Shaffer Wins at Rolling Wheels Raceway Park
ELBRIDGE, NY (October 10, 2009) - Tim Shaffer has had a great 2009 season and the only thing missing from it was a World of Outlaws win. He came close a few weeks ago at the famed Eldora Speedway in Ohio, leading a number of laps before settling for a runner-up finish. He made up for that near miss on Saturday night as he was victorious in the New Yorker 25 at Rolling Wheels Raceway Park as the World of Outlaws made their long awaited return to Super DIRT Week before a standing room only crowd at the sprawling 5/8-mile.
For Shaffer it was his 12th career World of Outlaws A-Feature win and his first victory in the state of New York. Prior to Saturday night, his best career finish at Rolling Wheels had been two eighth-place performances. With the victory, the current All Star Circuit of Champions title winner has now won a total of 13 times in 2009.
“To come up here and win this is awesome,” said Shaffer. “The car was great tonight. Brian (Kemenah, Crew Chief) and the guys do such a great job and it makes me look good. I have a great team here and the owner is great. It’s the whole package.”
The race began with Shaffer jumping to the lead from the pole with Donny Schatz in tow. The first caution of the night flew before the first lap was in the books, leading to a complete restart. On the second start, Schatz got the upper hand on Shaffer and led the field into turn one, with the latter taking the lead in turn two and officially being credited with leading the first circuit.
Shaffer extended his lead on the second lap, with Schatz gaining ground on the third go-around as he used the high side of the track, nearly taking the lead coming off the fourth turn. Schatz kept pace with him for the next few laps as they approached lapped traffic and were in traffic on the sixth lap. Schatz was all over the leader on the eighth lap as the pair negotiated lapped traffic. Schatz again nearly took the lead on the 11th lap as the pair charged around the track.
On the 12th circuit, Schatz went low in turn one and took the lead from Shaffer and quickly jumped to a six-car length lead. Schatz opened up a sizeable lead over the next five laps as they continued to work traffic, with the final caution of the night coming out on the 18th lap.
On the ensuing restart, Shaffer dove under Schatz in turns one and two and took the lead on the back straightaway. He would go on to lead the final eight laps to score the $10,000 triumph aboard the Kistler Engines J&J.
“The main thing was trying to get underneath him on the restart,” shared the winner. “I was hoping he would run in there too hard and slip up and he kind of entered the middle and coming off the corner he drove off the edge. It may have looked like I gave him a little push, but it wasn’t. I think he had a left rear push and that drove him off the track. We’ll take it any way we can get it.”
Shaffer extended his lead in the late going and encountered some traffic down the stretch, but was able to clear the slower machines each time. He began the night by winning the second heat race and also won the Crane Cams Dash for the first time this season to earn the pole position for the 25-lap A-Feature event.
“It was one of those nights where things were falling our way,” noted the native of Aliquippa, Pennsylvania. “We won the heat and that put us at the front of the dash and we won that. Donny (Schatz) got by us about halfway and on that restart, we just rolled the wing back and I was hoping to hit that line the best I could wide open and it worked out.”
Schatz would lead six laps on the night and wound up second to earn his series leading 38th Top-Five finish of the season in the Armor All J&J. Coupled with a fifth-place finish for Jason Meyers, Schatz was able to gain six points in the championship standings and now the gap between the two is 18 markers with three events remaining on the 2009 calendar.
”We were good and that gave us a chance to work on our car a little bit,” said Schatz. “We had a good draw. We got Timmy (Shaffer) in traffic and that’s what we needed. You hate to see those yellows. The puzzling part is that I came out of (turn) four we my tires locked down and never spun a tire wrong through both corners with as much speed as I could and he drove right on by. That’s pretty puzzling.”
Schatz led on the final restart and ran as hard as he could over the last eight laps of the race as he tried to track Shaffer back down. He kept pace for the first couple of laps after Shaffer got around him and the fell back a little at the end.
“We had plenty of laps there until the end and I push hard and made a few mistakes,” noted the North Dakota native. “That’s the way it goes, we were second I guess.”
Steve Kinser finished third on Saturday night in the Quaker State Maxim to continue his impressive streak at Rolling Wheels. The 20-time series champion has now finished in the Top-10 in all 27 of his starts at the sprawling 5/8-mile.
Jac Haudenschild finished fourth in the Owens-Corning Fiberglass Maxim, with Meyers in fifth piloting the GLR Investments KPC. Meyers began the night by setting fast time in qualifying to earn five bonus points, while Schatz was third quick to earn three. At that juncture, Meyers cut two points off Schatz’s advantage.
Cody Darrah finished sixth in his debut aboard the DirecTV Maxim for Kasey Kahne Racing, as he filled in for Brad Sweet. Darrah was victorious last weekend for the first time with the World of Outlaws at his home track of Williams Grove Speedway.
Lucas Wolfe was seventh in the Allebach Racing Maxim, with Jason Sides eighth aboard the Wetherington Tractor Service Maxim. Joey Saldana came all the way from the 24th starting spot to finish ninth in the Budweiser Maxim to earn the KSE Racing Products Hard Charger Award. Daryn Pittman rounded out the Top-10 in the Hunter Truck Sales Maxim.
The World of Outlaws return to action on Saturday, October 24 at Lone Star Speedway in Kilgore, Texas.