Anyone that knew Smokey Hanoian knew he was one of the most dedicated individuals you would ever find at a race track, and at the Madera Speedway. He enjoyed hard racing and the passion of the weekly racer, and plenty of that was on display during the 2011 edition of the Smokey Hanoian Classic on May 28th at the Madera Speedway.
The youthful drivers were fast to show off their talent in the trophy dashes, drivers like Kenneth Johnson and Emma Tucker showed the veterans how to run door to door in crowd pleasing fashion, then Tyler Johnson and Rylan Pasquale took over showing everyone how they could go side by side for 90% of a race (until the two touched spinning the Johnson car, and hurting the Pasquale car), but Smokey would have given each of them some sound advice and moved on.
Billy Congdon won the 4-Banger main but was chased by the car of Sheldon Cooper for the entire event, the old smooth driving stogie smoking Tom Rotella took third after the young guns of Johnson and Pasquale took themselves out.
Veteran Chuck Aguirre won the Hobby Stock Main event while flying the American flag on his 42 car (a nice touch for the holiday), but Aguirre had big trouble under the hood and big trouble in his rear view mirror as Willie Guthrie was all over him and under him on the white flag, but Aguirre won the race to the checkered flag. Guthrie was second, with Jillian Holden third, Jillian Holden set the fastest lap of the race but made a driving mistake that may have cost her a shot at the win, and ex track champion Don Selsor was fourth.
John Bowersox crashed in the trophy dash taking Gene Adams out for the night, but the number three car of Bowersox was repaired and he made short work of charging to the front, but on lap 17 of the 25 lap event Kevin Thompson caught the number three car of Bowersox.
On lap twenty two Thompson drove under Bowersox and the two ran to the checked flag door to door, it was Thompson by a nose to take the win! Bowersox was second, with the John McCollum Jr., and McCollum Sr. coming in third and fourth, and Mike Congdon filling out the top five.
The Toyota Sedans put on one whale of a race and Ronnie Roberts looked as though he was on a winning drive until the number four car of Jarred Tickel arrived on his back door step. Tickel slipped by Roberts on lap 46 of the 50 lap main event giving him the win. Donnie Large Jr. (Little Large) also got by giving him second. Roberts finished third with Del McIntosh fourth, buy McIntosh was penalized one spot for turning Donnie Large Sr. around, giving large Sr. fourth and McIntosh fifth, now that is some serious action!
Howard Holden jumped out front in the 50 lap LunkerDaddy late model race but Aaron Mullins and Bill Nason were all over him. Elliot Stjerne started at the back and while the top three were fighting he slipped up on them, and slipped by like a ghost without being seen. Stjerne drove away in three restarts due to rain delays, or concerns over the wet stuff.
Stjerne won his second race in a row starting his hot streak, Howard Holden was second, with Bill Nason third, Mullins fourth, and Larry Pasquale rounding out the top five in his debut appearance for the 2011 season.
