Sooner Region North Texas preview

ASCS Sooner Region Invades North Texas This Weekend!

TULSA, Okla. (May 12, 2008) -- It will be a mix of the new and the familiar when the American Bank of Oklahoma ASCS Sooner Region invades North Texas this weekend for a pair of events.

The "new" takes place on Friday night when the series makes its debut appearance atop the 0x00bc-mile Boyd Raceway dirt oval in Boyd, TX. Then for the "familiar", the series moves on the lightning-fast 0x00bc-mile Cowtown Speedway dirt oval in Kennedale, TX, on Saturday night.

While Boyd Raceway hosts the American Sprint Car Series Sooner Region for the first time, it won't be the first time that Sprint Cars have slung the mud in Boyd. It's just that it's been a decade or so since current Sooner competitors such as Kevin Ramey, Johnny Miller and Skip Wilson battled it out at Boyd in the old IMCA sprint ranks.

Since first hosting the ASCS Sooner Region in 2004, Cowtown Speedway has become one of the most anticipated stops on the Sooner trail. And the Cowtown wealth has been spread around with eight different drivers reaching Sooner Region victory lane in a dozen events at Cowtown. Ramey and past Sooner king Sam Hafertepe, Jr., both have two Sooner wins atop the high-banked oval, with Travis Rilat collecting his third Sooner win at Cowtown in the series season opener on April 5.

With the opening four nights of 20 scheduled events in the books, west Texas shoe Kolt Walker is out to the early ASCS Sooner Region points lead on the strength of three top-ten finishes, including a run from deep in the field to claim fourth in the Sooner lidlifter at Cowtown.

Hailing from Graham, TX, Walker holds a 39-point advantage over defending series champion Brian McClelland of Broken Arrow, OK, who is trying to make up ground after a Lawton flip on April 12 cost him feature points.

Eighteen-year-old Matt Covington of Glenpool, OK, enters the weekend ranked third in points as he seeks out his first series win, with other top ASCS Sooner Region contenders including Lawton's Michael Brown, Kerry McAlister (Mustang, OK), Sherman Davis (Sand Springs, OK) and Justin Melton (Flower Mound, TX) among others.

Friday's action at Boyd Raceway goes green at 8:00 p.m., with Saturday's card at Cowtown Speedway firing off at 7:00 p.m.

The semi-banked, 0x00bc-mile Boyd Raceway dirt oval is located in Boyd, TX, 2.5 miles south of SR 114 on FM 730, then 1.5 miles west on FM 2048. For more information, contact the track at 940-433-5587 or 817-304-2044.

The high-banked, 0x00bc-mile Cowtown Speedway dirt oval is located just east of Fort Worth, TX, off I-20 Exit 442-A, then 1.7 miles southeast on Mansfield Highway, then 1.4 miles southwest on New Hope Road. For more information, contact the track at 817-478-9952 or 817-572-0848.

The American Bank of Oklahoma ASCS Sooner Region is slated for 20 nights of racing action at ten different tracks throughout Oklahoma, Texas and Arkansas in 2008.

The nation's most prominent Sprint Car sanctioning body with a dozen different Regions throughout the United States in addition to the O'Reilly American Sprint Cars on Tour National series, the American Sprint Car Series' (ASCS) 17th year of activity will include approximately 250 nights of racing at more than 100 different race tracks throughout 28 different states and Canada.

-credit: ascs