Matt Tanner Victorious In Sunday Night’s ESS A-Main At Utica-Rome
Story By: JOHN TIFF / UTICA-ROME SPEEDWAY – VERNON, NY – The Empire Super Sprint feature at Utica-Rome Sunday night was a thriller with Matt Tanner driving his way to victory lane.
Josh Pieniazek started on the pole and secured the first spot in the order at the start. He kept his No. 9 at the front before watching Shawn Donath drive around him on lap four on the outside in turns three and four. Two laps later the caution came out as Bobby Varin had issues and slid off the track in turn one necessitating the yellow.
Donath held the lead only for a moment as Chuck Hebing was able to wrestle it away from on the restart on the outside of the speedway on lap eight. A lap later Tanner asserted himself on the bottom of turns three and four. Hebing stayed with him, but it was Tanner getting the job done.
With 10 laps left in the feature, Tanner entered into traffic. He continued to keep up the pace on the inner groove of the speedway. As he led, Danny Varin took over second from Hebing with six laps left. As the laps clicked off he did all he could to close on Tanner, but it wasn’t enough. Tanner claimed the victory with Varin, Hebing, Cory Sparks and Paulie Colagiovanni completing the top five.
LUCAS OIL EMPIRE SUPER SPRINTS (25-LAPS): 1 MATT TANNER 2 Danny Varin 3 Chuck Hebing 4 Cory Sparks 5 Paulie Colagiovanni 6 Dylan Swiernik 7 Shawn Donath 8 Scott Holcomb 9 Davie Franek 10 Larry Wight 11 Sammy Reakes IV 12 Billy VanInwegen 13 Jonathan Preston 14 Chad Miller 15 Jason Barney 16 Jeff Cook 17 Brett Wright 18 Dave Axton 19 Kyle Moffit 20 Kelly Hebing 21 Tyler Cariter 22 Josh Pieniazek 23 Emily VanInwegen 24 Bobby Varin 25 Todd Gracey 26 Denny Peebles
DID NOT QUALIFY: Mike Kiser, Pete Richardson, Steve Glover, Paul Pekkonen, Lance Moss
