CENTRAL CITY, PA (September 16, 2012) – Las Vegas, Nevada driver JFR*A2D used a late race charge to pass Hickory, North Carolina driver BLS_F1yer for the lead in the season opening Fall Brawl 50 at the newly renovated Thunder Valley Raceway.
The veteran racer would then hold off F1yer for just his third career win at VLR as the two drivers had the fans on their feet in an electrifying side by side duel at the line. A record number of cars entered the pits for the 19th season opener at VLR, with 47 of the nations best dirt late model drivers on hand for VLR's first ever race at Thunder Valley.
A2D, 20, proved that the win wasn't a fluke after qualifying first of the 44 drivers who participated in time trials. The California native then went on to win his heat race before coming out on top of the race-long battle between he and F1yer.
BLS_F1yer took the lead on lap ten and led for much of the race before A2D used the momentum he had built up on the high side to pass the F1 machine, which was sporting a much less flashy paint scheme than normal for this race. The two high caliber drivers would battle side by side through the last five laps but A2D was able to edge F1yer at the line by .083 seconds to earn a huge victory.
VLR_Shock of Crossville, Tennessee, finished third, after winning the B Main and quickly working his way toward the front after starting in seventh. Lawrenceburg, Indiana driver VLR_Gage had a strong season debut to come home in fourth, while Houston, Texas' BLS_Kevin showed marked improvement from his best finish of 21st last season to come home with a fifth place finish.
The race was a showdown for the win between JFR*A2D and BLS_F1yer from the drop of the green flag with the two battling side by side for nearly the entire race. Early on, BLS_18 and VLR_Gage had a similar side by side battle going on that allowed the two lead cars to pull away to settle the race amongst themselves.
VLR_Shock, IFRT_RB, and JFR_Faschek all then joined in on the intense battle for third and after 25 laps of hard racing VLR_Shock finally separated from the group but was futile in his efforts to run down the lead two cars. Up front it was JFR*A2D who notched one of the biggest wins of his career in front of a packed grandstand.
"It's a huge win for me and team JFR," said a victorious A2D. "It was awesome to see how many cars showed up, and to cross the line first out of all of them is amazing.
"I'm hoping to run for the championship this season and this is exactly the kind of run I needed to get that started. F1yer and I had a hell of a race up there and I love racing with him so to win that is just awesome. I'm gonna win this championship now, bitches."
BLS_F1yer crossed the line virtually side by side with the Nevada driver, but came up inches short in his bid for a seventh career win at VLR.
"Aww shit it was a good damn race with A2D up 'air and he drove the damn wheels off that damn thing," said F1yer in a thick redneck accent. "I thought I could, uh, damn, beat him, but shit he was up high there and just damn beat me to the damn line just by a damn little bit.
"But shit, we'll try to come back again next week and, uh, shit, go for another damn win I guess, I mean shit."
Defending champion VLR_Shock has scaled back his racing operations over the past few months, but the Tennessee driver proved he could still make some noise after earning the hard charger award by moving up from seventh to third after fifty laps.
"I'm surprised that I ran this good tonight," said a pleased VLR_Shock. "Third out of 47 is a good run for sure and I'm glad that I can still get it done so to speak. This track is really fun and makes for good racing and I think we saw that tonight so I'll take third and see what we can do at L-burg next week."
IFRT_RB of Oswego, New York finished sixth; seven-time VLR champion BLS_18 of Brookfield, Wisconsin finished seventh for the second consecutive VLR season opener; Hindman, Kentucky driver JFR_Faschek grabbed eighth after being a victim of a last lap melee that dropped him from sixth; VLR_King of Geneva, New York was impressive with his ninth place finish, his first VLR A Main since Volunteer Speedway two seasons ago; BLS_34 of Vineland, New Jersey rounded out the top 10 after making his second consecutive VLR season opening A main.
Fourty-Seven cars signed in for the nights racing action, a VLR record that beat the 46 car field during a race last season at Knoxville Raceway, proving that sim dirt late model racing is still a big deal throughout online racing.
A2D was quickest in the time trials, turning a blistering 13.543 on the newly renovated half-mile oval. It was A2D's first VLR pole since he sat on the pole and won the season finale at Rodeo on December 11, 2011.
Heat winners were JFR*A2D, BLS_F1yer, BLS_18, IFRT_RB, VLR_Brad, and JFR*Faschek. The D-Mains were won by Doit_3 (Johnstown, New York) and ERL_J-Mac (Amsterdam, New York). WFO_ICE (Muskogee, Oklahoma) and 51G (Geneva, New York) won the C Mains. The B Main was won by VLR_Shock.
Next week VLR heads to another first time track on the tour, Lawrenceburg Speedway in Lawrenceburg, Indiana. The famed 3/8 mile track features a very racy surface and provides for super close racing similar to the racing witnessed at Thunder Valley. We hope to see everyone back this week as JFR*A2D looks to back up his big win at Thunder Valley.
Pos Driver
1 JFR*A2D
2 BLS_F1yer
3 VLR_Shock
4 VLR_Gage
5 BLS_Kevin42
6 IFRT_RB
7 BLS_18
8 JFR_4H
9 VLR_21*
10 BLS_34
11 Doit 5
12 51g
13 Trav13x
14 WFO_ICE
15 VLR_McGee
16 VLR_911
17 JFR*22
18 DS5
19 WFO_Gibbz
20 GLH_Bubba
21 Doit 3
22 BLS_Lazy3
23 JFR_17
24 Doit 10
25 IFRT_14
26 XCR*Geisler
27 JO71
28 ERL_J-MAC
29 EricWilke_41
30 IFRT_Licmer
31 JFR*Waidler
32 JFR*Alec
33 ATR_Matt
34 imab3ast39
35 JFR_Duster
36 Doit_45
37 ErL_Turbo
38 Mcoy
39 XCR_Evan
40 BLS_BW43
41 carterracing46
42 cheeks
43 A11
44 Josh4
45 BLS Jsn!
46 dougiee
47 7c
- VLR_JW