RPW Exclusive: Victory For Bobby Varin; Heartbreak For Mike Mahaney Sunday Night At Utica-Rome

Column By: DYLAN FRIEBEL / RPW – VERNON, NY – With inclement weather in the area Sunday night at Utica-Rome Speedway, track officials looked to run the program smooth and fast. However, right after hot laps were over, a rain shower passed through that stopped action until around 8:30pm.

The threat of rain was still there the rest of the evening, but the moisture was just what the track needed as it wasn’t the normal “Utica-Rome’-type surface, and it provided for some amazing racing.

As the 358-Modifieds took the green, Lance Willix was out front. By lap 7, though, veteran Bobby Varin jumped to the top spot and set sail. A caution on lap 18 saw the big lead he had built up go away.

“That caution wasn’t something we wanted to see,” Varin said. “It took our tires two to three laps to get the heat back in them and I thought lost the race at that point.”

On the restart, 14th-place starter Mike Mahaney fired from fourth and over the next two circuits moved to the secod position. That’s when he began to run down Varin.

By lap 25, he had reeled in the Palmer’s Service #76 and looked to work around the outside. While Mahaney had the advantage on the top in turns one and two, Varin seemed to get back away in three and four.

With just two laps to go, Mahaney pulled alongside Varin on the backstretch, but a lap car was right in front of them. Varin used that car as a pick and that was all he needed to go on and take the win in the 30-lap feature.

“We had a good car last week,” Varin said. “We started to fade towards the end of last week’s feature and didn’t want to do that again. It was a great track tonight. It had bite and grip, however again, that caution killed us.”

That’s when he knew someone was set to put on a challenge.

“When I saw the red nose (Mahaney) poked in with about four-to-go, I thought it was Pat Ward and told myself to get up on the wheel,” he said. “I saw it was Mahaney a lap later. We raced clean and I kinda of used the lap car as a pick to get a gap off turn one and hoped to hold him off on the last lap.”

Varin was very happy to win again for the Palmer’s.

“Ninety percent of our success is because me and Alton (Palmer) work so good together,” he said. “He was a racer and won a lot of races and knows exactly what I’m looking for. That’s why this is such a good pairing.”

Mahaney, who ended up fifth at the checkers, was in better spirits than you would have of thought after the race.

“We have been through a lot with this car, so a fifth isn’t bad but it didn’t show what should of been,” he said “We had a really good car all night but still haven’t been handicapped here with missing the first week so starting so deep hurts us. We made some good adjustments for tonight and it brought this thing around. The good run gives the guys a lot of motivation to keep going week in and week out. I still don’t know if we had a tire going down on the last lap from normal wear or getting into the lap car.”

Other winners on the night included Richie Crane in the King Of Dirt Pro Stocks and Dave Marcuccilli in Sportsman.