Five of a kind for a full house?
(GEELONG, VIC. Saturday Dec 11, 1999) Donny Schatz continued his
winning ways with a record equaling fifth successive WSS A-Feature win in tonight's 30-lap
event at Avalon International Raceway. Unlike his previous wins, this time around the star
American didn't have to come from behind, but instead dominated every lap from pole
position, having won the Goodyear Eagle Trophy Dash.
Avalon master Brooke Tatnell had earlier denied Schatz of ‘fast time’ in time trials and topped preliminary qualifying only to draw the dreaded six inversion of the Dash field. It mattered little to Tatnell however as his Shell Helix Avenger stripped a set of gears and he was unable to contest the six-lap sprint. Further problems affected Tatnell in a heat race, when he had to borrow an official's belt to secure a broken top wing strut!.
Schatz
though was untroubled to lead from the start of the event, ahead of defending three-times
WSS champion Skip Jackson, whose increased performance in the Pennzoil/Skilled JohnBoy he
put down to a newly arrived Shaver motor from California. Queenslander Drew Kruck ran
third, ahead of Garry Brazier, Tatnell and Trevor Green. But it was Max Dumesny who was
the early charger rising from 10th starting position having been involved in a heat race
crash with national champion Phil March. "We had to replace a couple of shocks, both
wings, the front end and a birdcage," said Dumesny in complimenting his crew for
their rapid repairs of the Valvoline J&J.
While Schatz was soon busy in traffic around the hectic flat quarter-mile oval, a battle raged over third behind Jackson. It took Tatnell 10 laps before he could finally demote the persistent Kruck, who then came under assault from the trio of Brazier, Green and Dumesny. Unbeknown to anyone other than himself, Brazier was experiencing agonizing pain from a smoldering right foot, which was slowly being baked by a side panel, which was being melted by the muffler. When a caution flag was called for debris on lap 17, Brazier immediately sought medical assistance.
From
the resultant restart Schatz continued to draw away from his pursuers. The only other
withdrawal occurring when Nathan MacDonald exited when a torque tube broke on his
RAAF-backed Mac1. There was no stopping the 1997 World of Outlaws ‘Rookie of the
Year’ however, as Schatz ground out another superb victory in the Bunbury
Toyota/Parker Stores Maxim ahead of Jackson, Tatnell, Kruck and the dueling Green/Dumesny
duo. Rounding out the top 10 was NARC star Peter Murphy, Albury's David Anderson, Darren
Jensen and top local Mike Van Bremen.
"I'm used to running on sandier surfaces like this in the US," explained Schatz after equaling Tatnell's all-time WSS winning streak. "This track got pretty slick and rough and it helped running a different shock package to anyone else and knowing what I wanted out of the car. I didn't want to be too careful in lapped traffic as I could have easily been passed by Skip, but it just meant no stupid moves and making the right decisions."
Jackson was relieved to reverse his fortunes and return to the podium despite trailing a plume of smoke from his new motor, which Skip put down to, "being over anxious with our Pennzoil product! At least this time Donny didn't kick our butt, and we had him in sight for most of the race." Kruck was a delighted fourth, commenting, "I had huge problems with the bumps - after a while whenever I ran over one I started rating how big each one was! Everyone was having the same trouble but is was good to have a real race with Brooke for a while."
Green's fifth place kept up his impressive consistency if a little disappointed at not getting a handle on the Adrad/Freightmaster Maxim all night. Chief wrench and younger brother Daryl said, "We had it too loose in the Dash then over-compensated by tightening it up too much for the feature. The track was going to get rough, so I changed three shocks and a torsion bar for the conditions. It was probably the 'toughest' Avalon I have ever seen."
The teams now travel three hours southeast for tomorrow night's seventh round at Warrnambool's Premier Speedway, a contrastingly different high speed, high-banked tacky track. Schatz has the opportunity at Premier Speedway to rewrite the record books and continue his imposing and impressive race-winning streak.
1999/2000 WORLD SERIES SPRINTCARS CHAMPIONSHIP - ROUND 5
Avalon International Raceway, Geelong, VIC - Saturday, Dec 11, 1999
TIME TRIALS: 1. Brooke Tatnell (NSW #8) 13.341, 2. Donny Schatz (WA #2) 13.386, 3. Trevor Green (SA #4) 13.440, 4. Garry Brazier (QLD #28) 13.455, 5. Skip Jackson (NSW #71) 13.604, 6. Nathan MacDonald (QLD #32) 13.612, 7. David Anderson (VIC #37) 13.640, 8. Max Dumesny (VIC #5) 13.653, 9. Chas Calandro (SA #33) 13.693, 10. Drew Kruck (QLD #36) 13.794, 11. Brad Heywood (NSW #46) 13.807, 12. Peter Murphy (NSW #11) 13.812, 13. Mark Reuter (SA #95) 13.900, 14. Darren Jensen (QLD #75) 13.904, 15. Kelly Linigen (NSW #25) 13.996, 16. Peter Smith (SA #8) 14.014, 17. Phil March (AUS #1) 14.035, 18. Jamie Maiolo (WA #99) 14.105, 19. Joel Knott (NSW #44) 14.232, 20. Andrew Scheuerle (QLD #95) 14.258, 21. Rob Rankin (VIC #60) 14.264, 22. Daryn Maggs (VIC #7) 14.330, 23. Tim McCubbin (VIC #13) 14.419, 24. Matthew Reed (VIC #55) 14.516, 25. Jeff Judd (VIC #11) 14.519, 26. Ian Thomsen (VIC #90) 14.926, 27. David Swayn (VIC #20) 15.042, 28. Troy Shiells (VIC #36) 15.131, 29. Chris Evans (SA #77) 15.174, 30. Dean McComb (QLD #21) 15.191, 31. Darryl Wright (SA #28) 15.603, 32. Ron Dalton (VIC #44) 16.193, 33. Mike Van Bremen (VIC #6) 17.427, 34. Adam Constable (NSW #47) No Time
QUALIFYING HEAT RACES (10 laps) :
HEAT 1 : 1. Drew Kruck, 2. Jeff Judd, 3. Brooke Tatnell, 4. Troy Shiells, 5. Peter Smith, 6. Mark Reuter, 7. Garry Brazier, 8. David Anderson, 9. Adam Constable, 10. Darryl Wright
HEAT 2 : 1. Donny Schatz, 2. Skip Jackson, 3. Darren Jensen, 4. Andrew Scheuerle, 5. Tim McCubbin, 6. Ian Thomsen, 7. Chris Evans, 8. Ron Dalton, 9. Brad Heywood
HEAT 3 : 1. Dean McComb, 2. Mike Van Bremen, 3. Matthew Reed, 4. Kelly Linigen, 5. Peter Murphy, 6. Trevor Green, 7. Chas Calandro, 8. Rob Rankin, 9. Nathan MacDonald, 10. Jamie Maiolo
HEAT 4 : 1. Skip Jackson, 2. Brooke Tatnell, 3. Joel Knott, 4. Mark Reuter, 5. David Anderson, 6. Jeff Judd, 7. Tim McCubbin, 8. Brad Heywood, 9. Chris Evans
HEAT 5 : 1. Mike Van Bremen, 2. Drew Kruck, 3. Peter Smith, 4. Trevor Green, 5. Garry Brazier, 6. Kelly Linigen, 7. Chas Calandro, 8. Adam Constable, 9. Troy Shiells
HEAT 6 : 1. Matthew Reed, 2. Peter Murphy, 3. Jamie Maiolo, 4. Max Dumesny, 5. Darren Jensen, 6. Donny Schatz, 7. Dean McComb, 8. Nathan MacDonald, 9. Andrew Scheuerle, 10. Ian Thomsen
GOODYEAR EAGLE TROPHY DASH (6 laps) : 1. Donny Schatz, 2. Skip Jackson, 3. Garry Brazier, 4. Drew Kruck, 5. Trevor Green, 6. Brooke Tatnell
B-FEATURE (12 laps) : 1. Mike Van Bremen, 2. Mark Reuter, 3. Brad Heywood, 4. Kelly Linigen, 5. Tim McCubbin, 6. Jeff Judd, 7. Jamie Maiolo, 8. Darryl Wright, 9. Chris Evans, 10. Ian Thomsen, 11. Joel Knott, 12. Troy Shiells, 13. Adam Constable, 14. Daryn Maggs
A-FEATURE (30 laps) : 1. Donny Schatz, 2 Skip Jackson, 3. Brooke Tatnell, 4.
Drew Kruck, 5. Trevor Green, 6. Max Dumesny, 7. Peter Murphy, 8. David Anderson, 9. Darren
Jensen, 10. Mike Van Bremen, 11. Peter Smith, 12. Mark Reuter, 13. Chas Calandro, 14.
Matthew Reed, 15. Nathan MacDonald, 16.
Garry Brazier
LAP LEADER/S : Schatz (laps 1- 30)
SERIES STANDINGS AFTER 5 (OF 17) ROUNDS
POINT STANDINGS : 1. Donny Schatz (5000), 2. Brooke Tatnell (2870), 3. Trevor Green (2840), 4. Max Dumesny (2710), 5. Drew Kruck (2230), 6. Skip Jackson (2170), 7. Ron Krikke (1650), 8. Darren Jensen (1180), 9. Chas Calandro (1060), 10. Peter Smith (940), etc
A-FEATURE WINNERS : 1. Donny Schatz (5)
A-FEATURE LAP LEADERS : 1. Donny Schatz (94), 2. Trevor Green (38), 3. Brooke
Tatnell (17) 4. Max Dumesny (1)
FAST TIME WINNERS : 1. Donny Schatz (2), 2. Skip Jackson (1), tie Trevor Green (1), tie Brooke Tatnell (1)
GOODYEAR EAGLE DASH WINNERS : 1. Trevor Green (2), 2. Max Dumesny (1), tie Brooke Tatnell (1), tie Donny Schatz (1)
(John Hughes-Sprintcar World)
(Photos by James Baker)