Dirt Racing’s Winning Moment: Mike Gular took advantage of a late-race caution and pounced on home-state driver Jordan Watson, pulling past him in turn 2 with two laps to go and driving off to the feature win at Delaware International Speedway Wednesday night (April 12).
The victory marked the second in less than a week for Gular, who won over the weekend at Grandview Speedway as well. Runner-up finisher Watson faced some heckling in the grandstands during his post-race interview, where he was vocal that a bad carburetor was causing his engine to lay down and cost him Wednesday’s win.
2023 BATTLE OF THE BAY NIGHT 1 RACE RESULTS
Dirt Racing’s Dramatic Moment: Sheldon Creed was sent into one of the most violent tumbles Millbridge Speedway has seen in recent memory on the opening lap of the wingless micro sprint feature at the track, slammed into the frontstretch wall after polesitter Cole Dewease doored him on the opening start.
Creed was fortunately uninjured but suffered serious damage to his racecar. The incident collected numerous other cars, including fellow Xfinity Series regular Brandon Jones.
What Dirt Racing Fans’ll Be Group Chatting About This Morning
I’ve long been fiercely opposed to drivers confronting others in stopped racecars while they’re strapped in, but if Creed had opted to take advantage of Dewease being strapped in at Millbridge I might have looked the other way. Creed was wronged in a major-league way this Wednesday night.
Ryan Watt fortunately walked away from the hardest wreck of the evening at Delaware (more on that later), but Flo Racing’s cameras stayed focused on the wrecked racecar for a good long while without knowing whether Watt was uninjured. Surprising flaw in Wednesday’s broadcast given just how many nasty crashes have been plaguing dirt racing the last week.
I don’t care that it was the score to The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Marricone’s “Ecstasy of Gold” is now property of Modelo’s overly-preachy beer commercials and makes driver intros feel sappy. Be it the RUSH late models or the Super DIRTcar Series, please stop making this music part of pre-race activities.
Excellent news off the track today, as Jake Neuman continues to show signs of improvement after his nasty wreck in Tuesday’s High Limit race at Lakeside.
Dirt Racing’s Hero of the Day
Millesboro, Del.’s Dylan Betts won Wednesday’s “Little Lincolns” support class feature at Delaware driving a car with a borrowed rear end in it. That’s some serious effort to show up for and run a 12-lap midweek feature.
Dirt Racing’s Villain/Victims of the Night
There was no shortage of spectacular crashes this Wednesday night; both the wingless micro sprints at Millbridge and the RUSH late models at Delaware suffered a Big One on the opening lap of their features, while Millbridge saw several other flips and Delaware had a vehicle go over in the Delaware Super Trucks feature late in the evening. But Watt‘s tumble in his modified heat race topped them all.
The night’s biggest victim that didn’t suffer crash damage had to be Louden Reimert, who after leading the first half of Wednesday’s modified feature at Delaware and running in the top five late broke with three laps to go.
And there definitely was a villain this evening at Millbridge. See Dewease, Cole above.
Numbers Game
3
Dirt tracks that ran oval-track racing programs in the U.S. Wednesday night (per MyRacePass, Race Monitor and Speedhive).
74
The nation’s largest car count Wednesday night, the Battle of the Bay at Delaware.
$4,000
The nation’s largest purse Wednesday night, awarded to the modified feature at Delaware (Gular).
Up Next: Frontstretch will be back Friday morning (April 14) with continued coverage of the RUSH late model Battle of the Bay, this time from the Georgetown Speedway in Delaware. Coverage can be found on Flo Racing.
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Who wrote this headline? ‘Sheldon Creed Violated’…is the headline author so utterly out of touch that they don’t know the common meaning of such a statement?
I didnt know Lance Dewease ran micros at Millbridge.