ABBOTTSTOWN, Pa. — As the laps clicked away during Saturday’s Dirt Classic at Lincoln Speedway, Cory Haas kept his Buzz Wilson-owned No. 38 machine moving forward.
Haas’ climb from the 17th-starting spot ended in a fifth-place finish, a tremendous spring of action for he and his small team in the midst of a 49-car field.
“It’s pretty big,” Haas said. “We felt like, with the way the track was, we would be able to get up through there a little bit. Everything has to play out right, and it did.
“We caught cars at the right time, cautions at the right time,” he added. “Picked a couple guys off, some guys dropped out. We’ve been pretty good here. It just worked out.”
Haas passed Gio Scelzi and All Star Circuit of Champions competitor Bill Balog on his way to the front.
He takes pride in topping Lincoln’s slew of Saturday night racers, but his mind didn’t stop there.
“We had a good car, good enough to probably get farther up there,” Haas said. “But we probably used our stuff up to get to where we got.”
The performance versus the All Star Circuit of Champions certainly stands out, considering Haas races only on Saturdays. But he’s built toward the admirable run since June.
Over the past four months, Haas owns two wins, five podium runs and 13 top-10 finishes in 14 starts.
After a one-year hiatus from racing, Haas is content with his 20 to 25 race schedule with Wilson. He intends to carry over those plans into next year.
As for the remainder of this year, one potential race, Lincoln’s finale on Oct. 16, remains.
“We might run that, I’m not sure,” Haas said. “We might be done. We do what we want, when we want. Mosty here at Lincoln. It’s nice.”
• Danny Dietrich won his sixth race of the year, and third in a 19-day span, last Thursday at BAPS Motor Speedway in York Haven, Pa.
It took Dietrich 172 days to amass three victories this season, from his first race of the year Jan. 29 at Screven Speedway in Sylvania, Ga., to win No. 3 on July 20 at Selinsgrove (Pa.) Speedway.
“It’s not that we’re slow,” Dietrich said the weekend after his Aug. 28 win. “It’s just we haven’t been in position.
“I’ve had years where you couldn’t draw the wrong pill, you couldn’t time in the wrong spot,” he added. “This year, we’re timing in the wrong spot, we’re drawing in the wrong spot.”
Since those words, a little fortune has given Dietrich a boost.
On Thursday, he started on the front row for the first time since July 20. He cashed in thereafter.
• Entering this year, Anthony Macri knew emulating a breakout, 10-win season would be a tall order. On Friday at Williams Grove Speedway in Mechanicsburg, Pa., the 22-year-old eclipsed his impressive victory total from last year with his 11th triumph of the season.
Macri is one of 13 drivers to have won multiple All Star Circuit of Champions features this season.
• Freddie Rahmer clinched his second straight Lincoln Speedway track title with a runner-up drive from the 11th-starting spot Saturday night.
Rahmer also debuted his 2022 ride Thursday at BAPS, where he steered Rich Eichelberger’s No. 8 machine to the podium from the 12th-starting position.
• Williams Grove Speedway hosts its World of Outlaws NOS Energy Sprint Car Series tune-up on Friday, leading into the next weekend’s National Open.
On Saturday, Selinsgrove (Pa.) Speedway holds the Jim Nance Memorial 39th annual National Open.
The feature spans 40 laps and pays $20,075 to the winner, the largest victor’s share for a non-sanctioned sprint car race on the East Coast.