Quick Results: Blind Date Gets Crazy, but Warren Whisks Away a Win

December 8, 2020 – Manchester, NY…Rob Warren ducked, dived, and danced his way to a homerun on a wild Blind Date Night, and came home a big winner at the Supermodified Ultimate Pavement Racing Series, (SUPRS), opening round of the 2020-21 Empire State Super Series Tuesday night at MT Bullring.

For Warren, who is the All-Time SUPRS winner, it was his first feature victory this season, and the first time back in victory lane since February 3, 2020 during Florida Speedweeks. Even he wasn’t without many close calls though, including just missing being involved in the wreck that took out leader Brad Keysor.

Fifteen drivers took the green flag for the wild and crazy supermodified sim racing event and just 9 finished after a massive front stretch pile up took out four drivers including leader Keysor, and last year’s winner Keith Powell. Keysor encountered the crash, which began on lap 33 when John Held hit an inside tractor tire and came to an abrupt stop leaving Keith Powell nowhere to go but up and over Held’s right rear. This sent Powell flying into the outside wall just at the exit of turn four.

With nowhere to go, early leader, Gary Waldron first clipped the back end of Powell’s #41, then he also ended up nose in on the front-stretch wall just as Bobby Hayduk came upon the blocked track. Hayduk was at full-song and t-boned Powell sending both cars up and over Waldron.

As Hayduk slid upside down entering turn one low. and Powell was trying to gather his bearings in while coming to a rest on the outside of turn one, Carl Becker, who had exited high coming out of turn four and had, himself, bounced off the wall at that point, encountered the stalled Waldron who was still stuck against the wall under the flag stand. Becker, while trying to gain control of the Dowker Titanium Roadster turn to the left to avoid his stalled teammate Waldron which put him right in the path of the leader Brad Keysor.

Keysor veered to the left, but had no time to react to Hayduk who had finally come to a stop right in his path. Keysor drilled him at full throttle sending Keysor skyward nose first and Hayduk on his second round of flips. Keysor may have been able to continue, but second place runner Dave Ohh finished him off when he got sucked into the accident scene and caused Keysor to do a complete backwards flip. At the same time, Danny Ray went low, then high, then low, but couldn’t avoid Waldron or Becker and got stuck on top of Waldron.

Throughout the night, nearly every driver on the track struggled to miss the giant tractor tires lining the infield, or the candy striped Armco steel guardrail surrounding the tight 1/4 mile.

There were several multiple car accidents, and plenty of missing parts including wheels, however two rookie drivers acted like veterans and were able to stand on the podium. Steven Vincent hustled his Creative Assistant #28 Hyder Hawk to a second place and Ryan Cloonan, after missing the cut from the heat race, flew through the field to finish in third driving the Simability #13 Allegresso chassis.

Earlier in the evening, Dave Ohh established a track record with a lap of 10.644 over a very closely timed field. Heat race wins went to Ohh and Zach Sears who missed time trials.

Next Race

Next week, on December 15, the SUPRS racers head to Canada for a first time visit to the Sanair Super Speedway and the Seventeenth SUPRS Christmas Special. It’s the last race of the year before the annual Christmas Break and the drivers are ready to go after the victory and a Burgers’ Smokehouse Ham.

Hot Laps get underway at 8:0pm for this rFactor winged supermodified sim racing event. The Drivers Meeting takes place at 8:15pm and Time Trials follow at 8:30pm. The first race of the night is the Reindeer Dash for the SUPRS Six qualifiers at 9:05pm. Two heats and the 25 lap feature will follow.

Fans can watch the Seventeenth SUPRS Christmas Special on SUPRS LIVE! @ 9pm ET.

Keep Up with SUPRS

Fans of supermodified racing as well as online sim racers can learn more about the original online supermodified sim racing sanction when they visit www.SUPRS.net.

Join SUPRS active and vibrant Social Media channels by “Liking” SUPRS on Facebook, Following @SUPRSOnline on Twitter, and viewing SUPRS videos on YouTube.