Freddie Rahmer Takes Capital Renegade Sprint Showdown Saturday Night At BAPS
Story By: KALI LANDIS / BAPS MOTOR SPEEDWAY – YORK HAVEN, PA – Like any driver, Freddie Rahmer wanted to end his season on a high note with a visit to Victory Lane.
It wasn’t just about carrying momentum into the offseason. Rahmer wanted to add another racetrack to his career win list.
Rahmer checked off both boxes Saturday at BAPS Motor Speedway, when he captured the 30-Lap Sprint Showdown. The win, Rahmer’s eighth of the season, was worth a nice $5,000 payday.
“Some years we haven’t run good here at the end of the year,” Rahmer said. “I’ve never won here. It was a good field of cars tonight, so it means a lot. We had the car pretty good, and we were fortunate that the double-file restarts worked out for us.
“I think we’ve won everywhere around here now, but this is cool. I won at Selinsgrove for the first time this year, and we’ve been close here a lot of times. You just want to win no matter what.”
Lance Dewease started on the pole and was able to beat Anthony Macri into the first corner to lead Lap 1. It was short-lived, as the Dillsburg, Pa., ace dive-bombed into Turn 3 to wrestle the top spot away on Lap 2.
The first caution came out just as the second circuit was scored. Jordan Mackison spun in the third corner, setting up the first double-file restart of the main event.
Rahmer, who started third, stalked Dewease on the restart. One lap later, he shot to the bottom of Turn 1 and exited the second corner with the second position.
Macri built a 1.442-second lead by Lap 7. Two laps later, he entered lapped traffic, which allowed Rahmer to chop the lead down to just over a second.
Mackison spun for the second time on the 12th circuit. Rahmer got to the inside of Macri coming down the frontstretch on the restart and won the battle into Turn 1 to wrestle the top spot away.
“He tried to squeeze me going into one, but I was far enough ahead that he couldn’t come down,” Rahmer said. “I knew he would have a run going into three, so I just ran him down the racetrack like you are supposed to do.
“We were just racing each other hard, and sometimes you are on that side, and sometimes you are on the other. It was just good racing … all good.”
Things slowed down one lap later, when J.J. Grasso spun in Turn 3. On the restart, Danny Dietrich, who was running fifth, got sideways on the frontstretch, and Lucas Wolfe got upside down to bring out the red flag.
The field went single file on the restart, which allowed Rahmer to open up a 1.131-second lead by Lap 20. Shane Stewart and Logan Schuchart traded the third position, with Stewart taking the position on Lap 21.
Stewart got away from Schuchart a bit and tracked down Macri for second. He slipped by on the inside of Turn 3 on Lap 26 and started to track down Rahmer for the win.
Rahmer, however, was up to task and carved his way through heavy traffic over the final four laps to take the victory by 1.303 seconds. Stewart, Schuchart, Macri, and Dewease completed the top five.
Steve Buckwalter charged from 21st to 12th to earn Hard Charger honors from Dressler Electric. Lance Dewease was quick time on the night with a lap of 14.714
(30 Laps): 1. 51-Freddie Rahmer[3]; 2. 71-Shane Stewart[4]; 3. 1S-Logan Schuchart[9]; 4. 39M-Anthony Macri[2]; 5. 69K-Lance Dewease[1]; 6. 5R-Tyler Ross[7]; 7. 1A-Jacob Allen[13]; 8. 5-Brent Marks[10]; 9. 39-Chase Dietz[11]; 10. 91R-Kyle Reinhardt[17]; 11. 18-Giovanni Scelzi[8]; 12. 17B-Steve Buckwalter[21]; 13. 8-Billy Dietrich[22]; 14. 4R-Doug Hammaker[5]; 15. 55-Dallas Schott[19]; 16. 99M-Kyle Moody[18]; 17. 21-Matt Campbell[12]; 18. 12-Brent Shearer[23]; 19. (DNF) 54A-Zachary Newlin[15]; 20. (DNF) 48-Danny Dietrich[14]; 21. (DNF) 24-Lucas Wolfe[6]; 22. (DNF) 37-JJ Grasso[24]; 23. (DNF) 12M-Jordan Mackison[20]; 24. (DNS) 91-Anthony Fiore