Possibly the largest field of Hobby Stocks in the history of Rattlesnake Raceway took their places on the grid prior to the Hobby Stock Challenge race on July 5th.
After find the wall on Friday night, Lee Ketten Jr. won Saturday’s Gen-X feature and here is taking his victory lap.
After coming from the back Carl “Fireball,” Barlow (27N) made the winning pass on leader Richard Italiano (44) driving the car Pete Baglin usually pilots. For Barlow it clinched a sweep of both Hobby Stock features.
A delighted Steve Evenson takes the checkered flag as he wins the IMCA Modified feature at Rattlesnake on July 5. Since his birthday was on the following day he took it as an early present.
FALLON (July 5) – Having 4th of July celebrated on a Friday gave Rattlesnake Raceway an opportunity for a two-day show. On Saturday the feature attraction was a new event; the Hobby Stock Challenge.
This time the race was for money and not points so there was additional incentive besides the usual track payouts.
Add to the purse was a bonus for the winner as well as making sure every driver got $100. Although there was a catch, any driver that caused a caution or a wreck lost half of the guarantee and that money went back in the pot.
The extra funds were provided by Dennis and Tami Buehn, who both race Hobby Stocks.
The goal was for a clean race, as everybody had a stake in that, and maybe having a caution free event. In short track racing caution free features tend to be rare happenings.
But one driver, Carl “Fireball,” Barlow came, raced and collected.
“That’s it, two main events in a row plus the bonus month,” he said. “I started in the back, 21st out of 26 but it didn’t seem as hard as I thought it was going to be so I just put it on the outside, started going by everybody and the next thing I knew, I was up front.”
Then he thanked everybody as well as his wife as wel as sponsors Outdoor Toy Store and Pro Tech RV.
The 26-car field may have set a record as the most cars to have ever started a race at Rattlesnake.
When the green waved Rick Miller took off with Joe Blackbum and Richard Italiano, driving Pete Baglin’s regular mount, in hot pursuit. Contact with a lap car on the eighth lap spun Miller and dropped him from contention.
Then Italiano was on point but Barlow had been ripping past the pack using his patented outside line. Once he caught the leader Fireball used an inside move to grab the lead from Italiano.
There was a short caution that erased any advantage Barlow had and allowed the hard pressed score keepers to get everyone in their proper order.
Once the green waved Barlow was off and running. By now Dean Clark had moved to third and was challenging Italiano for second.
Only a few laps later a car spun and collected three others and two of them were damaged enough to head for pits. For the remainder of the race Barlow lived up to his nickname as he just ran away from everyone and sliced his way through any lap traffic.
“I didn’t have any problem with any lap cars at all,” he said later.
At the checkered Barlow streaked across the line followed by Italiano, Dan Dias and Blackbum.
At post race inspection Italiano said, “It was a good race, knew Carl was back there but had the tires burned off so just couldn’t fend him off. I missed my mark, the bottom was open, he pounced, made a good move and that was it.”
Then he thanked car owner Pete Baglin, who is scheduled for surgery next week, his brother Rusty as well as Italiano’s family for coming out to root for him.
When the IMCA A Mods took off Fred White briefly led until he spun before completing a lap. This put Jeff Olschowka and Steve Evenson on the front row for the mandatory restart.
When racing resumed Olschowka took off with Evenson and Travis White giving chase. But, a few laps later, Olschowka got a flat handing the lead to Evenson.
After that the battle was between Evenson, who won even though White dogged him for the remainder of the event.
Back in the pits Evenson said, “I got lucky. Last night I was too busy announcing and not enough racing going on and I wasn’t able to make the changes on the car that needed to be made at the big 4th of July show. Tonight I had that chance because I didn’t announce and Olschowka, unknown to him, gave me an early birthday present so I’ll take the heat and the main for the win.”
He added that on a track like Rattlesnake a driver is really racing the track and not necessarily the other cars. The reason has to do with it being so dry and creating a dry-slick condition where grip is at a minimum.
The he gave a special thanks to his wife, father-in-law and to son Vincent for all the work he’s going on Steve’s car as was as the Elerick family in Lovelock and T&T Welding from Grass Valley.
Since the B Mods didn’t race that night the only other class was Gen-X which was won going away by Lee Ketten Jr., who damaged his car the previous night but was able to get it in order for Saturday’s show.
“The rim was beat up and that’s about it,” he said later. “The car was very good and the track was good and tacky.”
Rounding out the show were the Outlaw Karts and Jacob Dias made it a sweep in the 250 class. Once again Robert McBroome ran away with the beginner victory while Tanner Danielson scored his first ever feature victory.
RESULTS
Rattlesnake Raceway – July 5:
IMCA A Modifieds:
Heat Winners: #1. Travis White, #2 Steve Evenson
Main: 1. Steve Evenson, 2. Travis White, 3. Robert Mull, 4. Dave Ausano
Hobby Stocks:
Heat Winners: #1. Nathan DeRagen, #2 Carl Barlow, #3 Joe Blackwell, #4. Richard Italiano
Challenge Main: 1. Carl Barlow, 2. Richard Italiano, 3. Dan Dias, 4. Joe Blackburn, 5. Shane Crazel
Gen-X:
Heat Winner: Lee Ketten Jr.
Main: 1. Lee Ketten Jr., 2. Mikki Beuchat, 3. Jeremy Christen, 4. Christy Rasmussen
Northern Nevada Outlaw Karts:
250cc – 1. Jacob Dias, 2. Trey Walters, 3. Grasen Tenora, 4. Shansen Tenora, 5. Kate Robertson
Box Stock – 1. Tanner Danielson, 2. Sarah Anderson, 3. Grasen Tenora, 4. Jayden Hopper, 5. Xavier Frock
Beginner – 1. Robert McBroome, 2. Landon Tangreen, 3. Tanner Frock, 4. Hayden Leach, 5. David Carera
