Column By: MIKE TRAVERSE / RPW – ACCORD, NY – It was a night at Accord Speedway to remember Phil Goetschius, a Sportsman competitor at Accord who passed away earlier this year from Covid.
With many of Phil’s family and friends in attendance Friday, it was Tyler Johnston coming away with the $3,000 win, his first of the season at Accord, as he outraced Kevin Stevens and Travis Green for the win.
United Pump and tank was the major sponsor of the memorial race. Upstate Auto was also a sponsor for the night’s events.
Kevin Stevens and Jamie Yannone made up the front row for the race with Stevens out front early. Johnston quickly moved into 2nd. caution was out after 6 laps. On the restart, Johnston made a bid for the lead on the outside, and after a couple of laps, he was past Stevens into first. As a few cautions slowed the pace, Johnston was able to lead all restarts. Jimmy Johnson made a strong move to race into 3rd.
As the laps clicked off, the front runners settled into position with little change in the running order. With about 10 to go, Johnson slowed and looked to be dropping out, but then picked up the pace again, but not before Green moved by him into 3rd. In the final few laps, lapped traffic became a bit of a factor as Stevens closed the gap some. But at the finish, it was Johnston, a 9/10ths of a second over Stevens with Green finishing 3rd, Johnson 4th and Cody Higbie 5th. Jared LaBagh was 6th, Brian Durbin 7th, Yannone 8th, Jared Miller 9th and Darrell Quackenbush 10th.
“We made a few changes for the feature that we don’t normally do here. Every week, I kind of lose a little drive off. I said tonight’s the night that we need to try something. It worked. It was great,” Johnson said. “The whole top 6 in the redraw, we race here weekly together. We ran a very clean race. I can’t thank everyone enough who helps me out. And thanks to Gary (Palmer) for a great racetrack. It was a great night.”
John Hechinger took the lead at the start and was able to maintain the lead over a few restarts to win Friday’s Pure Stock feature, his 2nd win of the season. Brian Walsh was 2nd, Gary Ronk held off a charge from Joe Narok for 3rd as Jayden Sleight was just nosed out by Narok at the line to finish 5th. Dave Demorest was 6th, JB Morris 7th, Tom Canfield 8th, Walt Henry 9th and George Van Ardsall 10th.
Kyle Smith was Friday’s Rookie Sportsman winner as he dominated the race for his 1st win of the season. Cody Cordova was 2nd, Mike Mikulski 3rd, John Cole Jr. 4th and Matt Sydoryk 5th. Dan Specht was 6th with Joe Smith 7th, Tommy Marshall 8th, Jay Baker 9th and John Doty 10th.
The All Star Slingshots winner Friday was Ashley Rogosich, her 4th win of the season. Tucker Jones was 2nd, Amber Baccaglini 3rd, Kristen Bishop 4th and Rob Charmello 5th.
Brayden Traver scored his 3rd of the season in the Junior Slingshots with EJ Hatch 2nd, Cody Williamson 3rd, Bodie Marks 4th and Walt Henry IV 5th.
Robert Beach won his 2nd straight and 3rd of the season in the Fireball 4 Cylinders. Ed King was 2nd, Brandon Conklin 3rd, Chris Dyer 4th and Cole Conklin 5th. The to 10 was rounded out by Jerry Kingeter 6th, Dave Donovan 7th, Sean Lynch 8th, Tim DeGrote 9th and George Barringer 10th.