Posted by Russ on November 9, 2009, 7:33 pm
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SCOTT WINTERS TAKES SUPERCLEAN MODIFIED RACE FOR THE THIRD TIME IN LAS VEGAS
BY DAVE GRAYSON
Scott Winters arrived in Las Vegas last weekend with one basic plan in mind: win the SuperClean Modified Racing Series 75 lap event for the third consecutive time. This event was part of the annual Las Vegas Open Comp held at the three eighths of a mile oval known as the Las Vegas Bullring.
To no real surprise the northern California modified ace was on fire in Las Vegas. He started the weekend by topping the speed charts in practice and then led qualifying with a lap of 15.335 seconds. But, more importantly, the team came through with their carefully laid plans to claim this prestigious race, and the $2,500 winner's check, for the third consecutive year.
Because of the prestigious nature of this event, 34 modified teams arrived in Las Vegas looking for modified racing glory. A series of heat races, held the day before, trimmed the field down to a 26 car starting field. A pre race inversion procedure placed Andrew Phipps, the newly crowned 2009 SuperClean Modified Racing Series champion, and Jimmy Dickerson, the 2008 series champion, on the front row for the 75 lap A main.
Phipps, following the initial green flag to start the race, jumped into the lead and quickly established himself as the car to beat. The only time his race rhythm was disrupted was during the yellow caution flag periods which occurred seven times during the 75 laps. While Phipps and Dickerson were pacing the field, Winters was in the process of charging to the front and by now had worked his way to third.
That effort was aided by a lap 21 multi car crash. That in turn led to a race stoppage, four laps later, to allow for track clean up due to oil on the track from a blown engine. Those two factors allowed Winters to eradicate the large portion of asphalt between himself and the race leaders.
With the field under green again Phipps continued to set the pace while Winters made quick work of moving into second. A spin out, with 23 laps remaining in the race, put Winters right behind the race leader. On the restart Winters made his race winning move by passing Phipps on the low end of turn four and ran out the final 18 laps for the win. Phipps, Dickerson, Tim Morse and Chris Gerchman followed him under the checkers to complete the top five.
After winning the Las Vegas Open Comp modified race for the third consecutive year Winters said "it's a little difficult to explain how it feels to be able to come down here with this level of competition and win three of these races in a row. This is the Super Bowl of modified racing out here on the west coast. My team gets pumped up, and I get pumped up, when we come to Las Vegas to race against this high quality field and then win it three times."
The 2009 season has been a great one for the northern California driver. "This season we won the Stockton 99 Speedway championship," he said adding "that meant a lot because this speedway reopened after being closed for several years. We also raced some other open shows and won them. In fact, tonight was our 20th win of the season."
Winters also made it a special point to thank the sponsors who support him and said "to start off there's the car owner, Wayne Ferrari, who put this entire team together to make this possible. He owns Ferrari Farms. Then there's Transmissions by Hal who provides us rear ends and transmissions for this car. Also a special thank you to the crew for a car that handled so well tonight. as well as the motors by Don Kramer. This car was just a rocket ship tonight."
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