By Jim Balentine
(Mercer, PA)
On a warm humid night, Michaels Mercer raceway present by Sunbelt rentals was able to complete its first back to back racing program of the season. Kyle Fink would win his second career Mercer modified feature by winning the $4018 to win Ryder memorial for the BRP modified tour. Jeremy Kornbau would capture his 12th career IMCA racesaver 305 sprint feature tying him for a third all time. Caden Petry would pick up his first career win in the top shelf trucking DIRT 602 crate sportsman modifieds; and Andy Thompson would tie for second all-time in the SCDRA mini stocks by winning his 22nd career feature. The entire program was completed at 10:30.
The Fink family goes back to the late 1980s at Mercer as Brian Fink would win his first Mercer feature in 1988 in the 6 cylinder class. Son Kyle would take over and win 18 limited modified features over the year and won his first big block race on June 11 2021 but none since… until Saturday night as he dominated the Ryder memorial for the BRP modified tour leading green to checker winning $4018 plus lap money for the biggest win of his career. Fink would line up next to Rick Regalski for the 40 lapper. Fink would take control from the beginning leading as much as 2.7 seconds over Regalski for the first 10 laps before Canadian Tyler Willard would overtake for 2nd.
Dave Murdick would suffer a flat tire on lap 13 negating a 2.4 second lead for Fink.
NY invader Erick Rudolph would move up from 10th to 3rd in 13 laps.
On lap 14 Austin Eyler and Steve Slater got sideways on the front straightaway and collected Jeremy Paup, Jeff Walters, and Kevin Green. All were able to continue.
Garrett Krummert and Rex King Jr. was slowly moving up from 8th and 11th to 4th and 5th respectively on lap 16. A few more yellows would bunch up the field, but then after a run of green flag laps , Rudolph would move into second and would hound Fink for the lead on lap 23 and Krummert would pass Willard for 3rd. On lap 35 Krummert would then pass Rudolph and then King Jr would do the same on the next lap. Krummert would try to catch Fink but would not succeed as Fink would win by .315 at the checkers. Krummert would finish 2nd with King Jr. 3rd, but was light at the scales and pending an appeal was disqualified. Unofficially Tyler Willard would move into third; Mike Kinney with a great run would finish in fourth and Eric Rudolph fell back to fifth after losing power steering. Fink would say,” Rick and Bob Ryder were my very good friends. I drove his car a few times for him. I can’t believe I’m standing here, but we are lucky with the starting spot. Everything kind of fell in our place and I thank Skip and Cindy Moore to Give me the opportunity! There might not be enough beer in Mercer County tonight. it wasn’t easy and scary.. I kept messing up and I was like they’re coming they’re coming. I don’t know how I held them off I don’t know what was going on behind me, but it all worked out.”
In the IMCA racesaver 305 sprints Jeremy Kornbau would collect his 2nd win in a row and his 12th overall putting him tied at third most all time with Cody Bova and Michael Bauer going back to 2011. Roman Jones with his best finish of the year, finishing second as sister Vivian Jones would finish third close to cementing her back to back track championships. Tim Bittner would be 4th and Mike Mathieson 5th. Jones will have a 67 point lead over former track champion Jarrett Rosencrance going into next Friday night’s point finale. Kornbau would say “ I know we had that great two years there and then you guys posted that(win list) so to get two in a row it’s awesome we’re all good so it’s a good thing!” last week It was almost too wet but was great. I thought he (Roman Jones) was second on the board and Roman doesn’t run the bottom so I’m glad I’m here!”
After 5 years of trying Grove City,Pa’s Caden Petry would pick up his first career win in the top shelf trucking DIRT 602 crate sportsman leading wire to wire in the 20 lap affair. The excitement was all behind him as Billy Adams, Logan Lockhart and Jordan Ehrenberg would battle behind. Adams would drift high in the corners, allowing Ehrenberg and Lockhart to get around. Lockhart would move into second and try to catch Petry but would do no better as finishing .868 seconds behind. Last week’s winer Pat Lane would move into third on lap 16 with Ehrenberg finishing 4th. Adams would fall back to 5th. Petry would say “ I worked so hard to get to this point at Mercer race I mean it has been like 4-5 years in trying to get this done with multiple top fives and obviously I couldn’t do it but everyone down there in the sponsors on the side of the car im kind of speechless right now! I’m not really paying attention to the cars around me or the scoreboard but just trying to hit my marks and It’s like a bunch of wild dogs chasing you out there!” Petry would move into the lead in the point standings by 16 over Ehrenberg and 24 over Pat Lane going into the finale next Friday.
Andy Thompson would pick up his 22nd career SCDRA mini stock feature win in dominant fashion by .524 over Randy Ealy. Joe Campbell would finish 3rd, Carl Ealy 4th and Bill Fuchs 5th. In the make up feature Joe Campbell would pick up his first win since 2019 after Randy Ely dropped out. Thompson would get second Carl Ealy third, Josh Eakman 4th and Ben Aley 5th. Thompson now has a 10 point lead over Randy Ealy and Joe Campbell heading into next Friday’s final points race.
Next week will be a special Friday night show as the FASTonDIRT 410 sprints compete in the Vern and Fumiko Hawley Memorial race along with the final point night for the regular three divisions
Racesaver 305 Sprints 12 Entries A Feature 1 | 00:10:48.193 1. 27K-Jeremy Kornbau[2]; 2. 82M-Roman Jones[1]; 3. 20M-Vivian Jones[3]; 4. 01-Timmy Bittner[4]; 5. 72-Mike Mathieson[10]; 6. 99-AJ Burton[12]; 7. 34M-Aaron Marano[7]; 8. 30-Jazlyn Boyles[9]; 9. 15-Lacey Shuttleworth[11]; 10. 71-Joe Coggin[5]; 11. 25-Jarrett Rosencrance[6]; 12. (DQ) 25G-Nolan Groves[8] Heat 1 8 Laps | 00:02:04.126 1. 27K-Jeremy Kornbau[4]; 2. 20M-Vivian Jones[5]; 3. 71-Joe Coggin[1]; 4. 34M-Aaron Marano[2]; 5. 30-Jazlyn Boyles[3]; 6. 15-Lacey Shuttleworth[6] Heat 2 8 Laps | 00:02:07.639 1. 25-Jarrett Rosencrance[1]; 2. 82M-Roman Jones[2]; 3. 01-Timmy Bittner[5]; 4. 25G-Nolan Groves[6]; 5. 72-Mike Mathieson[3]; 6. 99-AJ Burton[4] BRP MOD TOUR Big Block Modifieds 24 Entries A Feature 1 40 Laps | 00:29:20.531 1. 17M-Kyle Fink[1]; 2. 29-Garrett Krummert[7]; 3. 165-Rex King Jr[12]; 4. 777-Tyler Willard[3]; 5. 20P-Mike Kinney[4]; 6. 25-Erick Rudolph[10]; 7. 13-Rick Regalski Jr[2]; 8. 11R-Brad Rapp[16]; 9. 18-Colton Walters[9]; 10. 14S-Justin Shea[5]; 11. 9-Cameron Miller[11]; 12. 64-Rodney Beltz[15]; 13. 5A-Austin Eyler[17]; 14. 86R-Rob Curtis[18]; 15. 60-Tom Holden[20]; 16. 18W-Jeff Walters[21]; 17. 5C-Ayden Cipriano[6]; 18. 71-Steve Barr[19]; 19. 35-Steve Slater[14]; 20. 37MD-Jeremiah Shingledecker[13]; 21. 74-Kevin Green[24]; 22. X-Jeremy Paup[22]; 23. 61-Dave Murdick[8]; 24. 3K-Shawn Kozar[23] Heat 1 8 Laps | 00:02:19.630 1. 17M-Kyle Fink[2]; 2. 5C-Ayden Cipriano[1]; 3. 29-Garrett Krummert[7]; 4. 777-Tyler Willard[4]; 5. 37MD-Jeremiah Shingledecker[6]; 6. 11R-Brad Rapp[5]; 7. 71-Steve Barr[3]; 8. X-Jeremy Paup[8] Heat 2 8 Laps | 00:04:01.638 1. 165-Rex King Jr[6]; 2. 13-Rick Regalski Jr[1]; 3. 14S-Justin Shea[8]; 4. 9-Cameron Miller[4]; 5. 35-Steve Slater[3]; 6. 5A-Austin Eyler[5]; 7. 60-Tom Holden[2]; 8. 3K-Shawn Kozar[7] Heat 3 8 Laps | 00:02:17.610 1. 25-Erick Rudolph[1]; 2. 20P-Mike Kinney[2]; 3. 18-Colton Walters[3]; 4. 61-Dave Murdick[5]; 5. 64-Rodney Beltz[6]; 6. 86R-Rob Curtis[4]; 7. 18W-Jeff Walters[7]; 8. 74-Kevin Green[8] Mini Stocks King’s Forest Products 11 Entries A Feature 1 15 Laps | 00:11:58.840 1. 5-Andy Thompson[1]; 2. 38-Randy Ealy[4]; 3. 40C-Joe Campbell[6]; 4. 0-Carl Ealy[3]; 5. 10JOK-Bill Fuchs[9]; 6. 55-Josh Eakman[5]; 7. 9R-Ben Aley[8]; 8. 45-Andrew Thompson[2]; 9. 54-Tim Callahan[7]; 10. (DNS) 60-Dillon Thorne Heat 1 6 Laps | 00:02:07.053 1. 38-Randy Ealy[4]; 2. 45-Andrew Thompson[1]; 3. 55-Josh Eakman[2]; 4. 54-Tim Callahan[5]; 5. 10JOK-Bill Fuchs[3] Heat 2 6 Laps | 00:02:02.610 1. 5-Andy Thompson[3]; 2. 0-Carl Ealy[4]; 3. 40C-Joe Campbell[5]; 4. 9R-Ben Aley[2]; 5. (DNS) 60-Dillon Thorne Make Up Feature 15 Laps 1. 40C-Joe Campbell[3]; 2. 5-Andy Thompson[9]; 3. 0-Carl Ealy[5]; 4. 55-Josh Eakman[10]; 5. 9R-Ben Aley[7]; 6. 38-Randy Ealy[2]; 7. 60-Dillon Thorne[4]; 8. 10JOK-Bill Fuchs[6]; 9. 45-Andrew Thompson[8]; 10. (DNS) 13S-Chaz Smith DIRT 602 Crate Sportsman Top Shelf Trucking 16 Entries A Feature 1 20 Laps | 00:09:11.223 1. 7P-Caden Petry[1]; 2. 58-Logen Lockhart[6]; 3. 12L-Patrick Lane[8]; 4. JD57-Jordan Ehrenberg[4]; 5. 717-Bill Adams[2]; 6. 1-Jim Bryce[5]; 7. 29-Cole Edwards[7]; 8. 404-Michael Kristyak[9]; 9. 77-Tommy Kristyak[11]; 10. 10S-Trevn Schaffer[12]; 11. C3-Chas Wolbert[16]; 12. 93-Phill Kapcewich[13]; 13. 29A-Anthony Antus[3]; 14. 71-Gage Priester[15]; 15. 51R-Thomas Rodgers[10]; 16. (DNS) 41-Brian Schaffer Heat 1 8 Laps | 00:06:17.878 1. 7P-Caden Petry[7]; 2. 29-Cole Edwards[1]; 3. 717-Bill Adams[4]; 4. 1-Jim Bryce[2]; 5. 404-Michael Kristyak[6]; 6. 77-Tommy Kristyak[5]; 7. 93-Phill Kapcewich[8]; 8. 71-Gage Priester[3] Heat 2 8 Laps | 00:02:24.272 1. 58-Logen Lockhart[1]; 2. 12L-Patrick Lane[2]; 3. JD57-Jordan Ehrenberg[7]; 4. 29A-Anthony Antus[3]; 5. 51R-Thomas Rodgers[6]; 6. 10S-Trevn Schaffer[4]; 7. (DNS) 41-Brian Schaffer
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