MANKE FINALLY GETS SUPER LATE MODEL WIN IN ORANGE SHOW SPEEDWAY MAIN EVENT

Source: Orange Show Speedway Public Relations
Date: 06/17/2007

SAN BERNARDINO, California -- John Manke, the leading winner in the Hype Manufacturing Super Late Model class over the past two years, got his first win of the 2007 season Saturday night (June 16) at Orange Show Speedway.

Manke, 43, a landscaper from Ramona, had won three times in 2005, when he captured the class championship, and a division-best five times in 2006. But in the first six races of the current season, Manke’s best finish had been a fourth.

Saturday night, on the ASA-sanctioned quarter-mile oval at the National Orange Show Events Center, Manke shook off the early season doldrums by leading 43 of the 50 laps in his Litehouse Dressings Chevrolet Monte Carlo and finishing about three car lengths ahead of fast qualifier Frankie Gould.

Rex Lockwood in Pro 4, Jim Edmiston in Stock Pony, Spencer Samaro in Factory Fours and Mark Whitson in Stock Cars USA were the night’s other main event winners although Lockwood won by default when first-place finisher Bryan Glidewell was disqualified in a post-race inspection because of an unapproved carburetor.

“We’d really, really struggled,” Manke told the crowd of 1,200. “When you’ve had the success we’ve had here, it was really hard not to have a good race. We had a couple of races where we were in the lead and got taken out, but that’s racing at Orange Show Speedway.

“We were having a tough day today. We had old tires, we had distributor problems and I had had the flu all week. But I’m sure glad we came out.”

Manke started on the outside of the front row, alongside Riverside’s Mark Shackleford, and led the first lap. Shackleford led the next seven. Then Manke took over again on lap nine and never trailed again.

Gould started sixth and raced strongly throughout, moving into second with eight laps remaining and holding off Brett Edwards of Yucaipa. Points leader Rick Chavez recovered from an early spin to finish fourth and Shackleford was fifth.

Edmiston, the 2005 Stock Pony champion, strengthened his bid for another title by holding off defending champion Jim Mardis in a 25-lap main event that saw them run nose-to-tail virtually the entire distance. Mardis’s Ford Pinto was quicker through the middle of the turns, but Edmiston’s Pole Position Kart Track Pinto was better able to accelerate off the turns and repeatedly foil Mardis’s attempts to pass.

Samaro, 17, of San Bernardino got his second win and his seventh straight top three finish to pad his Factory Fours points lead; Whitson went wire-to-wire in the 25-lap Stock Cars USA main for his fourth win in five races; and Pro 4 leader Lockwood, of Victorville, inherited his second win of the season.

See Also .:

• Orange Show Speedway Track Page

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