Nothing Was Stopping Hearn Saturday At Lebanon Valley…Even A Broken Shock

Column By: BOBBY CHALMERS / RPW – WEST LEBANON, NY – Three weeks ago, many, including myself, thought they had witnessed the greatest drive ever by Brett Hearn on the Lebanon Valley high banks. Well, after the performance Brett displayed Saturday night, he proved us all wrong.

The Jersey Jet notched career win #898 and his 100th Modified win at the famed West Lebanon, NY oval, all while coming from dead last to the lead in just 24 laps.

A lap one accident put a hurt on several possible winners including Brian Berger, Kyle Sheldon, JR Heffner and Hearn. The Madsen Motorsports #20 sustained a broken right front shock, which necessitated a trip to the pit area.

“JR must have run into the guy in front of him, and they were all rubber banded, and he was spinning out,” Hearn said. “I just touched him with the right front and it broke the shock.”

Hearn brought his car down to the pit area and his crew went to work, doing everything they could to get him back on track as quickly as possible.

“I thought for sure we were done when we came to the pits and they were going green the next time by,” Hearn said. “But, my guys were amazing and got the shock changed and even though we were a half lap behind the field, this car was fast.”

Fast is an understatement. Brett worked his way up and was to the top five by lap 15 and then proceeded to mow down four racers in front of him. First it was Kenny Tremont. Then it was Wayne Jelley, followed by Matt Pupello. Finally, on lap 24, with just six laps remaining, Hearn made the winning move on leader Olden Dwyer. The defending champion was never challenged again and easily went on for the win.

“This is our car from last year that we ran here,” Hearn said. “We recognized what our weaknesses were and we went to work to make improvements on a couple key areas and they’ve all helped.”

Still, even with the win, Hearn was bothered that he and his team weren’t given ample time to make the necessary fixes to get back on track after the lap one accident.

“By the time they broke JR and me apart, I came through the center of the pits as fast as I could because my guys already knew what was wrong,” he said. “They were ready for me. They took the broken shock off and put a new one on. They barely had time to do that, as I don’t think they went a full lap before we were going back green while I was still sitting on pit road.”

That meant the Jet had to fly.

“We were about a half straightaway behind the field but we caught them rather quickly,” he said. “But still, that isn’t fair. They would never do that to anyone else; especially when they knew we were about five seconds away from being ready to go.”

For second place finisher Olden Dwyer, the runner-up finish feels like a win.

“This is huge for all the guys on our team,” Dwyer said. With like seven laps to go, I began to think and hope that he wasn’t right there. But, he got me the next lap.”

Still, for the entire 88JR team, this was a great shot in the arm as they are one of only a handful of teams running the spec AFR heads on their Big Block.

Pupello would bring his AMSOIL By Jim Nichols, Grand Premier Tire #42 home in the third position followed by Jelley and Newtown, CT’s Kyle Armstrong who backed up his fourth place run from a week ago with another top five.

What looked to be promising nights for several top points contenders ended up being a loss with the Hearn victory.

Second place point man Andy Bachetti looked like he had a car that could contend for the win early only to have his Green #4 Teo Pro Car fade near the middle stages of the event. He ended the night in sixth.

Kenny Tremont was running inside the top five when he pulled off with only a handful of laps remaining. Fearing his Bedell powerplant was starting to tighten up, the multi-time track champion decided to pull off. He was credited with a 17th place finish.

Probably the driver who took the biggest hit on the evening was Keith Flach. The Ravena Rocket was running well in his #43 Bicknell only to go up in a big plume of smoke before halfway.

A hole in the oil pan indicates a massive engine failure and put Flach 20th on the night. He now sits third in points, 45 points behind Hearn.

If you were at the Valley for last week’s 358-Modified feature, you knew that Kenny Tremont won, followed by JR Heffner and Jason Herrington. Well, déjà vu all over again, as the same three finished the same way once again.

This time, Tremont started 19th on the field, and with only one caution in the event, the “Sand Lake Slingshot” took the lead from the “Flyin’ Farmer” Herrington near the two-thirds mark and never looked back. This was Tremont’s third win in a row in the Small Blocks.

“This car is just an absolute pleasure to drive, so that race was fun,” Tremont said in victory lane. “This was all about the guys who maintain the car and that’s why it really runs well.”
Sean Mandell had the best race of his 2017 racing campaign on Saturday night, leading some laps and coming home in the fourth position.

“This is like a win for us,” he said with a big smile on his face. “Kenny’s (Tremont) has been helping us with this car. I wonder if he’ll help us anymore now that we’re finally going in the right direction.

Brandon Pitcher grabbed his first top five of the season bringing the Bare Bones Racing #17 home in fifth.

Tremont now has a 22-point lead on JR Heffner as the two have set themselves apart from the rest of the field in the chase for the 358-Modified track title.

To say that Jay Corbin needed to park his Burt Crane and Rigging, Jamie Scott Auto & Tire Center #8 Pro Stock in victory lane would be putting it mildly. He needed it bad. As the old cliché goes, if it weren’t for bad luck, he’d have no luck at all.

That all changed Saturday as the Rensselaer, NY driver nailed down one of the Pro Stock crown jewels at the Valley, the 12th Annual Bubba Tanner Pro Stock Classic.

While Corbin started on the pole due to his bad luck, he still had to fend off Rick Dempsey early, and then hold off a determined Chuck Towslee for the $1,323 payday.

“The car was really good tonight,” Corbin said. “I think if I had to, I could have held Chuck off because I had the preferred line, but he’s got some serious motor this year. He’s a good runner so it would have been interesting to see what would have happened.”

The win helped Corbin gain some serious points in the season-long championship battle. He jumped three spots in the standings to seventh but has still has some ground to make up if he wants to contend for another track title.

Towslee brought his #23 machine home in the runner-up spot to back up his win from one week ago. In talking with him early in the night, they were just looking to finish the race. Since becoming a regular at the speedway, Towslee hasn’t finished a Bubba Tanner Pro Stock Classic. That all changed on Saturday.

Rob Yetman was third, followed by Dempsey and Rick Duzlak.

The Sportsman feature was won by Kevin Ward, but he had to hold off the charges of Whitey Slavin and Robbie Knipe to do it…oh, and a small power outage that knocked out lights on parts of the front and back stretch.

That didn’t stop the driver of the #98 machine as he went on to grab his first win of 2017.

“Thankfully we were able to take advantage of our good starting spot,” he said. “With restarts, I tried not to lose the line I was running and it paid off.”
Slavin brought the Cedar Peaks #53 home in the second position followed by Robbie Knipe, Michael Sabia and Rob Maxon.

Pure Stock feature event wins went to Shawn Perez and Ray Hall Sr.

News & Notes
LJ Lombardo was looking to back up his first career Modified win of a week ago, but unfortunately engine temperature forced the young driver pitside before the feature was complete.

“We started 13th in the feature and were running sixth by lap five,” Lombardo said. “We were digging hard until the motor started to run hot. Being a small dollar team with only one car and one motor, I pulled in before doing any damages to the engine.”

LJ was credited with 18th at the finish.

Paul Gilardi has quietly put together a nice string of finishes aboard his HigFab Chassis, Superior Seamless #87x machine.

Saturday was his third top 10 finish in the last five races and that has the team excited, but they are still digging for better.

“The car is good, there’s no question that I love this car,” Gilardi said after the races. “We were down a little on the engine tonight, but the car was excellent so it helped to make up for the engine.”

Gilardi finished 9th on Saturday night.

Chad Jeseo started the night in his PMC Chassis #25. However, the car would be parked after half a lap in early night warm-ups.

“We had an electrical issue with the PMC,” Jeseo said. “Not sure exactly what it was, but it made us go to the other car.”

Jeseo took out the team’s backup Teo Pro Car for the heat race, but didn’t finish the 8-lap qualifier, pulling off after the car began to smoke. He ran that car the rest of the night and salvaged a 16th place finish in the 30-lap main event.

“We had a power steering line break in our heat,” he said. “That was the smoke. Lucky we got what we could in the main event. That was better than not even starting the feature.

This is the same Teo machine that Eddie Marshall ran for the team on one occasion last season.

Chris Lynch was having a solid run going in the Sportsman feature until he tangled with John Virgilio on the backstretch and the two went for a spin.

Lynch regrouped only to get caught up in another spin on the backstretch that caught up Nikki Ouellette and Mike Gramolini and resulted in heavy damage to the rear end of the Elliott Air #74 machine.

Lynch did, however, start the Modified feature off in an interesting way. As an avid guitar player, the Connecticut musician played the National Anthem on his guitar to the delight of the packed grandstands.

Saturday was Racing 4 Colon Cancer night at the speedway. Mark McIntosh is a Colon Cancer Warrior and tried to do something nice for the drivers who put it all on the line in the sport he loves.

McIntosh and his wife raised money to give bonuses or prizes to top finishing drivers in all classes racing on the night. His goal was also to raise money for Colon Cancer research through the Colon Cancer Alliance.

The coolest thing to see about the whole situation was that many of the drivers who won money donated it right back to Mark. Truly a great gesture to see and I am glad I was able to help Mark, even in a small way.

Saturday June 17, 2017 – West Lebanon, NY – Alarms of Berkshire County & DMC Racing Products Presents – Modified Results (30 Laps) – 1) Brett Hearn, 2) Olden Dwyer, 3) Matt Pupello, 4) Wayne Jelley, 5) Kyle Armstrong, 6) Andy Bachetti, 7) Eddie Marshall, 8) Elmo Reckner, 9) Paul Gilardi, 10) Rob Pitcher, 11) Kolby Schroder, 12) J.R. Heffner, 13) Brian Berger, 14) Kyle Hoffman, 15) Mike King, 16) Chad Jeseo, 17) Kenny Tremont Jr, 18) L.J Lombardo, 19) Mike Keeler, 20) Keith Flach, 21) Kyle Sheldon,

Small Block Modified Results (24 Laps) – 1) Ken Tremont Jr, 2) J.R. Heffner, 3) Jason Herrington, 4) Sean Mandel, 5) Brandon Pitcher, 6) Demetrios Drellos, 7) Timothy Davis, 8) Brian Sandstedt, 9) Chad Pierce, 10) Frank Harper, 11) Olden Dwyer, 12) Ray Hall Jr, 13) Brett Haas, 14) Frank Hoard III, 15) Brian Peterson 16) Kenny Aanonson, 17) Pete Carlotto, 18) Michael Sabia, 19) Alan Houghtaling,

Sportsman Results (20 Laps) – 1) Kevin Ward, 2) Whitey Slavin, 3) Robbie Knipe, 4) Michael Sabia, 5) Rob Maxon, 6) John Virgilio, 7) Frank Hoard Jr, 8) Cody Ochs, 9) Lem Atkins, 10) Milton Mann, 11) Vinnie Visconti, 12) Colin DuBois, 13) Nikki Ouellette, 14) Chris Lynch, 15) Mike Gramolini, 16) Brandon Daley, 17) Alan Houghtaling, 18) Harold Robitaille, 19) Nick Plumstead,

Pro Stock Results (BUBBA TANNER PRO STOCK CLASSIC) (23 Laps) -1) Jay Corbin, 2) Chuck Towslee, 3) Rob Yetman, 4) Rick Dempsey, 5) Rick Duzlak, 6) Jon Routhier, 7) Jason Meltz, 8) Steven LaRochelle, 9) Jason Casey, 10) Jay Casey, 11) Hugh Page, 12) Tom O’Connor, 13) Tom Dean, 14) Joe LaFlamme, 15) Rich Crane, 16) Nick Hilt, 17) Brian Keough, 18) Don Kennedy, 19) Walt Cross, 20) Dan Cote, 21) Dave Peck, 22) Rick Spencer, 23) Todd Hoffman,

Pure Stock #1 Results (10 Laps) -1) Shawn Perez, 2) Tim Thompson, 3) Larry Perez, 4) Zach Seyerlein, 5) Chris Murphy, 6) Evan Denue, 7) Wuggie Burdick, 8) Joe Walcott, 9) Karen Verhagen, 10) Mike Arnold, 11) Scott Morris, 12) Jordan Miller, 13) Phil Sherman, 14) Tom Murphy,

Pure Stock #3 Results (10 Laps) – 1) Ray Hall Sr, 2) Ed Hatch, 3) Gary O’Brien, 4) Jeff Kreutzinger, 5) Jeff Meltz Jr, 6) Bill Deek Jr, 7) John Devine, 8) Jay Casey, 9) Dom Denue, 10) Dave Stickles, 11) Jesse Murphy, 12) Zach Sorrentino, 13) Brian Walsh, 14) Jeff Meltz, 15) Lou Ganczar,