Chris Madden Repeats Past Success at Ogilvie Raceway for Series Win No. 5

OGILVIE, MN – July 14, 2018 – Chris Madden repeated his 2017 success at Ogilvie Raceway on Saturday as he collected his fifth World of Outlaws Craftsman® Late Model Series victory of 2018.

The route back to Victory Lane for Madden and his Barry Wright Race Cars [BWRC] wasn’t an easy one. The team was forced to unload their backup car on July 6 at Dubuque Speedway after a multi-car tangle in the heat race. Entering four events since then, the team continued their search for faults in the car which simply just wasn’t performing to their recent standard.

In the past four races in the backup BWRC No. 44, Madden collected a pair of seventh place finishes, a third and a 15th. Whereas in their primary car, Madden had only four finishes outside of the top-five of 20 races entered.

So, enough was enough. It was time to get back on the team’s hot streak and back into the primary car. At Ogilvie Raceway, the BWRC team went back to the basics and got to work to get the BWRC house car back in pristine condition to compete with the best Late Model drivers in the nation. Their hard labor paid off – $10,000 to be exact.

“No, [the trip] won’t be bad at all,” Madden said in Victory Lane of the teams 18-hour drive back to Gray Court, SC. “These guys can get some rest and I’ll try to drive as far as I can tonight. I can’t wait to get home to see my wife, my kid and my family.”

Madden charged to the lead from a fifth place start on lap 10 and never looked back. Not even a single caution on lap 13 (for Tyler Erb who punted a tire barrier onto the track in turn-one) could pose a threat to the strength in Madden’s ride.

“It was actually fun,” said Madden of the 50-lap shootout. “Great racetrack and this is an awesome place here. You can race all over this thing. Those guys back there (crew guys) made it to where I could win tonight.”

Madden’s biggest hindrance was lapped traffic which allowed a hard charging Brandon Sheppard to gain ground on his lead.

“I thought I was [hung up in lapped traffic] there but my car was really good enough to where I could move around more than actually what I was,” added Madden. “I should have actually moved around a little earlier on some of those cars. I let Brandon catch up with me there a time or two, just kind of not doing what I needed to be doing. We got the job done tonight.”

Sheppard finished second in the feature to continue the hot streak for the Rocket1 Racing team finishing fourth or better for the past six events. Sheppard followed Madden’s lead on lap 9 driving up to the top line rather than staying on the bottom of the track like in previous circuits. The topside momentum slingshot the pair ahead of pole-sitter and race leader at the time, Rick Eckert.

“We would have liked to get the win tonight, but everybody would have I guess,” chuckled Sheppard. “It’s a really big confidence booster knowing we can keep this thing up in the top-three. We have a really good piece, I just made a few wrong moves there that probably lost me that race. Good job to Chris, he did a really good job. The track was awesome tonight and I have to thank all of the fans for coming out tonight… Hopefully we put on a good show.”

Eckert’s third-place run was his best of the 2018 season thus far. The veteran World of Outlaws driver has come close to cracking into the podium on four separate occasions but had fallen short by one position.

“We are definitely building,” said Eckert. “We can see [the leaders] now but we just have to figure out how to keep them behind us. I have to thank [my crew]. Those guys worked hard with me today changing motors and stuff. I have to thank the fans for coming out this is an awesome racetrack. We could run the inside or up against the outside wall, so hats off to the track crew.”

The World of Outlaws Craftsman Late Model Series returns to action on July 24 at Davenport Speedway in Davenport, IA.

Abbreviated Results from Ogilvie Raceway:

Sears Craftsman Feature (50 Laps): 1. 44-Chris Madden [5][$10,000]; 2. 1-Brandon Sheppard [3][$5,000]; 3. 7-Rick Eckert [2][$3,000]; 4. 157-Mike Marlar [6][$2,500]; 5. 25-Shane Clanton [7][$2,000]; 6. 7W-Ricky Weiss [4][$1,700]; 7. 28-Jimmy Mars [11][$1,400]; 8. 18c-Chase Junghans [13][$1,300]; 9. 54-David Breazeale [1][$1,200]; 10. 11-Pat Doar [9][$1,100]; 11. B1-Brent Larson [17][$1,050]; 12. 9-Devin Moran [14][$1,000]; 13. 77-Jordan Yaggy [8][$950]; 14. 91-Tyler Erb [12][$900]; 15. 71-Rick Hanestad [16][$850]; 16. 71jr-Buddy Hanestad [20][$800]; 17. 21x-Joel Collins [18][$770]; 18. 20-Rodney Sanders [19][$750]; 19. 42s-Don Shaw [15][$730]; 20. 6m-Jeff Massingill [21][$700]; 21. 90-Lance Matthees [10][$700]

Hard Charger Award: B1-Brent Larson[+6]

Marlar Charges to the Top of Point Standings in Part of Outlaws Win No. 4

GRAND FORKS, ND – July 13, 2018 – Mike Marlar was behind the wheel of a rocket ship on Friday night at River Cities Speedway en route to collecting his fourth World of Outlaws Craftsman® Late Model Series victory of the 2018 season. With this triumph, Marlar charged to the lead of the championship point standings for the first time this season.

It wasn’t an easy victory – Marlar had to work for it. Starting fourth in the feature, the driver of Winfield, TN maneuvered his way past Ricky Weiss, Rick Eckert and Brandon Sheppard to commandeer the top spot.

“I don’t think I’ve worked that hard in a racecar in years,” said Marlar. “It was a fun race to drive but a lot of times I was like, ‘Man, one of these times I’m going to give this thing away and let loose of the steering wheel or something’”

Marlar claimed the lead on lap 22 after running door-to-door with Weiss for multiple circuits. When the checkers fell, Marlar finished nearly one second ahead of a hard-charging Sheppard who had closed in on the No. 157 the final laps.

“This northern racing up here is awesome,” added Marlar. “We had a good car there. It was a handful to drive. The thing that made it hard to drive is probably the thing that made me win, so it was really good. Man, I had a lot of torque and a lot of traction but man, that made ‘er hard to drive too. The track guys worked on this racetrack all night. Track prepping it and prepping it. Thanks to my crew Josh [Davis] and Jerry [Sprouse], my car owner Ronnie Delk and everyone that makes this happen. It’s a lot of fun.”

“Awesome race and I guess we got the points lead, so that’s cool,” continued Marlar. “We just want to go out every night and win some races and just run good everywhere and whatever happens, happens.”

Marlar swept the night with by collecting the PFC Brakes Fast Time Award, his heat win and the $10,000 victory. That was just the results that Marlar and his team were hoping for. Headed into the event, Marlar was tied for first in the championship point standings with Chris Madden.

While Marlar had a picture-perfect evening, Madden found a strike of bad luck. As he was running sixth on lap 39 of the 50-lap event, Madden blew his motor forcing him to retire from the remainder of the race. Madden went from being tied for first in the point standings, to plunging 30 points behind. This places him only eight points ahead of Sheppard in third.

Sheppard has been on a recent hot streak allowing him to steadily climb ahead in the standings. Winning three of the past five races and eight Series wins overall, Sheppard and his Rocket1 Racing team are still hungry for more victories and podium finishes.

“I had a really good car there,” said Sheppard. “I think Marlar was a little bit better. He could steer right across the black a little bit better than I could to pass the lap cars. I couldn’t get up into the corners like I needed to. All-in-all we did really good. Our team has been working hard. Danny, Mark, Austin, Joel, everybody involved with this Rocket house car. It’s unbelievable to drive, hopefully, we can keep it in the top-three the rest of the season and get some more wins. It’s been fun and this track was a lot of fun tonight. It was a little bit more top-dominated than I wanted but we’ll take second place.”

Devin Moran rallied to third place after an exciting battle for the spot with Ricky Weiss and Shane Clanton. Moran started sixth in the feature and fell back to as far as 12th mid-race. After a restart on lap 29 caused by Eckert who slowed on the track, Moran charged from seventh to fifth and kept climbing forward from there.

“Once again, we were just terrible at the start of the race,” said Moran. “We fell back to 12th and then we had to pass everybody, we just worked really hard. The track was really awesome and you could throw those massive sliders and we started doing that there. A couple of guys got into my left side and it made me get up on the wheel even harder. I was trying not to deal with that so I had to get around them. I tried to catch these two up front but they were pretty checked out… I didn’t see the white flag, I was just going as hard as I could as long as I could… Hopefully, we can carry this over to tomorrow.”

The World of Outlaws Craftsman Late Model Series will make the long haul from Grand Forks, South Dakota to Ogilvie, Minnesota’s Ogilvie Speedway for another 50-lap $10,000-to-win shootout on Saturday, July 14.

Abbreviated results from River Cities Speedway

Sears Craftsman Feature (50 Laps): 1. 157-Mike Marlar [4][$10,000]; 2. 1-Brandon Sheppard [3][$5,000]; 3. 9-Devin Moran [6][$3,000]; 4. 7W-Ricky Weiss [1][$2,500]; 5. 25-Shane Clanton [5][$2,000]; 6. 71-Dustin Strand [9][$1,700]; 7. 91-Tyler Erb [14][$1,400]; 8. 54-David Breazeale [22][$1,300]; 9. 18c-Chase Junghans [8][$1,200]; 10. 77-Jordan Yaggy [12][$1,100]; 11. B1-Brent Larson [11][$1,050]; 12. 0-Robert Bladow [19][$1,000]; 13. 11-Shane Holden [13][$950]; 14. 14-Brody Troftgruben [20][$900]; 15. 44-Chris Madden [7][$850]; 16. 7-Rick Eckert [2][$800]; 17. F9-Brandon Fuller [16][$770]; 18. 70-Jesse Teunis [23][$750]; 19. 12s-Brad Seng [17][$730]; 20. 4-Shane Edginton [15][$700]; 21. C4-Ryan Corbett [10][$700]; 22. T-1-Tom Corcoran [21][$700]; 23. 2-Bill Mooney [18][$700]

Hard Charger Award: 54-David Breazeale[+14]

Qualifying: 1. 157-Mike Marlar, 11.975; 2. 25-Shane Clanton, 12.196; 3. 1-Brandon Sheppard, 12.272; 4. 7W-Ricky Weiss, 12.308; 5. 7-Rick Eckert, 12.365; 6. 71-Dustin Strand, 12.381; 7. 44-Chris Madden, 12.44; 8. 18c-Chase Junghans, 12.455; 9. 9-Devin Moran, 12.459; 10. 54-David Breazeale, 12.461; 11. 91-Tyler Erb, 12.603; 12. 77-Jordan Yaggy, 12.635; 13. C4-Ryan Corbett, 12.655; 14. B1-Brent Larson, 12.717; 15. 4-Shane Edginton, 12.82; 16. F9-Brandon Fuller, 12.901; 17. 12s-Brad Seng, 12.92; 18. 2-Bill Mooney, 12.947; 19. 0-Robert Bladow, 13.206; 20. 14-Brody Troftgruben, 13.209; 21. T-1-Tom Corcoran, 13.268; 22. 11-Shane Holden, 13.387; 23. 70-Jesse Teunis, 13.388