Elite Racing Mechanicsburg event summary

ON POINT: JASON MEYERS GETS BACK INTO THE GROOVE AT WILLIAMS GROVE

For 48 years the best drivers in sprint car racing have made the homage to Williams Grove Speedway for the National Open. This year as Jason Meyers and his Elite Racing team made the trek out east, they not only had adding their name to the prestigious list of race winners on their minds, but also holding on to the lead in the World of Outlaws point standings. At the end of two grueling nights of racing where Meyers faced over 55 other sprint car drivers, he not only walked away with two top-10 finishes, but also extended his point lead by 102 markers over his closest competitor.

Night 1: Top-10 finish keeps Meyers in the hunt

On the first night of racing at Williams Grove, Meyers had to overcome a late qualifying draw. Luckily with Charlie Garrett horsepower under the hood, the California native made the inversion and started second in his heat race. Meyers would transfer into the dash and grab the 10th starting spot for the feature event.

Starting side-by-side with fellow title contender Joey Saldana in the feature, Meyers would quickly pick up the 9th position. "Hot Foot" would spend the early part of the race trying to track down Danny Lasoski. At the same time Meyers had to defend his position from a hard charging Brian Montieth. Meyers and Montieth would trade the 8th and 9th position several times through out the feature event.

On Lap 20, Meyers would clear Montieth for the final time in his #14 GLR Investments KPC. With 5 laps remaining, Meyers tried to track down Joey Saldana, but was unable to execute the pass. While Greg Hodnett went on to take night one for the PA Posse in the opening night of the National Open, Meyers would finish in the 8th position.

"With four races left, we are going to go out there and try to win every one of them," stated Meyers. "That is what is going to win us this title. We are still trying to win one here for Charlie (Garrett), so we are going to have to regroup tonight and come back even more focused on that goal. We had a good run tonight and I want to thank Glen (Beaton), Brian (Bloomfield), and Sam (Matthews) for all the hard work they put into this week in and week out. Also thank you to GLR Investments, DDNI, Elite Landscaping, Media Tile, Tarlton and Son, Allstar Performance, and TriQuint for all their support."

Night 2: Closing in on his goal

The second night of racing at Williams Grove Speedway saw Jason Meyers start the evening by qualifying in the same position as the night before. Making the heat inversion, Meyers won his heat and came up one spot shy of winning the dash. The Californian made up that one spot at the drop of the Green Flag in the feature. Diving under Brian Montieth on the start, Meyers quickly jetted into the lead.

Montieth would stalk Meyers in his #14 DDNI KPC over the opening laps of the race. When the duo encountered lapped traffic for the first time on Lap 8, "Hot Foot" worked it masterfully until the first caution flag of the night flew on Lap 12.

On the restart, Meyers chose the high side and jumped back into the lead. Behind him Stevie Smith picked up the second position and started to pursue Meyers. The turning point of the race for Meyers came on Lap 27 when back-to-back incidents caused a single file restart. On the restart, it was a different 1 car that was chasing Meyers. This time it was Sammy Swindell and he quickly got around the #14 car and set sail. With four laps to go Lance Dwease would use lapped traffic to his advantage to take away the second position. At the end of the 40-lap contest, the Californian settled for a third place finish while Swindell went on to score his second National Open victory.

"We lost the battle tonight, but we are trying to win the war," Meyers said. "It was still a good night. We the car was good and led a lot of laps. It was a good weekend for us. This is what it's all about. We have four races to go and we have to keep digging. Good runs like tonight will help us. We want to win some more races before the year is over and we have a good race car right now. I'm looking forward to next weekend. We didn't change a lot. It's hard when you are leading to change a lot because you have a good car. We changed a couple of small things and it was simply for the sake of trying something rather than really doing anything. We have to honestly go back now and think about it so that we can get better for next time. I was a little loose, which would have helped me in traffic and every time we got to traffic the yellow would come out. We got through traffic pretty good, but you never know what will happen. For us it's about getting good restarts, which we did. The caution gives you a little breather and some time to regroup and to get some signals from the crew. Unfortunately we just came up a little short tonight. All we are trying to do now is win races. We go out each night and try our best to win and stay out front of the guys that are chasing us."

Up Next

As a part of Super DIRT week, Meyers and his Elite Racing team will be returing to the East coast this week. On Saturday, October 9, 2010 World of Outlaws title fight will carry on at Rolling Wheels Race Park in New York.

-source: elite racing