Shellhammer Dirt Track’s 50th Anniversary Season Opens In Grand Style
Story By: MIKE FELTENBERGER / SHELLHAMMER DIRT TRACK – LEESPORT, PA – A beautiful night greeted race fans and race teams at the Little Track By The River, Shellhammer Dirt Track Weds. night for the Wingless Weds. opening night of racing with over 100 cars entered for the 7 classes scheduled to run.
The Junior Sprints were 1st on the speedway and taking the 20 lap opening night win was Enzo Iudicello getting by race leader Braylon Morris on lap 8 to score the victory over Logan Schibilia.Slotting in for 3rd was Cole Surman with Mason Noll notching 4th after his last place starting spot. Carter Green rounded out the top 5. These young racers were getting faster with each lap completed.
Setting a blistering pace in the 125 micros was Steve Simmons in the Sam Borger # 04 with Easton Miller and Seth Gregory keeping pace early in the event. Miller took a tumble in turn 1 on lap 17 but they uprighted the 17E and he continued on for 5th just behind Seth Gregory,whose turn 1 challenge fell just short of victory with Mitch Gibson and Corey Harting getting 3rd and 4th.
Thirteen Junior Slingshots had some position shakeups during the 20 lap with Charlie Geibel thwarting off all challengers to get the win over Aubrey Romig who came from the last starting spot of 13th for 2nd. Geibel had early race battles with Hailey Burnatowski, Barry Seaman and Romig before finally getting the checkered. Seaman held firm for 3rd with Carter Hughes rebounding from early race incidents to garner a strong 4th with Burnatowski getting 5th place money.
The 270 A Main finish is under review due to a lap 18 computer error,so here is what the unofficial finish is. Chris Dolan was slotted in as the winner with Adam Buchel 2nd after leading 19 laps.Dustin Roberts was shown 3rd,Jacob Neff 4th and Dylan Kuronya designated as 5th. Official finish will be reviewed by Brenda.
It was Johnny Fugelo withstanding strong race runs by Dakota George, Dylan Hoch and Tyler Hoch to claim the Stage 1 Modified main. Once things panned out late in the 20 lap showdown, Tyler Hoch got a podium finish of 2nd only.4 seconds behind Fugelo. George worked his way back up for a solid 3rd with Alli Cushman just getting to the checkered ahead of 5th place runner Carter Mullins.
The star studded All Star Slingshot field put on a fantastic show with 100+ feature winner Brett Bieber having an early race duel with 2024 Junior Slingshot champion Hailey Eroh and perennial hotshoe Lindsay Garl. A lap 5 caution for 2nd place running Eroh would find the restart jumbling up quite a few positions as Jason Dunkelberger,Tess Horvath and Colton Williams had their own private battle with Mason Pittenger and Jon Imhoff getting into the mix. Colton Williams’ run would be denied after he was the lap 17 caution giving Garl one last chance to overtake Bieber ,just falling short. A strong 3 lap run by Imhoff got him by PIttenger,Horvath and Dunkelberger for 3rd as Dunkelberger got to the checkers just ahead of Horvath for 4th.
The 600 micros finished off the night in high style with a torrid early race 3 car war with Adam Buchel, Trevor Kobylarz and Chase Wehr.Behind this trio was Matt McAnally,Luke Hess, Dan Lane, Jr. and Geezer Fanelli.There wasn’t any safe spots on the speedway as again another lap 17 caution would set the tone for a 3 lap dash to the finish line with Buchel notching the win over Kobylarz with McAnally getting by Wehr for 3rd with Lane,Jr. only a few car lengths behind Wehr and Fanelli getting 6th just ahead of Dan Souder.
Some opening night snafus will be righted with many of the racers never seeing or racing at Shellhammer’s getting their car setups bettered for the upcoming racing action.
Special thanks to Jen Feltenberger, RRK Maintenance LLC and Strapped In TV Show on BCTV for their voucher sponsorship.
Wingless Weds returns April 30th.
A great way to begin the Golden Anniversary year at Shellhammer Dirt Track.
