Thunder Hill All Stars

All Star Sprint Race Results - Thunder Hill Speedway
By David Smith, Jr.

MAYETTA, KS - Mon. 8/14/99 - Current All Star points leader Kenny Jacobs took the lead on lap nine and withstood several racelong challenges to win the opening night of the sixth annual Thunder Through the Plains tour featuring a 44 car field of the O'Reilly National Championship Racing Association and All-Star Circuit of Champions sprint cars Monday night at Thunder Hill Speedway. The tours' first ever visit at the track found ButlerBuilt Hot Seat pole starter Rodney Duncan take the lead as the green flag fell for the 30 lap feature with third starting Jerrod Hull, Jacobs and outside front row starter Calvin Landis trailing at the end of lap one. Lap two saw Hull pass Duncan up high on the backstretch to take the lead and quickly opened up an eight car length advantage. Jacobs and Duncan began their battle for the runner-up position for several laps, changing positions several times before the first caution flag fell on lap seven when Aaron Berryhill spun his TropArtic sprinter at the bottom of turn one. Berryhill would exit with front end troubles. The restart saw Jacobs quickly overhaul Duncan for second and then set his sights on the leader Hull. Jacobs went low in turns one and two and slid up in front of the high flying front runner exiting turn two to take the lead. Duncan wasn't about to give up the fight for the top spot and by lap twelve It became a three car battle for the lead with Jacobs holding on to the top position each lap. By the races halfway point it was still Jacobs, Hull, Duncan and new track record holder Chad Kemenah, up to fourth from his sixth starting position, as it now became a four car race for the lead. Slide jobs were the norm throughout the field on the dry slick four-tenths mile oval, and such was the case up front as the front four now began slicing their way through lapped traffic. Kemenah passed Duncan for third on lap eighteen and took over runner up position on lap 23 when the night's final caution flag waved when Hull, who was running second, got tangled with the lapped car of Todd Gracey causing him to spin to a stop in turn one. On the final restart, Oklahoma's Mike Goodman, who had worked his way up to fourth, quickly passed Duncan and Kemenah to take over second and then quickly pressured Jacobs for the lead one lap later. Goodman, who picked up his first ever Thunder victory last year at Tulsa Speedway, then got beside the leader as the pair was exiting turn two with five laps to go. But Jacobs slid high causing Goodman to back off the throttle and from there it was all Jacobs as he held on to take the five car length victory, his sixth All Star feature of the season in the Jacobs/Honecker Motorsports Chevrolet-powered Eagle chassis. Goodman settled for second with Kemenah coming home third. Current NCRA outlaw points leader Gary Wright put on the best passing performance. After starting fifteenth due to a bad time trial lap, the tour's all time feature winner worked his way up through the field lap after lap and with one lap to go, passed Duncan for the fourth position. Heat races for the 44 car field were won by NCRA rookie of the year contender Travis Rilat, the Builtwiser chassis of Jason Johnson, Wright and the F&J Construction sprinter of Wayne Johnson. Danny Smith won the Commercial Truck and Trailer Dash while Greg Wilson came from his thirteenth starting position and passed race long leader Kelly Kinser coming down for the checkered flag to win the fifteen lap Georgia Marketing & Promotions B feature. Landis finished third while Zach Chappell took the final transfer spot, finishing fourth. T W Metals conducted one of its periodic "Special Bonus Nights" with bonus money paid to four finishers in the "A" Main and one finisher in the "B" Main. Membership in the All Stars was not required, but the bonuses are contingent upon displaying T W Metals decals on both sides of the car. This was in addition to the nightly "Top 10 Award" bonus at all events, on which membership is required. "We have a large warehouse and sales office in Wichita," stated Joe Darmofal, Manager of the company's Motorsports Alloys Group special business unit, "and we'd like to have our customers who will be attending some of these venues see our logos prominently displayed. Our Special Bonus Nights have been well received in the past and we hope to receive the same support out west by rewarding the teams for displaying our decals".