HOT NIGHT IN KANSAS CITY ENDS WITH ANOTHER 10TH
KANSAS CITY, KAN. (June 30) – The temperature has been extremely warm during the Outlaws run through Kansas the past two weekends. It’s been over 100 degrees for a more than a week and the racing on the track has been just as hot. Four-time WoO champion Donny Schatz was hoping to break a winless draught by racing to victory in the Sunflower State, and even though Schatz wasn’t able to snap the draught, he did continue his run of top-10 finishes Saturday at Lakeside Speedway just outside Kansas City.
The storyline followed a familiar pattern from WoO action during the month of June. For the ninth time in 10 June WoO races, Schatz found himself outside the top-10 in qualifying. He timed in 13th and raced from the fifth-starting position in the opening heat on the half-mile dirt oval.
The finish qualified him for the 30-lap A-Feature, where he started from the inside of row seven. He avoided an opening lap crash and charged his way into the top-eight five laps into the race. Trouble struck on lap seven when flames erupted from under the hood of his STP machine. A leaking fuel line exposed raw fuel and sparked a fire. Schatz stopped the car, got the fire put out and after some quick work by the TSR crew, he rejoined the field to restart the race. He restarted 15th and promptly climbed back into 10th during the next few laps. Unfortunately, the heat had taken its toll on the track and the surface began taking rubber and didn’t allow for much passing during the second half of the race. He would finish 10th and increase his run of top-10s to 10 straight.
Sammy Swindell won the feature race and passed both Schatz and Steve Kinser in the standings. Swindell leads Kinser by nine points and is 13 ahead of Schatz heading into the Outlaws next race Tuesday, July 3 at Huset’s Speedway in Brandon, S.D.