ATTICA, Ohio — Late-race cautions fell perfectly for Travis Philo Friday at Attica Raceway Park. The Waterville, Ohio, resident then executed perfect restarts and held off a hard charger D.J. Foos for a thrilling 410 sprint car feature win at the third-mile dirt track.
Philo and Foos battled in very close quarters the final seven laps with Philo earning his seventh career win at “Ohio Finest Racing” speed plant.
“I knew I had to do something different each time (on restarts). I actually got that one where I took off really early from D.J.,” Philo said. “I saw him do that one night and I couldn’t believe they let it go so I was like I might as well try it. We’ve been struggling a little bit lately with some issues. Kind of lucked out starting on the front row. That was really fun battling with D.J. It had to be a heck of a race for you fans.”
Foos finished second, with Chris Andrews, Byron Reed and Caleb Griffith rounding out the top five.
Ryan Missler, a five-time Attica track champion, took the lead in the UMP Late Model feature on lap six and survived several cautions to get his 15th career win at Attica, moving him into fourth on the all-time win list for the division.
“I learned all you have to do is cream the wall at Eldora and your car gets faster,” he said. “It felt really good tonight. You learn some stuff when you go racing at other places. I just been trying to use common sense and trying different things and not doing the cookie-cutter thing that everybody tells you to do. I have to thank everyone for coming out on fan appreciation night.”
Dustin Stroup tangled with Paul Weaver at the start of the Fremont Fence 305 Sprint A-main but was able to keep going while Weaver took a tumble.
Stroup then led all 25 laps but it wasn’t easy as Matt Foos put up a great fight, actually pulling inside of Stroup on the final lap. Stroup was able to get by a lapped car which stopped Foos’ advance as Stroup scored his fifth career Attica win.
The finish:
Feature (30 Laps): 1. 5T-Travis Philo[2] ; 2. 16-DJ Foos[1] ; 3. 23-Chris Andrews[20] ; 4. 5-Byron Reed[4] ; 5. 33W-Caleb Griffith[9] ; 6. 97-Greg Wilson[15] ; 7. 3J-Trey Jacobs[11] ; 8. 27S-John Ivy[13] ; 9. 12-Kyle Capodice[5] ; 10. 9Z-Duane Zablocki[3] ; 11. 35-Stuart Brubaker[14] ; 12. 18S-RJ Jacobs[18] ; 13. 29-Zeth Sabo[21] ; 14. 2L-Landon LaLonde[12] ; 15. 23H-Jordan Harble[19] ; 16. 71M-Caden Englehart[17] ; 17. 57X-Andrew Palker[16] ; 18. 25R-Jordan Ryan[10] ; 19. 4-Cap Henry[8] ; 20. 18-Cole Macedo[7] ; 21. 28-Tim Shaffer[6]