Local Racing
Larson Strikes Again
HAGERSTOWN, MD (July 2, 2020 – Pittsburgh Racing Now) – Kyle Larson extended his points lead in the 30th Annual Pennsylvania Sprint Car Speedweek with his victory at Hagerstown Speedway in the Johnny Grum Memorial. His second win of the series boosted his margin to 110 points over Danny Dietrich and 190 over Freddie Rahmer, Jr. with just two races remaining. Larson earned over $5,000 for his night’s work.
Larson noted that the win was his first on one of the big half miles in the area. After his win two nights ago at Grandview Speedway, Larson expressed a preference for the smaller venues, which are few and far between here. “I like it a lot better now,” he said with a smile. “Any time you win, you have a lot of fun.” Larson made the win look very easy. “My car was really good, I could get through (turns) one and two pretty respectably. I could carry a lot of speed on entry and I could drive through the middle. I didn’t have to run the cushion, but I could slide up to it in two and get a good run down the backstretch.” He added that turns three and four held a lot of moisture through the night, so he could run the bottom at that end of the track.
Larson’s only disappointment was with the caution, which came out on lap 23 of 30. “I wanted it to stay green because I knew that I had lapped a lot of cars so I knew that I had a big advantage over the second place car.” That happened to be Brent Marks, who had taken the position away from Sammy Swindell in traffic. “I thought we may have had something for (Larson) after the yellow there, but I needed him to mess up a couple of times,” Marks commented. Swindell agreed. “I knew that I wasn’t going to get Kyle unless he messed up real bad.” Unfortunately for Marks and Swindell, Larson was free of any errors on this night.
The luck of the draw put Larson on the pole for the feature event, and he had his son, Owen, to thank for that. He quipped that Owen would have to do the honors for the rest of the weekend becasue it was the first good pill that he had during Speedweek. Brock Zearfoss was on the outside of row one. Marks and Swindell were in the second row. Then came Dietrich and Rico Abreu. Kyle Reinhardt and Ryan Smith were in row four with Anthony Macri and Freddie Rahmer, Jr. in the fifth row.
Larson entered turn one with the lead and he never was pressured. Zearfoss held second position for the fist eight laps of the race. That was when Swindell powered off turn two to take it away from him. Abreu held fourth for a few laps before giving way to Dietrich and Marks. Macri, Kyle Moody, Smith, and Rahmer raced along in the top ten.
Marks took over the second position just two laps before the caution was displayed for Zearfoss, who spun in turn four while racing in the fifth spot. That eliminated all of the lapped cars that separated Larson from the rest of the pack, but when the green light came on again it did not take him very long at all to open up his lead over Marks and Swindell.
Larson completed the final seven laps without incident, as did Marks and Swindell. The same could not be said for Dietrich, however. With two circuits left, Dietrich slowed on the backstretch, losing several positions. benefiting most were Abreu and Rahmer, who completed the top five. Other beneficiaries of Dietrich’s misfortune were Macri and Smith. Following the faltering Dietrich across the line were Chase Dietz and Mike Wagner.
Scoring wins in their heats were Reinhardt, Marks, Smith, and Swindell. Robbie Kendall took the B Main. Larson’s quick time of 15.593 was just .013 seconds off the track record.
Hagerstown Speedway will host the Ultimate Late Model Series on Saturday for a $5,000 to win event. Speeweek round eight will be held Friday night at Williams Grove Speedway. It will be the Mitch Smith Memorial paying $15,000 to the winner. It will be a Sprint Car only show, with fireworks for added entertainment. Speedweek will then conclude at the Port Royal Speedway with the Greg Hodnett Classic paying another $10,000 for first place.
SARVER, PA (April 26, 2024) AJ Flick picked up his first Peoples Natural Gas Sprint Car win of 2024 at Lernerville Speedway on Friday night and Michael Norris made it back-to-back wins in the Late Model Division.
Flick started fourth on the grid and passed leader and pole-sitter Carl Bowser using the bottom side on lap 8 while Bowser worked the high side. Bowser wouldn’t go away easily, pulling side-by-side with Flick at the halfway mark. Flick eventually was able to hold Bowser at bay, building a three-second lead as he encountered lap traffic.
A caution flag with five-laps-to-go bunched up the field but Flick got an impressive restart and kept the field at bay to pick up the victory. Bowser finished second and Michael Bauer finished third after starting eighth.
“I didn’t expect it to slick off as much as it did,” Flick said about the track conditions. “It was odd because it wasn’t really wide but yet the actual racing groove was getting slick and starting to come in already. I missed it in the heat race, but come feature time it seems like we’re starting to dial it in a bit more.”
Norris started 10th and put on a clinic coming through the field to make it two straight at ‘The action Track.’
“Luck was on our side tonight,” Norris said. “I always seem to have late race cautions. Thanks to John Garvin for leaving me a lane, he got me pretty good on that last restart but I knew as long as I could be even with him going into turn one, the top was so good and it was.”
Erick Rudolph made the trip to Sarver from Ransomville, New York and it paid off. Rudolph took home the feature victory in the Diehl Automotive Big Block Modified main event.
“There’s something about Lernerville Speedway,” said Rudolph. “It’s one of my favorite tracks in the country and anytime we get a chance to come down here it’s always something we look forward to.”
Tyler Dietz proved to be the class of the field once again, garnering his first feature win in the Millerstown Pic-A-Part Pro Stock main event. Dietz survived a late race restart and held off front row starter Tim Bish and a hard charging Chris Schneider to grab the checkered flag.
“I kind of thought that he (Bish) was going to take the bottom,” Dietz stated, remarking about the crucial restart. “I was hoping he would go high because I think I was better up high but I just never got the chance to go up there.”
PITTSBURGH, PA (April 24, 2025) The Historic Stock Car Racing Association (HSCRA) is joining the lineup of racing groups at this year’s Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix (PVGP) Historics at Pittsburgh International Race Complex. This is the first time the HSCRA will race in the PVGP Historics 3-day weekend, July 26 to 28, 2024.
“We are thrilled to welcome the HSCRA to our 2024 event,” said Dan DelBianco, Executive Director of the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix. “Their participation not only broadens the appeal of the PVGP Historics but also aligns with our mission to celebrate all automotive history. This is a fantastic opportunity for race fans of all types to witness the power and beauty of historic stock cars in action.”
The HSCRA, renowned for its commitment to preserving and celebrating the history of stock car racing, will bring a new dimension to the PVGP Historics. The group is open to all stock cars that ran in one of the major NASCAR series.
“The HSCRA is anxious to bring NASCAR to Pittsburgh,” said Carlus Gann of HSCRA. “We look forward to making this a regular stop on our tour. Western Pennsylvania has deep roots in racing, and building a world-class track at Pitt Race in Beaver County makes it a perfect fit.”
The most popular class is Generation 4 Cup cars built for the 1992-2007 seasons. During this era, teams built a few cars for the two road courses on the schedule.
“We are hoping for a full field of meticulously restored stock cars,” added Chris Evans of the HSCRA. “Former NASCAR winners like Joe Nemechek and a competitive lineup of today’s top historic stock car drivers will be on hand.”
Gary Moore, a seasoned participant in over a dozen PVGP races, knows the intricacies and challenges of the Pitt Race track. Moore will be showcasing his 1969 Mercury Cyclone (right), victoriously driven by Cale Yarborough, exclaiming, “It’s quite the adventure behind the wheel!”
The HSCRA will have a practice session in the morning and a qualifying race in the afternoon on Friday, July 26. A morning and afternoon practice session on Saturday, July 27. Sunday, July 28 will see the HSCRA have a short morning warm-up prior to being one of the featured Sunday afternoon races.
The Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix Motorsport Festival features two weekends of racing action. The first weekend is the PVGP Historics at Pittsburgh International Race Complex. The second weekend is racing through a 2.33-mile road course set on the streets of Pittsburgh’s Schenley Park. In addition to the race weekends, the PVGP stages car shows, parties, road rallies, and a black-tie formal. The PVGP’s mission is to provide residential care, treatment and support for people with autism and intellectual/developmental disabilities – donating $6.7 million to charity since 1983.
IMPERIAL, PA (April 20, 2024) Aliquippa’s Tim Shaffer started on the pole position and survived several caution flags and restarts to win the Herb Scott Memorial Saturday night at Pittsburgh’s Pennsylvania Motor Speedway (PPMS).
“Boy I earned that one huh,” said Shaffer following the race. “These wins just keep getting better and better. Herb Scott won a lot of features and I have a long way to go to catch him, but my career went on the road and it became hard to win races. It’s kind of back home racing now for me and it’s a lot of fun.”
Brock Pinkerous and Dave Hess Jr. staged an epic battle over the last several laps with Pinkerous scoring an emotional runner-up finish.
“Congrats to Tim on the win,” said Pinkerous, who hails from Ellenville, NY. “He’s really good at this track. Him and Dave are legends around this area. It’s really cool to battle with them; they raced me clean and I raced them clean. Even though we didn’t win tonight, this is for my uncle tonight who passed away about a month ago. I hope he’s watching over us tonight, and I really love you uncle Chris.”
“We were really good on those restarts,” said Hess, the 39-year-old Waterford, Pa. driver. “A little tweak to the car and maybe a gear change and we could have had something for the leaders. Once those two (Shaffer and Pinkerous) got rolling, they were a little better than I was.”
Kyle Lukon finished fifth and Logan Roberson rounded out the Top 5.
A Feature (30 Laps): 1. 45-Tim Shaffer[1]; 2. 555-Brock Pinkerous[4]; 3. 44-Dave Hess Jr[21]; 4. 184-Kyle Lukon[5]; 5. 17R-Logan Roberson[19]; 6. 10S-Joe Martin[16]; 7. 36-Cody Dawson[7]; 8. 3J-Jeremy Wonderling[10]; 9. 42-Daryl Charlier[6]; 10. 184C-Justin Chance[13]; 11. 21J-Jim Rasey[24]; 12. 184P-Cole Petrelle[20]; 13. 77-Tom Klein[23]; 14. 57-Charlie Sandercock[11]; 15. 36B-Colby Beighey[15]; 16. 18-Mike Wonderling[25]; 17. 29-Ryan Hare[17]; 18. 60H-Brian Huchko[22]; 19. 9R-Mike Reft[14]; 20. 25-Zachary Kane[9]; 21. 72B-Kassidy Kamicker[18]; 22. 75-Jared Miley[3]; 23. 60-Brandon Burgoon[2]; 24. 14AJ-AJ Miller[8]; 25. 14G-Jake Gunn[12]
McLaughlin goes back-to-back at Barber Motorsports Park
Macri Gets Third Straight Kauffman Classic at Port Royal; Amantea and Craig Perigo Also Score
Flick, Norris, Rudolph and Dietz Victorious at Lernerville
Wagaman and Brenneman Top Williams Grove
Scott Dixon on top of INDYCAR Championship Standings after Team Penske Penalty
Borden Thrills at Port Royal; Robinson, Covert, and Hart also Score
Team Penske Penalized for St. Pete Infractions. Newgarden Stripped Of Win
Historic Stock Cars to run at Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix
Pittsburgh’s PA Motor Speedway Cancels Saturday Program; Pivots To Flood Relief Drive
