AVONDALE, Arizona -- West Sacramento, California's Burney Lamar took the lead for good on lap 18 and held off a late race charge from NASCAR Nextel Cup star Ken Schrader to win the Copper World Classic 75 January 30th at the Phoenix International Raceway. The NASCAR Autozone Elite Division Southwest Series event was a part of the raceway's annual Copper World Classic.
Reigning series champion Jim Pettit II and 2002 champ Eddy McKean led the 43 starters under the initial green flag. The field was set based on 2004 points due to the rain that washed out qualifying the day before. McKean led the first 17 circuits, around PIR's one mile oval, before Lamar passed him on lap 18 and completed the only lead changes in the race. Lamar collected $11,200 for parking his Groeniger-Tri Chips-Victory Circle Chassis Chevrolet in victory lane.
However, this is not to imply that Lamar had an easy time of it at Phoenix. He had to fend off a hard charging Schrader in the final laps and won the event by a mere margin of .320 seconds. Schrader started his Chevrolet in 19th and raced his way into the top five by lap 29. By lap 64 he was in second and staring at Lamar's back bumper. But there just wasn't enough laps left in the race for Schrader to do anything with the race leader. Lamar did a masterful job of quickly working his way around lapped traffic, during those final laps, which caused minor delays in Schrader's momentum.
McKean's Pontiac finished third, the Chevrolet of Eric Holmes was fourth while Pettit's Ford completed the top five. Average speed for the race, which took a little over 49 minutes to complete, was a healthy 90.361 MPH. The race rhythm was slowed three times for caution flags that consumed 19 laps.
During his post race interview, a very excited Burney Lamar had high praise for his hard working crew and his dedicated sponsors. When asked about seeing Ken Schrader in the rear view mirror, during the final laps of the race, Lamar said"anytime you see Schrader, the king of PIR, behind you it's a cause for worry."
When asked about his second place finish an always gracious Ken Schrader said "we've got no complaints,(about finishing second), we just basically dusted this car off which hasn't been raced since last November. We had a good race at the end there and I wish the race would have went longer but, hey, we were the first loser today, those guys did a really great job today and I congratulate them."
The win was especially sweet for Lamar because he was performing under the watchful eye of his new boss NASCAR Nextel Cup star Kevin Harvick. On the Friday morning prior to the race KHI, Kevin Harvick Inc, announced they had signed Lamar to a contract as part of their new west coast driver development program. The plan calls for Lamar to run 5 NASCAR Grand National Division Series events and four NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races for Harvick this year.
