crisp, unaffected by the inversion, jumped
out into the lead. On the third lap, Lau got into the back on new polesitter Blair
Pontious, causing Pontious to spin in front of the field. He was collected by the car
of George Bartimac, causing enough damage to send Pontious to the garage. For
causing the yellow, Lau was sent to the rear of the field.
While Crisp was running away with the race, the real show was watching Lau come
back up through the field. Basically “dirt tracking” his car through the corners, he
was back up to seventh when the caution came out on lap 20 for Anthony Easton’s
third spin of the race - all of which came at the exact same spot between turns 3
and 4.
On lap 32, he was up to third and got to second with seven laps remaining. Lau
got to second with seven to go, but Crisp was so far ahead by that time there was
no hope of catching him. The yellow never came, and Crisp crossed the stripe
about a half a straightaway ahead of Lau. Mike Hinegardener finished third, while
Darrin Ellis and Craig Robinson rounded out the top five.
In other action, Jesse Dutilly led the first lap, but Joe Winchell led the next 99 to
take the win in the Turner Tree & Landscape limited late models. The car Winchell
was driving set fast time qualifying, and won for the second time in its four races
this season. Dutilly was second and rounding out the top five were young Andrew
Brannon, A.J. Isbister and Dustin Chisholm.
James Nanney won the street stock 25-lapper, and Scott Donnelly defeated a field
of only 7 cars to take the bomber 25 lap feature
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