8.24.19 Senoia Raceway Results
(Senoia, GA – August 25, 2019) Ashton Winger’s breakout season continued on Saturday night at his hometown Senoia Raceway track as the teenage Super Late Model driver picked up his biggest career payday pocketing $5,454 by winning the 22nd Annual Michael Head, Jr. Memorial Race. Winger won his sixth race of the season in the top level of dirt racing and his first within the division at the track nearest to his backyard.
“This team is just awesome,” said Winger on the front stretch afterwards. “We have been fast everywhere and I knew we could do this tonight.”
With lightning flickering over the western horizon, Winger held off Winston’s Michael Page on several occasions Saturday night. Page tried to slide job the youngster on mid-race restart, but Winger held him off with a powerful move in the top lane groove. Page tried to out-wit Winger over the next few laps, but the budding star could not be rattled as he led all 54-laps to capture the victory.
“I couldn’t find anything that would work tonight,” Page said.
Winger’s victory ended a three race win streak by Page with the Southern All-Stars tour events at Senoia Raceway. Page had won the tour stop earlier this season in May, as well as, clean sweeping both Southern All-Star events last year. It was Winger’s second Southern All-Stars victory this year as he also won in Tennessee on August 3rd.
Michael Page did pick up a win on Saturday night. Page won the Crate Late Model feature in a dominating effort. He led flag to flag in one of the most competitive races of the night, if only for the positions behind Page.
On the drop of the green for the Crate Late Model main event, Page shot out to the lead while the battle behind ensued with a four wide tussle in turn two. LaGrange’s Colby Darda and Jake Traylor were piloting the middle cars while Franklin’s Tanner Collins and Winston’s Landon Bagby made it four wide.
“You just don’t see this kind of racing everywhere,” said All-Stars director Lynn Acklin. “Senoia Raceway fans get a show every week in every division. It is unreal how they can race four wide on a track that is this tight (narrow).”
Bagby worked his way up to second with four laps remaining, but there were two other drivers that had missed the set-up on qualifying and had to start near mid-pack that were moving up the leaderboard. Sharpsburg’s Wayne Harbin and McDonough’s Jamie Maurice began working the high side and low side respectively and then took advantage of a restart on lap 18. Bagby slipped on the restart allowing both Harbin and Maurice to sneak past and finish in second and third behind Page who had safely moved out front. Bagby would settle for fourth with Darda rounding out the first five.
Bagby’s fourth place finish helped move him within striking distance of the season points lead in the Crate Late Model division. Defending champion and current points leader, Marty Massey of Winston, had another less than stellar week finishing thirteenth. Bagby now trails Massey by only 38 points with two races remaining including a double points opportunity. This is the closest anybody has come to Massey since the early part of the 2019 campaign.
There was a turn-over in the points lead on Saturday night in the Late Model Sportsman division. Locust Grove’s Jason ‘Tin Man’ Williams overtook Newnan’s McKenna Nelms on the strength of his fifth feature win of the year. Williams took advantage of the misfortune of hard racing when fellow Locust Grove driver Jamie Nicholson, Jr. developed problems with his car after a skirmish with McDonough’s Jason Turner.
On lap thirteen of the twenty lap race, Turner dove low in the third turn sliding up and clipping the quarter panel of Nicholson, Jr. The result was Turner spinning and causing a caution flag to be waved. During the caution, Turner rammed the back of Nicholson’s car and was disqualified for unsportsmanlike actions. Nicholson’s car then could not get restarted resulting in his early exit from the race. That left Williams in the lead position. A positions he would not relinquish.
Byron’s Brandon McDaniel finished second in his first ever Late Model Sportsman race at Senoia Raceway while Winder’s Logan Stinchcomb was third. Stinchcomb arrived late unable to practice or qualify for his starting position. He started scratch on the field climbing throughout the race to finish in the show position. Nelms would finish in fourth and now trails Williams by a single point heading into this Saturday’s race night.
Powder Spring’s Keith West waited until the last lap to work past Alabama’s Jake Sanders in the Hobby Stock feature. West sild up the track in turn four ahead of Sanders and then powered away to win his second of the season. Sanders would finish in second ahead of Lithia Springs’ TJ Joiner.
Sixteen-year-old Cody Lively of Locust Grover won his first career feature at Senoia Raceway on Saturday night. The rookie raced past Newnan’s Tommy Faulkner on lap seven and then cruised to his first trip to the winner’s circle.
Another teenager, Braxtin Barber of Alabama, won the Chargers feature. The fourteen-year old was the third driver under the age of twenty to win on Saturday night as he led flag to flag to gain the victory.
The fun continues this Saturday night with the inaugural ‘Bible Bash’ featuring points racing in the Limited Late Models, Crate Late Models, Late Model Sportsman, Bombers and Hot Shots along with the Charger division. As a part of the ‘Bible Bash’ the track will offer any person named Matthew, Mark, Luke or John free admission into the grandstand with a photo ID.
“We just wanted to have some fun with this promotion,” sais track promoter Mayes Massey. “We had one fan mention that we should allow those named Ezekial in free too.”
The gates will open at 4pm for the pit area and trackside parking while the grandstand will open at 5pm. Opening ceremonies takes place at 7:30pm. Tickets are $12; kids 5-12 are $5 with four and under admitted for free. Pit passes and trackside parking tickets are $30, kids 5-12 are $20 and four and under are admitted for free with an adult.
For the full schedule of events along with special attractions, promotions and additional information, visit the track website at www.senoiaraceway.com or call the speedway at 770.599.6161.
Official Results – Saturday, August 24, 2019
Southern All-Star Super Late Models (Feature): 1-Ashton Winger, Senoia 2-Michael Page, Winston 3-Dalton Cook, Columbus 4-David Breazeale, Four Corners, MS 5-Zach Leonhardi, Cartersville 6-Clint Smith, Senoia 7-Mason Massey, Douglasville 8-Billy Franklin, Calera, AL 9-Ryan Crane, Panama City, FL 10-Matt Dooley, Brooks 11-Jacquez Daniel, Cartersville 12-Lamar Haygood, Douglasville 13-Mark Dodson, Caledonia, MS 14-Joey Armistead, Senoia 15-Dennis Hale, LaGrange 16-Marty Lunsford, Newnan 17-Ricky Williams, Fayetteville 18-Cass Fowler, Acworth 19-Dylan Holmes, Smiths Station, AL 20-Mark Page, Winston 21-Kyler Haygood, Douglasville 22-Marty Massey, Winston 23-Steve Lamance, Six Mile, SC 24-Craig Scott, Newnan 25-Glenn Morris, Fayetteville Fast Qualifier: Winger (14.518 seconds/93.0 mph)
Crate Late Models (Feature): 1-Michael Page, Winston 2-Wayne Harbin, Sharpsburg 3-Jamie Maurice, McDonough 4-Landon Bagby, Winston 5-Colby Darda, LaGrange 6-Tanner Collins, Franklin 7-Dusty Jones, LaGrange 8-Jake Traylor, LaGrange 9-Morgan Alexander, Jackson 10-Danny Herrington, LaGrange 11-Dow Kirkland, Lake Spivey 12-Jimmy Waldrop, Selfin, FL 13-Marty Massey, Winston 14-Chris Justus, McDonough 15-Chris Carr, Newnan Fast Qualifier: Page (15.612 seconds/81.2 mph)
Late Model Sportsman (Feature): 1-Jason Williams, Locust Grove 2-Brandon McDaniel, Byron 3-Logan Stinchcomb, Winder 4-McKenna Nelms, Newnan 5-Jack Mills, Griffin 6-Billy Stevenson, Locust Grove 7-Dalton Benefield, Carrollton 8-Rcikey Payton, Newnan 9-Jamie Nicholson, Jr., Locust Grove 10-Jason Turner, McDonough 11-Ted Minnix, McDonough 12-Shane Payton, Newnan 13-Scott Shelton, Fayetteville 14-Austin Brumbelow, Winder Fast Qualifier: Nicholson, Jr (14.904 seconds/90.6 mph)
Hobby (Feature): 1-Keith West, Powder Springs 2-Jake Sanders, Camp Hill, AL 3-TJ Joiner, Lithia Springs 4-Landon DeGraff, Barnesville 5-Brandon Henderson, Senoia 6-Wilson Boozer, Jenkinsburg 7-Ben Wells, Milner 8-Shane Tidwell, Whitesburg DNS: Bucky Ussery, LaGrange; Drew Larson, Marietta Fast Qualifier: DeGraff (15.935 seconds/84.7 mph)
Mini Stock (Feature): 1-Cody Lively, Locust Grove 2-Tommy Faulkner, Newnan 3-Ernest Turner, Douglasville 4-Cory Wilson, Locust Grove 5-Kurt Starling, Fort Valley 6-Cory Greene, Griffin 7-John Caldwell, Senoia 8-Brysson Ussery, LaGrange 9-Bob Faulkner, Newnan 10-Stacey Henderson, Senoia 11-Joshua Till, McDonough Fast Qualifier: Till (17.558 seconds/76.9 mph)
Chargers (Feature #1): 1-Braxtin Barber, Valley, AL 2-Dave McWilliams, Brooks 3-Brant Hardin, McDonough 4-Chad Atha, Loganville 5-Lucas Pittman, Grantville 6-Jason Stevenson, Locust Grove 7-Johnny Stinchcomb, Newnan