Erick Rudolph Claims Fifth Win Of Season Friday Night At Ransomville Speedway

Story By: DAVE BUCHANAN / RANSOMVILLE SPEEDWAY – RANSOMVILLE, NY – Erick Rudolph of Ransomville picked up his fifth win of the season in the Krown Undercoating 358 Modifieds on Friday night at Ransomville Speedway during Fan Appreciation Night presented by Nutrien Ag Solution, Niagara Frontier Publications, the Youngstown Fire Company, Faery’s Nursery and Bub’s Backyard Speedway

In additional action, Garrison Krentz of Pendelton, N.Y. earned his first win of the season in the Investor’s Service Sportsman. Billy Bleich of Port Robinson, Ontario claimed the win in the Ki-Po Chevrolet Street Stocks. Cole Susice of Ransomville extended his Gippster’s Collision Mini Stock points lead with his second win of the season. In the Stevenson’s Hardware Novice Sportsman, Mike Martin of Appleton, N.Y. secured his first of 2019.

Mat Williamson started on the pole of the Krown Undercoating 358 Modified feature as he began the event 23 points behind Erick Rudolph for the division lead. Rudolph started fourth, but managed to drive under Williamson on the opening lap to take the lead.

Rudolph and Williamson quickly pulled away from the field, but their progress was slowed on lap 8 when Steve Lewis, Jr. stopped on the race track to bring out the caution.

Williamson turned the tables on Rudolph on the restart as he was able to regain the lead. The pair resumed their battle as they pulled away once again. This time there was no caution to impede their progress, but instead lapped traffic would come into play. Rudolph was able to get underneath Williamson on lap 19 to take the lead as the pair drove through slower cars.

Rudolph managed to get some separation from Williamson as he had difficulty clearing lapped traffic. Rudolph drove on to score his fifth of the year at the “Big R” and his 21st victory overall in 2019. Williamson settled for second place, which extended Rudolph’s points lead to 27 with one race left in the season.

Chad Brachmann finished third for his third-straight top three performance. Gary Lindberg placed fourth with Mike Bowman rounding out the top five.

Just like the Modifieds, the Investor’s Service Sportsman also had their penultimate points race of the season on Friday. Derek Wagner took command of the field from the drop of the green flag after starting on the outside pole.

Wagner dominated for most of the race as he led through a handful of caution periods. His luck changed, however, when Noah Walker brought out the final caution of the race on lap 19 when he stopped on the backstretch.

Garrison Krentz, who had been running second for the entire race up until that point, lined up alongside Wagner on the restart. Krentz slid up in front of Wagner in turn two to steal the lead in what turned out to be the deciding move of the race.

Krentz drove away for the final laps to secure his first win of the season. Wagner had to settle for a second place finish, one spot ahead of Brett Senek. That one position trimmed Senek’s points lead to 13 as they head into the final points race. Jonathan Reid finished fourth followed by Zach George.

The Ki-Po Chevrolet Street Stock feature was decided by a series of events that took place with five laps to go. It all started when Pete Stefanski stopped on the track with five laps remaining to bring out the caution. Stefanski, who was second in the points standings, then headed to the pits.

This set up a restart with Pat Dell leading Jaren Israel, Cory Sawyer and Bill Bleich. The quartet had battled at the front of the field for most of the race, including making a wild four wide run down the backstretch. The intensity boiled over on lap 17 when Dell and Israel made contact in turn three. The duo slammed together, and then continued to get physical as Bleich drove underneath them to take the lead. Sawyer tried to drive around them to the outside, but he clipped the end of the turn four wall. His car went into the moat along the front straightaway and tagged the inside retaining wall before coming to a stop.

With the rest of the front runners taken out of contention, this allowed Bleich to pick up his first win of the season at Ransomville. Anthony Guthrie finished second followed by Chris Dziomba, Dan Korpanty and Zach Bleich.

Despite Sawyer’s hard hit he still kept his points lead over Stefanski for the track title. Stefanski returned from the pits and finished two laps down in seventh. He was able to finish one spot ahead of Sawyer.

In the Gippster’s Collision Mini Stocks, Cole Susice picked up his second win of the season as he led all 15 laps from the pole position. Susice had the field covered as he extended his points lead in the division. Ryan Plante finished second with Mike Kramarz in third. Chuck Cala and Nick Tarnowski rounded out the top five.

Mike Martin claimed a huge late season win in the Stevenson’s Hardware Novice Sportsman. Martin passed Sam Junkin around the outside of turn two to take the lead at the halfway point of the race. He then cruised the final seven laps to score the win. Junkin finished second followed by Tyler Vinson, Orval Harris and Bubby Pawlak.

Martin’s first win of the season came at a crucial time as he trailed Butch Zimmerman by 18 points for the track championship at the start of the event. The victory combined with a seventh place run by Zimmerman cut the lead to just two points going into the final points race of the season next week.

Next Friday, August 30, Ransomville will crown the track champions in all three open-wheeled classes on Season Championship Night. The Modified will settle their championship with a $2,000-to-win, 50-lap main event. There will also be a $1,000-to-win 4/6-Cylinder demolition derby presented by Triple T Auto Parts. Racing starts at 7:15 p.m.

RESULTS

KROWN UNDERCOATING 358 MODIFIEDS

Heat Winners: Rick Richner, Phil Vigneri III, Gary Lindberg

Feature: 1. 25-Erick Rudolph, [4]; 2. 6-Mat Williamson, [1]; 3. 3-Chad Brachmann, [9]; 4. 37S-Gary Lindberg, [7]; 5. 71-Mike Bowman, [5]; 6. 42-Pete Bicknell, [3]; 7. 38-Ryan Susice, [17]; 8. 111-Allan Wills, [14]; 9. 47V-Phil Vigneri III, [8]; 10. 4-Greg Martin, [12]; 11. 55C-Jesse Cotriss, [11]; 12. 28ZT-Darren Peters, [10]; 13. 27-Jim Zimmerman, [13]; 14. 678-John Smith, [2]; 15. 6M-Mike Williams, [18]; 16. 26-Rich Richner, [6]; 17. 11S-Steven Lewis Jr, [15]; 18. 132-Brandon Michaud, [16]

INVESTOR’S SERVICE SPORTSMAN

Heat Winners: Robbie Johnston, Garrison Krentz, Brett Senek

Feature: 1. 56-Garrison Krentz, [3]; 2. 61-Derek Wagner, [2]; 3. 111B-Brett Senek, [9]; 4. 9-Jon Reid, [10]; 5. 126-Zack George, [15]; 6. 68-Dave DiPietro, [5]; 7. 75-AJ Custodi, [6]; 8. 07-Brian Harris, [16]; 9. 66-Brett Martin, [13]; 10. 35T-Cameron Tuttle, [4]; 11. 12W-James Harbison, [1]; 12. 33J-Robbie Johnston, [8]; 13. 22-Noah Walker, [12]; 14. 54JR-Scott Just, [17]; 15. 14-Darrell Borkenhagen, [18]; 16. 111-Kevin Wills, [7]; 17. 33-David Fingerlow, [14]; 18. 80-Cody Wolfe, [11]

KI-PO CHEVROLET STREET STOCKS

Heat Winner: Chris Dziomba, Pat Dell

Feature: 1. 108-Bill Bleich, [3]; 2. 43-Anthony Guthrie, [5]; 3. 55D-Chris Dziomba, [4]; 4. 11-Dan Korpanty, [2]; 5. 108Z-Zack Bleich, [7]; 6. 10X-Jarrod Brown, [12]; 7. 2-Pete Stefanski, [6]; 8. 5X-Cory Sawyer, [9]; 9. 14P-Pat Dell, [1]; 10. 10-Jaren Israel, [8]; 11. 4-Mike Kramarz, [10]; 12. 74-Casey Jonathan, [11]

GIPPSTER’S COLLISION MINI STOCKS

Heat Winner: Cole Susice, Steve Matson

Feature:1. 98-Cole Susice, [2]; 2. 93-Ryan Plante, [5]; 3. 4-Mike Kramarz, [7]; 4. 126-Chuck Cala, [6]; 5. 88X-Nick Tarnowski, [1]; 6. 17-Brian Melcher, [10]; 7. 29-Steve Matson, [4]; 8. 26-Dave Dussault, [8]; 9. 79M-Chris Miller, [9]; 10. 14-Chris Harlings, [12]; 11. 11-Matt Hornquist, [3]; 12. 20-Jeffrey Wynes, [11]

STEVENSON’S HARDWARE NOVICE SPORTSMAN

Heat Winner: Orval Harris, Mike Martin

Feature: 1. 99-Mike Martin, [4]; 2. 2-Sam Junkin, [6]; 3. 93-Tyler Vinson, [7]; 4. 24-Orval Harris, [1]; 5. 1-Bubby Pawlak, [2]; 6. 8-Tommy LaLomia, [11]; 7. 0-Butch Zimmerman, [9]; 8. 25-Chris Hawkins, [12]; 9. 56-Jordan Moden, [8]; 10. 26-Kyle Richner, [3]; 11. 5-Clayton Cain, [10]; 12. 07W-Ken Washburn, [5]; 13. 18-Cliff Gregg, [13]