INDUSTRY, California — Buck Blair, from Huntington Beach, continued his current hot streak in speedway motorcycle racing Wednesday night by winning his second 500cc Division 1 main event of 2010 at Industry Speedway in front of about 500 fans. He also won on June 30. Within the last week, the 32-year old builder by trade won the D-1 Orange County Fair Derby event at Costa Mesa last Friday and the feature at Victorville last Saturday. The D-1 field at Industry this week consisted of 18 riders with four Division 2 (intermediate-level) riders assimilated into an 18-rider D-1 field.
The five-rider feature Wednesday had Blair and Shawn McConnell tied at 15 points after three heat races and the pair of five-rider semi-final races, which they both won. Blair won the tie-breaking coin toss and selected the pole position. He launched from the first lane and beat lane five rider Mike Faria and lane two starter McConnell to the first turn. Blair led all four laps and won by five yards. McConnell, 51, made an inside pass in the third and fourth turns and took second from Faria, 53, on the final lap. Faria, Eddie Castro, 51, and Tyson Burmeister, 26, followed. Faria won the last chance race for the third and fourth place finishers from the two semi-final races.
Paraplegic driver Brian Motis and his sidecar “swinger” Brandi McElroy won their first sidecar main event at Industry as a team this season. Last week they flipped exiting turn four and McElroy left the dirt track on a stretcher wearing a neck brace. She declined transport to a hospital for examination and said she was okay. They returned on the same No. 2 sidecar and led all four laps of the main event. Two other sidecar teams won the three preliminary sidecar heat races.
Former sidecar competitor Chris Jones, of Aliso Viejo, won his first 500cc Division 3 main for entry level riders. He parked his cycle near the finish line and cartwheeled four times across the finish line in his now traditional celebration. Broc Nicol, 12, of Lomita, won his first Youth Division main for 150cc cycles. In his fourth week of racing, the son of recent D-1 rider Doug Nicol led all four laps in a field of six pre-teens. Rocco Scopelite, 14, of Huntington Beach, fell on the original start of the Youth 250cc main. He returned for the restart and won his first main this year over Max Ruml, 13, the 250cc winner a week ago. Tristan Britt, 7, of Huntington Beach, won his second 50cc mini cycle pee-wee main of the eight-week old season. He led all four laps in a six rider field.
There were two special events this week under the title speedway games. A wheelie contest trophy and $50 cash prize went to McConnell over Burmeister and Neil Facchini. From a rolling start, McConnell made it to the second turn. Then five riders participated individually in a hot lap contest with the winner receiving a trophy and $50 cash. After the starting line tapes raised, Austin Novratil, 15, and Blair tied with laps of 11.00. John Marquez ran a 11.65, Tyson Talkington ran 11.70 and Michael Raines turned 11.90. A one-lap runoff race was used to settle the tie. Novratil used lane two and Blair had lane four. They ran side-by-side all the way and Novratil, on the inside, edged Blair by a wheel-length.
With summer speedway cycle racing in full swing, D-1 feature winners during the last week were: Nor Cal tracks: (Friday) Charlie Venegas at Fast Fridays Speedway in Auburn, and (Saturday) Billy Janniro at Golden Gate Speedway in Vallejo at Solano County Fairgrounds. So Cal tracks: (Wednesday) Bobby Schwartz, 53, at Industry Speedway; (Friday) Blair at Orange County Fair Costa Mesa Speedway; (Saturday) Blair at Victorville; (Saturday) Tyson Burmeister in scratch main and Philip Harmatiuk in handicap main at Inland Motorcycle Speedway in San Bernardino (Orange Show Fairgrounds).
Next week (July 28) will be round nine of Wednesday night Industry Speedway season seven. It will feature Harley-Davidson Night II of 2010 for street-legal motorcycles.
