Young O’Leary Wins At Buxton
12-year-old Tate O’Leary took his first feature win at South Buxton Raceway Saturday – Photo by James MacDonald/ Apex One Photo
Authier, a 53-year-old seven-time track champion in his 35th season of racing, won his first Westside Performance Plus UMP Late Models feature of the season.
O’Leary, who turned 12 in May, won his first Autotech Bomber feature in just his sixth night of racing.
“They’re all special now, because you never know when you’ll get another one,” Authier said of his feature win.
While Authier basked in the glory of his win partying with a large number of well-wishers, O’Leary didn’t have much time to celebrate – he had to be up first thing Sunday morning for a football game in London with the Chatham-Kent Peewee Cougars.
And he still had homework to do before school on Monday, as he is a Grade 6 student at Blessed Heart School in Port Lambton.
“It feels pretty good,” O’Leary said of his first checkered flag at South Buxton.
But the youngster admitted he wasn’t surprised to win this early in his career.
“I was leading the feature last week but blew a tire on the last lap,” he said.
“That was pretty disappointing.”
O’Leary started eighth and was battling Blenheim’s Jeff Schives – a four-time feature winner this season – for fifth when a two-car accident happened right in front of the duo.
One car flipped end-over-end and landed on its wheels. It was O’Leary’s 13-year-old brother Caleb.
“It was scary when I saw him flip … I was glad he was OK,” Tate said, as Caleb was able to return and finished sixth.
O’Leary used a bump-and-run to take the lead from Ridgetown’s Nick Glassford with four laps to go and held off Maidstone’s Murray Morrison on a green-white-checkered to take the victory.
The young driver sounded like a pro as he reeled off his list of sponsors to thank, “and I also want to say thanks to my heroes at South Buxton – Kirk Hooker, Drew Smith, Brad Simpsons and the Hoekstras (Darryl and Eugene),” he said.
“My brother and I are racing in memory of my Mom,” he added, as Krista O’Leary passed away suddenly at age 35 in October, 2012.
Merlin’s Cale Johns, Windsor’s George Rock and Blenheim’s Austin Pickering rounded out the top five.
Authier, who like O’Leary suffered a flat tire while leading his feature a week earlier, rebounded by leading all 20 laps of Saturday’s feature.
The veteran Chatham driver held off a furious challenge from Ridgetown’s Dale Glassford over the final 10 laps, including a bid on the high side coming out of the final turn of the last lap.
“I was playing my own game, don’t give anybody any idea where you’re going to run,” Authier said of his strategy.
“My concern was holding my line, I had to stay at the bottom, but every now and then I’d change it so they didn’t know where I was running.
“I knew the way the track was, they weren’t getting by me on the top side,” Authier said.
The feature win capped a perfect three-for-three night, as Authier also won the heat and pursuit, with Glassford second in both.
“We needed a night like this, and hopefully we’ll have a few more nights to shine,” said Authier, who had one feature win in 2013.
“I realize I’m getting a little older, but I don’t think these guys have anything on us, other than they’re a little younger,” said Authier, who turns 54 in August.
“But we know a little more,” he added, with a smile.
Chatham drivers Erick Walker, Gregg Haskell and Jim Jones finished third through fifth.
Glassford regained the points lead by seven points over Jones.
Blenheim’s Brett Hope passed Cottam’s Rob Quick coming out of the final turn to win his second Tirecraft Mini-Mod feature in the last three weeks.
It was the third week in a row the two drivers had finished one-two, as Quick was the victor last Saturday.
“It was good, clean racing, it’s nice when you can race hard with someone and know you’re not going to get hit,” Hope said of battling Quick.
“We raced door to door for three weeks … and I don’t think we touch,” he added.
Hope noticed Quick had moved off the bottom coming out of turn four a few laps earlier, waited until the final lap to make his move.
“I had to try something different, so I drove into (turn) one a little harder and a little higher, kept my momentum and followed him on the back stretch,” Hope described the white-flag lap.
“I expected him to go a little higher with the lap traffic in three and four, so I threw it to the bottom but he threw it to the bottom, too.
“I was just about to lift but he hit the bumps, moved up and left me a little room, I got back to the gas.
“It was close coming off four …. luckily I won,” said Hope.
Blenheim’s Trevor Jones finished third and saw his points lead shrink to three over Hope and 13 over Quick.
Leamington’s Joel Dick won his second straight and seventh Schinkels Gourmet Meats UMP Modified feature in eight weeks, leading all 25 laps.
He also won his heat for a track leading 12 checkered on the season.
“We made a good tire call,” Dick said. “We changed it (air pressure) twice before the feature, fortunately we hit on it, we had the right combination and the car had a good balance.”
Dick, who opened a 101-point lead over Belle River’s Mario Toniolo, repeated he his not worried about points or the standings.
“I just come to do this every week,” he said, while waving the checkered flag to the fans.
Leamington’s Justin Coulter, Merlin’s Joe Brosseau, Toniolo and Chatham’s Louis Clements rounded out the top five.
Merlin’s Eren Vanderiviere gained a measure of redemption as he also led all 20 laps to win his third Tirecraft Sport Stocks feature of the season.
Last week, Vanderiviere was leading when he was hit from behind by Cottam’s Tiffany Ellis, triggering a three-car pile-up and bringing out the checkered flag because of the time limit.
Race officials ruled Vanderiviere was already loose before the contact, as the scoring reverted to the last completed lap, giving Ellis the win.
“I had a lot of motivation this week,” Vanderiviere said.
“I have nothing against Tiffany, I know she was just driving hard,” he said.
“It was a bad call from the track in my eyes, but we took it, moved on and we showed what we were made of tonight.”
Essex’s Doris Lajeunesse was the runner-up for the second week in a row, with Chatham’s Eric Vanderiviere – the race winner’s older brother – Kingsville’s Rob Young and Grande Pointe’s Tyler Lozon rounding out the top five.