MERIDIAN TEENAGER PULLS OUT HOMETRACK LEGENDS TITLE ON LAST NIGHT

MERIDIAN, Idaho — Ben Matheson got the repeat, and Camron Madsen didn’t Saturday night at ASA-sanctioned Meridian Speedway.

Matheson became the second man from Washington state to win the Austin Christopherson Memorial 50 twice, but the stars aligned to put Cameron Cotta of Meridian, Idaho at the top of the championship heap in the Domino’s Pizza Legends.

Cotta won the season championship by 18 points after finishing third in the Christopherson and watching Phillip Zubizareta and Madsen, both Boise, Idaho drivers, get pushed to the back of the field after wrecking while battling for the lead with nine laps left.

“It feels amazing,” the teenager said after his championship-clinching finish. “I’ve got to thank my mom and my dad. They’re amazing.”

Cotta also showed appreciation for his racing teammates – Sara Henry, who finished second to Matheson on Saturday, and Darin Turpen, both of whom race out of Nampa, Idaho.

The 2010 champion, Madsen entered the night five points behind Zubizareta and Cotta, who were tied for the series lead before the first green flag dropped Saturday. Cotta came out on top, with Zubizareta grabbing the season runner-up slot and maintaining his lead over Madsen.

Matheson, who towed from Pascoe, Wash., joined Nick Johnson of Bonney Lake, Wash., as the only two-time winners of the race run in honor of a former Racing For Smiles of the Northwest honoree who passed away at the age of 14 in 2006. Matheson won the 2009 edition.

In other main events Saturday, track record-holder Jerry Rice of Twin Falls, Idaho, ran away with the 50-lap Intermountain Pro Trucks feature; Dennis Wurtz II of Kuna, Idaho, won two of the three segments of the Project Filter 99 with Boise, Idaho’s Dan Lowther winning the middle leg; and Nampa, Idaho’s Melissa Weaver made a daring move late in the College Western Idaho Professional Truck Driving Street Stocks feature to get another victory and maintain her series lead with championship weekend looming next week.

With a gaggle of championship points on the line, the NAPA Late Model Sportsman division got down to brass tacks.

Only 71 points separated Meridian, Idaho’s Chris Fenton and Middleton, Idaho’s Tyler Bailey with two race nights left and double and triple points available Saturday.

The points race boiled over in the second of three 33-lap segments for the Project Filter 99. Fenton and Bailey were racing side-by-side for three laps when Bailey’s No. 99 racer wiggled up into Fenton’s quarter-panel, sending the series leader spinning hard into the Turn 4 wall and nearly destroying his race car.

The wreck put a crimp in Fenton’s night and could have given Bailey the opportunity to pile on points through the third leg of the race, which carried triple points. But Fenton tore off the front fenders of his race car and finished third directly behind Bailey in the third leg.

Lowther got the second checkered flag and a $1,000 bonus.

“This has been a hard-fought year,” Lowther said after his first career Late Model main event victory. “This is for my boss Jeff Russell. I’ve been wanting to put it in victory lane all year for him. I wish he was here to see this.”

A fan favorite at Meridian, Russell continues to recover at home after a devastating race practice crash in Las Vegas in October.

Bailey was looking to grab control of the points race with just Sunday’s season finale remaining, but his five-second lead in the third segment evaporated when Twin Falls’ Rick Fowble spun in Turn 3 with three laps left.

Wurtz blew past Bailey on the restart and slid into the lead, taking his second segment of the evening.

“I just pulled out there and didn’t know if I could get it,” Wurtz said.

In the Intermountain Pro Trucks 50 presented by Champion Produce, Rice backed up his record-setting start to the day with a dominating 3½-second victory. Rice drove underneath 14-year-old Twin Falls product Hannah Newhouse at the midway point of the race and then walked away from the field.

Rice broke his own track record with a 14.605-second qualifying lap at the start of the action.

In the Street Stocks main, Weaver got the last bit of glory in her Street Stocks duel with track record-holder Chad Bess, another Nampan. Bess lowered his record qualifying pace to 14.799 seconds Saturday.

Weaver entered the night with an 86-point lead over Bess, and she matched Bess pass for pass in the feature to pick up bonus points.

With time running out in the 35-lap feature, Bess crept up on Weaver’s quarter panel, but the reigning track champion and current points leader had one last surprise for the fans.

Seemingly at a disadvantage in the low groove with the slower racecar of Fruitland, Idaho’s Bobby Riggs in front of her, Weaver swung her No. 92 Chevrolet Camaro out in front of Bess on the backstretch, forcing Bess to brake hard and sealing her victory.

“Definitely lapped traffic gets in there, so it makes it a little difficult,” Weaver said. “But it’s more fun for the fans, though, right?”

The Street Stocks have two races left, running a doubleheader Friday and Saturday for the speedway’s finale weekend.

“It’s pretty stressful to have three races in one week, but we’ll manage that, I guess,” Weaver said. “Friday night and Saturday night are going to be pretty rough.”

A second track record fell Saturday night when Jerry Rice of Twin Falls, Idaho backed up his Intermountain Pro Trucks fast time from July. Saturday, he rolled around the quarter-mile paved oval in 14.605 seconds to better his own record of 14.808 set on July 9.

Rice wasn’t able to duplicate his success in the Trophy Dash for the touring racing trucks series as Johnny Pierre, who also hauled from Twin Falls, took the hardware in an attempt to erase a disappointing performance in his first 2011 visit to Meridian.

“We had bad luck when we ran out here the last race,” Pierre said. “We just want to redeem ourselves and put on a good show for you folks and hopefully go home with a (main event) trophy.”

Pierre couldn’t make the magic last in the heat races, finishing second to Kimberly, Idaho driver Alan Larson in the second eight-lap heat. Doug Dugger passed fellow Twin Falls racer Hannah Newhouse early in the first heat race and went on to the checkered flag. Newhouse is a 14-year-old who is also a cheerleader at her Twin Falls school.

The Intermountain Pro Trucks ran a 50-lap feature later in the night

Another track record-holder, Dennis Wurtz II of Kuna, Idaho, kicked off the Project Filter 99 segment race for the NAPA Late Model Sportsman division by taking advantage of hard luck on the part of early race leaders Dan Lowther of Boise, Idaho, and Rick Fowble of Twin Falls.

Lowther and Fowble hooked up while leading the 11-car pack into Turn 3. Fowble fell out of the low groove, skidded across the infield grass and wound up in front of all the racecars in the middle of the Turns 3 and 4 to bring out the third caution flag of the first 33-lap leg of the night.

As Wurtz stayed in front of Monroe, season series runner-up Chris Fenton of Meridian, Idaho, tried to gain ground on season leader Tyler Bailey of Middleton, Idaho.

Driving hard because this weekend will decide the championship, Fenton nosed in front of Bailey with about four laps left only spin out soon after. Fenton was sent to the back and was unable to gain much ground on Bailey.

Racing resumes Sunday night for Tates Rents Fan Night and a Racing For Smiles of the Northwest night.

The NAPA Late Model Sportsman division returns to cap a doubleheader weekend and will share the track with the SPI Transportation Sprintcars (formerly called the Idaho Sprintcar and Roadster League) touring series as well as local series such as the Project Filter Pro-4s, Jr. Stingers and Thunder Dogs.

The gates open at 4 p.m. with racing at 6:30 p.m.

Tickets are $10 for adults, $7.50 for senior citizens and military personnel with ID, $6 for ages 7-11 and children 6-and-under free. A family pass good for two adults and up to four children ages 7-11 is available for $30.

Fans can buy tickets online at www.meridianspeedway.com, print them off at home and avoid the long lines on race night.

For more information, visit www.meridianspeedway.com or call (208) 888-2813.