Glassfords Double Up

A week after being shut out for the first time all year, the Glassfords parked their No. 60s in Victory Lane on a rain-shortened race night Saturday at South Buxton Raceway.

Dale Glassford, 45, won for the 11th time in 13 features in the Westside Performance Plus UMP Late Models.

Nick Glassford, 15, picked up his fifth feature win in the Autotech Bombers.

It marked the fourth time this season that the Ridgetown father-and-son duo have won features in the same race night. Last Saturday was the only night that neither Glassford won a feature.

Rodney’s Justin Martin won the Dowler Karn-RayMac Auto Parts Topless Sprints feature, taking the checkered flag just as a heavy downpour forced the cancellation of the remaining three features.
It was the second time a race night ended early because of weather to go along with four complete rain outs.

The Late Model feature started with a thrilling battle between Glassford and Chatham’s Brad Authier as they went door-to-door for five laps.

Authier slipped up the track in turn two, allowing Glassford to pull away.

On the next lap, Authier’s car died on the track with problems in the MDS electronic box to end his night. He finished ninth.

Glassford then held off a hard charging Gregg Haskell, of Chatham, over the final five laps to continue his season-long dominance of the class.

“It’s hard to do that for one lap, then we did it for four more laps, I’m thinking, ‘geez, is this going to go on all night?’ ” Glassford said of his side-by-side battle with Authier.

“Then all of a sudden, I didn’t see him, I didn’t know what happened to him, but that was too bad.
“I never like to see that, no matter who it is, when they’re running good.

“It was wishful thinking, but that would have been fun to race like that with Brad for 20 laps,” Glassford said.

But he still had his hands full as Haskell, coming off a win in his father Rick Haskell’s memorial race a week earlier, pressured the leader in the waning laps.

“I was going into a corner and saw the nose of the 21 (Haskell), and I thought, ‘where did he come from?’ ” Glassford said.

“I knew if I screwed up, he would slide right by me, so I couldn’t make any mistakes.”

Haskell posted his fifth runner-up finish to Glassford, while Chatham’s Jim Jones, Ridgetown’s Jason Haskell and Rodney’s Brad Simpson rounded out the top five.

Glassford and Authier won their heats.

Glassford leads Jones by 169 points with three weeks left in the season as the Ridgetown driver is going for his second straight and fourth career series championship.

“This is one of those years when everything is going well,” Glassford said.

“We’re having fun with it, we’re not so serious that it’s overwhelming us, we’re just riding the wave.

“I know it’s not going to last, this could be my last win of the season, who knows … there’s a lot of fast cars out here,” Glassford said.

Nick Glassford led all 15 laps of the Bomber feature, as he had to hold off the top three points cars to claim his fifth checkered.

Wheatley’s Chris Johns – driving for his nephew Cale Johns – passed the points leader Jamie Beaulieu, of Windsor, with two laps to go but couldn’t run down Glassford.

“I think they were a bit faster than me, I knew they were right behind me (because) I was feeling some bumps,” Glassford said.

“The track was basically a one-lane track, it wasn’t much of a passing track.

“Tonight was about being consistent, you could still go in the corners hard but you just couldn’t push up because if you missed, you knew someone was going to get on your inside.”

Port Lambton’s Caleb O’Leary and Blenheim’s Austin Pickering rounded out the top five.

Beaulieu, who won the previous two features, takes a 15-point lead over Johns and 52-point advantage over Kingsville’s James Kelly heading into this Saturday’s championship night.

Glassford is fourth in points and will start on the outside of the second row in the season championship race.

“The top four have been so close all year, this championship race is going to be the best race of the year,” Glassford said.

Martin led the final 23 laps after St. Thomas’ Jesse Costa spun in turn four coming around to complete the third lap, the first of four cautions in the first 11 laps in the Topless Sprint feature.

Port Stanley’s Chris Durand finished second, with Delaware’s Kris Hoot third, Lefroy’s Warren Mahoney fourth and Costa recovered to finish fifth.

The only local drivers in the field – Blenheim’s Chris Vandewiele and Chatham’s Tyler Hendricks – finished ninth and 10th in the 10-car field.

A total of 16 preliminary races were run along with the three features before the night was suspended.

Blenheim’s Elliott Wilton, Cottam’s Rob Quick and Leamington’s Brandon Windsor and won the heat races and Kingsville’s Dylan Wolters won the ‘B’ Main in the Tirecraft Mini-Mods.

Blenheim’s Kyle Hope, who finished second to Wilton in his heat race, has a commanding 193-point lead over Quick with two weeks left in the Mini-Mods’ season.

Chatham’s Darryl Hoekstra, Blenheim’s Brian Speelman and Merlin’s Joe Brosseau and won the heats in the Schinkels Gourmet Meats UMP Modifieds.

Shrewsbury’s Jim Dale Jr. took the ‘B’ Main checkered flag.

Chatham’s Eric Vanderiviere and Merlin’s Steve Shaw won the Tirecraft Sport Stocks heats.

Chatham’s Jake Hooker finished second to Shaw in his heat and leads Kingsville’s Rob Young by 47 points with two race nights remaining in the Sport Stocks season.