HUDDLESTON INCREASES POINTS LEAD AFTER IRWINDALE VICTORY

Source: Dave Grayson
Date: 07/23/2007

After parking his bright blue Justice Brothers race car in the Irwindale Speedway victory lane the very happy winner said "when the Blue Crew gets this thing on the money the car hits the marks all night and the car just couldn't do no wrong. We're sure proud of the job they did tonight. The guys worked really hard and we rebounded from a rough race last week and we really wanted to come out tonight and run really good. It was also a good points night for us."

The Auto Club Late Model feature got off to a horrific start on the very first lap when eight race cars slammed into each other in turn two. Getting the worst of this situation was driver Clay Wattenbarger whose car erupted into flames. The Bakersfield-California driver made quick work of safely exiting the vehicle but the car was a total loss. Despite the severity of the accident five of the eight cars were able to continue. The red flag was out approximately 45 minutes while the safety crews did the track clean up. During the lull the track's public address system played some music to entertain the fans. In a sheer note of irony one of the musical selections played was Johnny Cash singing "I fell into a burning ring of fire."

The King Taco Super Trucks ran a 40 lap feature and it appeared that rookie driver Connor Cantrell was going to lead the entire race. He paced the 20 truck field for the first 34 circuits before Matt Hicks was able to pass him. During the course of that winning pass the two trucks leaned on each other and Cantrell's vehicle sustained some slight sheet metal damage. Unfortunately things got even worse less than a lap later when Cantrell found himself in the middle of a three truck spin on the backstretch. Following the restart the field made three more green flag laps before the yellow came out again due to a turn four spin. That set up a green-white-checker finish. Hicks was able to get a good restart and held off the last ditch efforts of Ray Robinson who settled for second. Logan Henson, John Israel and Dean Klock completed the top five.

In the 35 lap Legends feature Tom Landreth passed series points leader Darren Amidon on lap 16 for his second consecutive feature win and third win of the season. But much important than that was the fact that this race was a qualifying event for the Legend Car Nationals. The win automatically secured Landreth a starting berth in the Racereceiver Legend Car Asphalt Nationals to be held in Las Vegas during the weekend of October 11th through the 13th. Amidon followed the leader under the checkers to take second while Gary Scheuerell,Chad Schug and Matthew Hicks completed the top five.

The future of racing was on display at the Irwindale Speedway when the young Bandolero drivers ran their 15 lap main event. Lancaster-California's Andrew Anderson won this race flag to flag followed by Brianna Holley in second while Aaron Anderson, Ashley Ambriz and Andrew Porter rounded out the top five.

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