Records Set for Opener

Irwindale Speedway opened its second season of racing Saturday night with a record attendance, a record number of cars and plenty of spins and crashes for excitement.

A turnaway crowd of 7,500 was on hand as 134 stock cars showed up for the first event of NASCAR’s Weekly Racing Series season.

Greg Vogt of Goleta, driving a Ford Taurus, won the Home Depot 100 for super late model cars which was shortened to 75 laps because of a number of accidents during earlier races. Ben Walker, younger brother of former World of Outlaws driver Tyler Walker, finished second after passing pole-sitter Dan Holtz of Bakersfield late in the race.

The Grand American main event produced a controversial finish in which Rip Michels of Mission Hills was declared the winner although his Dodge blew an engine on lap 19 and Dean Kuhn of Oceanside appeared to take over the lead. However, NASCAR officials ruled that the race ended when a yellow caution flag, brought about by Michels’ engine, was waved.

The race was cut from a scheduled 35 laps to 20.

In the 20-lap super stock main event, pole-sitter T. K. Karvasek of North Hills was the winner in a race without a single caution flag. Jeff Green of Long Beach was second as Chevrolets took the first seven positions.

Riverside’s Todd Burns had a busy night. First, he qualified Sean Woodside’s super late model Chevrolet in 10th position. Then he put his own late model Chevy on the pole at 94.2 mph and followed that by winning the eight-lap trophy dash and the 20-lap main event, both wire-to-wire.

Woodside was unable to qualify his car because he was in Bakersfield qualifying a NASCAR Craftsman Truck for today’s Dodge 250 at Mesa Marin Raceway. He qualified 29th, then drove to Irwindale in time for the super late model main event, where he had to start at the rear of the field.