IRWINDALE, California -- Simi Valley, California's Andrew Phipps won a 50-lap feature, August 13th, at the Irwindale Speedway. The race was the second of twin main events for the NASCAR Lucas Oil Super Late Model Series at the half-mile oval near Los Angeles. Phipps won this race flag to flag.
Phipps and Jim McGill led the 26 starters under the initial green flag. Phipps jumped into the lead for good and had to maintain his focus through an accident marred race that featured four yellow flags and three red flags.
The first of the caution flags occurred on lap 12 when Ed Hoffman's Chevrolet spun around and slammed into the turn four wall. During the course of track clean up, and engine fire erupted under the hood of Todd Southwell's car and the field was stopped under red flag conditions. It was a horrible night for the series points leader that saw Southwell plagued with engine woes during both of the twin mains. The restart barely made one green flag lap before a spin out brought the yellow caution flag right back out.
Phipps and McGill were able to run 15 green flag laps before another series of racing incidents presented themselves. On lap 37 Mike Price blew a tire and slammed hard into the turn two wall. Speedway officials red flagged the race in order to properly clean up sheet metal debris and oil from the track.
On the ensuing restart the field made two green flag laps before the race was red flagged again for the worst incident of the evening. Cars driven by Dan Moore, Robby Sawyer and Scott Calvin made contact and slammed hard into the turn two wall. Three other cars, behind them, went into a spin to avoid becoming part of the major accident.
All drivers climbed out of their cars except for Calvin who quickly became the focal point of emergency officials. The Jaws of Life rescue tool was used to cut away the top of Calvin's Ford so EMT's could safely remove him. Calvin was reported to be awake, alert and spoke with emergency officials during the removal process. However, a member of his team did express major concern over a possible back injury. Calvin was transported to a nearby hospital for treatment and observation.
With the race finally underway again, Phipps made quick work of winding down the final seven laps and led McGill, who won the first 50-lap feature earlier in the evening, under the checkers. Brian Ickler Rod Johnson and Russell White completed the top five.
After the race Phipps, a member of the Irwindale Speedway's rookie class, was thrilled with the win and said "I don't think I wanted to win a race as bad as I wanted to win this one tonight. It's such a boost for the crew. We've been really long in the jaw lately. We've had a couple of DNF's, (did not finish), the $5 part failure type of thing, but these guys kept their heads up and we got this car driving really good. I tried to take care of it during the first race, (where he finished third), where all we wanted to do was bring it home in the top three and save the tires on it. We were just points racing during that first race but in the second race the green light was on, the hammer was down and I was trying to run as fast as I possibly could."
Phipps was also happy for Jim McGill and said "Jim won the first one tonight and got second in this one. He's one of my favorite competitors and I was really happy to see him get is first win. He was fast in the second race too. He set fast time tonight and he was chasing me the whole way."
"I've really got to thank Bob Brucati, who owns this car, along with Sunrise Ford and Freight Train Motors. Bob gives me everything in the world and, as a rookie, I couldn't possibly ask for a better ride than this car right here, it's unbelievable," he added.
