Christman Wins "Tri State Line-X 50"

7/4/2007

            Tri State Line-X and Accessories presented the O’Reilly USA Modifieds at the Angola Motor Speedway Tuesday Night July 3 for the Open Wheel Spectacular #1 of 2007.  An amazing 41 modifieds made the call in front of one of the biggest crowds in history at the high banked oval.  Edon, OH’s Brian Nester took his second fast time award of 2007 posting a time of 14.869.  Tony Dager of Spencerville, IN grabbed the Fast Dash victory with Bud Perry of Edgerton, OH taking the heat race win.  Only the top 16 in qualifying automatically advance into the A Main Event, with that 2 B Mains were on tap to determine the remaining cars to compete in the Tri State Line-X 50 event.  The top 3 of each B Main would advance leaving the others loading up and heading home.  In the first B Main Scotty Tomasik of Avon, IN took the win with Tim Taylor of Indianapolis, IN and Bob Curry of Plainwell, MI advancing.  The second B Main found North Manchester, IN’s Tim Burkett in victory lane with Joe Hodgeson Jr. from Davison, MI and Mike Hadley Jr. of Indianapolis, IN advancing into the Main Event.  The final 2 spots would be given by point provisions to finish out the 24 car starting lineup for the Tri State Line-X 50 and the Angola Motor Speedway.

            When the green flag dropped for the start of the feature Fort Wayne, IN’s Steve Christman sailed into the early lead.  The red flag would be displayed on lap 9 due to an incident in turn 2 and would lead to Plainwell, MI’s Steve Curry being loaded onto a flatbed and taken to the pit area.  Lap 18 seen the caution again as 4 cars used the turn 3 launch pad to hit the Angola Dunes.  It would be determined that a blown motor on Hodgeson’s modified put liquid down the backstretch and into turn 3.  Christman ran away from the rest of the pack as Nester and Rodney Scott of New Castle, IN put on a great showing battling for the second spot.  Perry along with Rick Coe of Columbia City, IN and Mt Morris, MI’s Bobby Murany kept juggling positions, never giving up that top 5 hope.  When the checkers flew it was Christman with a commanding lead taking the victory with Nester and Scott second and third.  Murany finished fourth with Coe taking home a fifth place finish.  The AllStar Performance Hard Charger Award went to Hadley Jr. for advancing the most positions and the LEAF Racewear Hard Luck Award going to Josh Nester from Edon, OH. 

Scott Melchi, owner of Tri State Line-X awarded a Bedliner to one driver that was unable to advance to the feature event, the driver drawn was Jonathan Martin of Fort Wayne, IN.  Barry Grant and Demon Carburetion presented the Demon Carb Bonus Program for the second time in 2007 with every driver who attended the event being entered into a random draw, Terri Popielarz from Brownsburg, IN took home a brand new Demon Carburetor.  A very special thank you goes out to the Williams Family for donating some much appreciated money for lucky drawings for the drivers.

            The O’Reilly USA Modifieds will be in action this Saturday July 7 and Anderson Speedway for the Bigelow Trailer Sales 50 presented by Sam Pierce  Chevrolet.  For more information and a complete raceday schedule of events at Anderson Speedway log on to www.usamodifieds.com.