By Ken Keating
Cody Aumen had
the pole as eighteen cars lined up in the Steve Copp Construction sponsored
winter Enduro series on Sunday afternoon running for 200 laps or two hours
whichever came first. This event also feature the Keg Steakhouse & Bar
Challenge where staff from the downtown location challenged the Quadra Street
location to see who would come out on top driving these Hornet cars. Darren
Yates, the current points leader, started in the third row outside as the field
came down the frontstretch to take the green flag. Alex Atkinson grabbed the
lead after the first lap followed closely by Aumen and Yates. On lap four Aumen
passed Atkinson dropping him back to second as Yates hung on to the third spot.
One lap later, Yates moved up to run second with Atkinson running third and
Howie Mace moving into the fourth spot. Lap eight produced a yellow flag as one
of the cars quit coming out of the dogleg while lap eleven produced another
yellow as Brad Aumen slammed into one of the big tires forming the frontstretch
chicane. His car suffered quite a bit of damage to the front end ending his
day. On the restart, Aumen again took the lead followed by Yates and Mace and
they began to pull away from the rest of the field and then the top two drivers
also pulled away from Mace. By lap twenty-two, Atkinson got into the side of
Brandon Carlson, driving the #16 car, ending his day. On lap twenty-three Yates
spun around on the frontstretch but only lost a couple positions leaving Mace
running second and Blair Davis running third.
The race was slowed a bit as a
couple more yellow flags came out but by lap fifty-two, Aumen still led
followed by Mace, Yates, and Davis running in the top four positions. After the
mandatory stop at the half way marker Yates was quick to take over the second
position as Aumen still held the lead. The green flag run was short lived as
one of the Keg drivers went around on the frontstretch followed quickly by
another of the Keg cars both spinning out. On the restart it took very little
time for Aumen and Yates to run away from the field again and build a pretty
good lead. By lap ninety-nine, Aumen had opened a good distance between himself
and Yates just as another yellow came out tightening up the field. Again the
field was under another caution as the #13 car spun around again along the
frontstretch. By this time Yates got by Aumen and grabbed the lead with Aumen
still attached to rear bumper of the #90 car. By lap one hundred and twenty,
Yates still led followed by Aumen, Mace, Davis, and Ian Walker rounding out the
top five positions. As time was beginning to be a factor, one of the Keg
drivers spun out as the frontrunners were closing fast along the frontstretch
and almost collected Yates as he had to take evasive action to avoid the
spinning car. Time did run out after one hundred and forty-one laps with Yates
taking the win followed by Aumen, Mace, Davis, and Walker rounding out the top
five positions. It wasn't clear which Keg Steakhouse & Bar actually won the
Challenge but everyone had a great time watching and cheering their driver
throughout the run. They all had their picture taken with Rockell Kroppmans who
also presented the winning drivers with their trophies. The next and last
event, in the winter series, is scheduled for March 25th again at 1:00 PM in the
afternoon.
Winter Points
After Feb 19th:
1/ #90 Darren
Yates - 90
2/ #04 Cody
Aumen - 81
3/ #28 Howie
Mace - 69
4/ #8 Blair
Davis - 67
5/ #91 Brenda
Leslie - 65
6/ #15 Steve
Copp - 53
7/ #49 Kevin
Knight - 46
8/ #66 Ian
Walker - 43
9/ #98 Brad Aumen
- 37
