5.11.19 Sprint Bandits Results

Wichita Falls, TX (5/12/19) by DarinShort.com. On the first
visit of the Sprint Car Bandits (SCB) to the ultra-modern
Monarch Motor Speedway Saturday night, May 11th, a
night of firsts, led to several eye-poppers, jaw-droppers
and head scratchers as John Carney II would take his first-
ever series win. He would become the 17th different Series
winner in the past 21 events.

But his path to victory lane was anything but a walk in the
park.

Recent heavy rains led to extremely fast and volatile track
conditions throughout the evening. The track crews worked
feverishly to keep up with demands of the track surface,
with all race teams doing a great job keeping the track
packed during yellow flag laps and between races. Several
times corner workers would scrape the walls so drivers
could see through their spent tear-offs where the track
ends and the wall began.

Action and passing abounded throughout the evening.

After gridding 10th in his heat race, Carney II would blister
the field in his heat race by not only winning but earning
enough points to start on the pole of the feature event.

Other big movers in heat race action was Harli White, who
drove from 6th to win her heat race, while Will Eggimann
would start 8th in his heat race and finish 2nd. White and
Eggimann would become the 2nd and 3rd high point
drivers and start the feature event outside front row and
inside second row, respectively.

Not one crash or flip would take place in any of the sprint
car heat races – or companion midget heats – as drivers
would do a masterful job negotiating the highly technical
and fast racing surface.

As the feature race fired off, Carney II would take the lead,
while Harli would get in a small snafu leading to her
rejoining the 22-car starting field from the tail.

Her night was far from over.

In the meantime, the moisture in the shoe-sucking track
surface would keep drivers up-on-the-wheel, as the high
speeds and cushion would cause several incidents leading
to yellows and a red for the #18 of Logan Scherb. Scherb
was on his was possibly going to be his highest SCB
feature finish when the incident occurred.

In the ensuing restart Carney II would come down to the
white stripe from his pole position, when the car appeared
to stumble a bit as he hit the throttle, and third place
runner Will Eggimann would blast by him on the frontstrech
and take command of the event.

Eggiman would lead the next ten or so laps with Carney II
falling back to as far back as forth as Arkansas’ Tim
Crawley would continue to advance through the field from
his 16th starting position.

After a pair of cautions to remove stuck cars from their
infield excursions, a fuel stop was ordered – which is
something that had only occurred once before in SCB
history.

Eggimann would jet back out in front of the field in his well-
prepared J&J Chassis sprinter with Carney II climbing his
way back to 2nd place, now with Crawley and White in tow,
with little signs that anyone had enough to get past
Eggimann as the laps wound down.

As Eggimann and Crawley came down to the three laps to
go mark, disaster struck, resulting in one of the more
bizarre situations leaving fans jaws dropped, as they were
still trying to process what happened.

When the lead pair entered corner one to negotiate the
soon-to-be-lapped car of Kodey Keimig, Keimig would dig
in to the cushion, sending his #27 sprinter into a series of
flips that would shear the top wing off of leader Eggiman’s
car as the speeding pair of leaders would pass by.

During the ensuing red flag, unharmed physically, yet sans
the top wing, Eggimann would quickly determine that he
would not resume the feature from his pole restart position
and chose to exit to the pit area ending his stellar run
against some of the top 360C.I. sprint drivers in the
business.

The final restart of the event would see Carney II blast off
from the second-row pair of Crawley and White, to take the
hard-fought and highly popular win. Carney II would
entertain the hardcore sprint car fans in the stands by pre-
entering his car under the pseudonym “Rusty Pipes.”
When the fans found out who was really behind the wheel
of the car, they all erupted in applause.

Harli White would zip past Crawley to finish 2nd – and as a
reminder from the tail – to complete her impressive
rebound, while Crawley would take the final podium
position.

We’d like to thank West Texas Raceway for putting up
$100 to the night’s Hard Charger, which goes to Dale
Wester after advancing 15 spots from his 20th place
starting spot.

The KoolTrikes.com heat races were won by John Carney
II, Dalton Stevens and Harli White.

The companion Monarch Midget Championships feature
event was a hotly contested battle between Tim Crawley,
Kyle Jones, Hank Davis, Wesley Smith and Kevin Ramey.
Wesley Smith would take a bite out of the cushion battling
with Crawley for the lead, while not getting upside down,
Smith would retire from the event. Meanwhile, Hank Davis
would drop to the sidelines, leaving Crawley, Jones and
Ramey to battle it out. Jones would slip by Ramey to finish
2nd, while Crawley would win by one car length – in a very
popular win to the local crowd as his winning car was
fielded by local racer/car owner John James.

The massive 41-car Limited Modified field would entertain
the crowd throughout the night with great side-by-side
racing, and their results will be posted as they become
official.

30 cars would sign in for Sprint Car Bandits vs NCRA
Shootout competition, and full results will be posted along
with points in the next few days (there’s one car missing
from the scoring loop results here, the 72 of Daniel Estes),
so these results are pending his insertion:

45 – John Carney II
17W – Harli White
1X – Tim Crawley
79 – Ryan Hall
12W – Dale Wester
21 – Michelle Melton
9Z – Taylor Courtney
71 – Colby Estes
92 – Jordan Weaver
77W – Will Eggimann
27 – Kodey Keimig
13M – Chance McCrary
99X – Dalton Stevens
57C – Chris Schmelzle
23 – Junior Jenkins
18 – Logan Scherb
18L – Dillon Laden
44 – Jason Howell
10C – Jeremy Campbell
V8 – Robert Vetter
35 – Chris Hinson
72 – Daniel Estes (finishing position pending
transponder/hand scoring confirmation)

Thank you to all the fans that supported the event on an
abnormally cool May evening, to one of the hardest
working and determined track crews ever witnessed, and to
the race teams that all supported the event.

Next up for the Sprint Car Bandits series is a pair of $2,000
to win and $300 to start shootout events with the NCRA
series, to be contested Saturday May 25th and Sunday
May 26th at 81 Speedway in Wichita, Kansas. Details on
these events will be posted by mid-week.

Until then we hope you enjoy a great Mother’s Day holiday
with the family and we look forward to seeing you all back
at the track soon!