RPW Exclusive: Solid Night For Tim McCreadie In Chili Bowl Prelim Wednesday; Finishes Sixth In A-Main
Column By: JOHN DOUGLAS / RPW – TULSA, OK – Tim McCreadie looks to do something no one else has done in dirt racing. He has the opportunity to be the only person to win the World 100 dirt late model race and become Chili Bowl champion at the same time.
His preliminary night of racing set him up well for Saturday Night’s Main event.
McCreadie, a Watertown NY native running a throwback paint job to his fathers famous Syracuse Frame big block modified, shot out to an early lead in his heat race. As is usual with the Chili Bowl, cautions bunched up the field early in the going. Once things got settled in under the green flag McCreadie pulled away completing the first goal of his 2019 Chili Bowl by taking the victory.
McCreadie came to this year’s Chili Bowl in a more traditional type of midget car than the Bob Bondio team had run in the past.
“It’s a weird transition. I’ve never driven a Boss car McCreadie said. “When it transitions I lose the front for a second. I just haven’t gotten my marks as a driver down to know when to deal with it. This is such a new deal and I haven’t driven a standard type midget car in about five years. Right now we’re happy.”
Though the feel in the driver’s seat is unfamiliar to the Late Model and Modified star, there are some familiar things about his ride.
“This is like a throwback to my dad and he won a lot of races with this paint scheme and right now we’ve got one. So about 700 more to go and we’ll be even.” McCreadie joked.
McCreadie’s A-Main qualifier went just as well as he took second place from his third place starting spot. In an uneventful race for McCreadie, clean laps and track time were good to tune up for the night’s A-Main event.
McCreadie lined up In the sixth position for the night’s A-Main event and quickly jumped to fifth position before the caution came out for a dust up into turns one and two. Chris Windom, one of the many midget racing specialists in the field, pin-balled through the middle of the pack.
McCreadie moved to third on the restart and began sizing up the top two. However, he found himself having to stay on the bottom for the track conditions and lost third place to David Gravel.
Sammy Swindell and Alex Bright the eighth and tenth place cars respectively, brought out the yellow again with 9 laps complete. McCreadie sat fourth.
The restart was what McCreadie needed as he passed both Cole Bodine and David Gravel to move to second and into one of the two transfers to the Saturday main event. However he faded after three laps back to fourth as the trio battled tooth and nail for position.
‘T-Mac’ found himself in third looking for more with ten laps to go after another restart, however his car again seemed to stall out and he was relegated to a battle for third with Cole Bodine. With just three laps to go and a possible B-main in sight on Saturday night, McCreadie misread the berm in turn three, bobbled and fell to sixth position where he would finish.
A solid preliminary night for McCreadie, though he did not transfer automatically to Saturday’s A-main. The rest of this story is yet to be told, but he’s in good position to capitalize on a solid car and a good first showing in the 2019 Chili Bowl Nationals.
