With horrendous traffic on the start of a long weekend it was a late walk-up crowd to Western Springs Speedway. Early fans got to sample some Pop n Good popcorn and settle back to enjoy a night that had a bit of everything. The efficiency all night was something to behold with racing finishing just past 10pm having seen 230 laps of racing. This has given me an idea for a new segment - an efficiency rating of laps per hour so we can rate a tracks efficiency on any given night! Watch this space.

I took a look at this track early on and thought oh my god this is going to get ugly. In race three of the night, the F2 Midgets were kicking up dust in Town Bend. Pine Tree Bend on the other hand was fairly drivey. The water truck was called into action from about heat nine onwards and it did a good job of saving the top line in Town Bend. The track was tricky but it did have two lines and none of the holes were especially challenging. It was slow, but sometimes slow is best as it produces more passing. This ended up being a pretty good track with two similarly matched lines. 7/10

The kids got two races tonight. As usual 4a Taylor Clarke was in a league of his own. His blitzed the field from the back in the opening heat and set off in pursuit of 6a Connor Clarke. Conner held his nerve as the race was declared due to an altercation between 16a Ryan Barry and 78c Matthew Leversedge. The same cars were up front in heat two. 84a Jarrod Guptill had a loose tail tank which proceeded to disintegrate into various bits around the track.
Winners - 6a Connor Clarke, 4a Taylor Clarke

No feature for the TQ's as noise concerns mean they can't run fields of a necessary size to have a feature. They are running some two night formula with the 50 lapper. Once again tonight the class put on a show, at times upstaging the main event. Race one saw 2nz Craig Todd lead away from 98a Chris Gwilliam and 9c Ricky Brett. Todd was keeping it on pole and his slow entry to the corners caused problems for Gwlliam. Coming into Town Bend late in the race Gwilliam checked up and was collected by Brett who had nowhere to go.

Heat two saw most of the frontrunners at the front to start the race and subsequently nobody was able to make a big run through the pack. 41a Jarred Taylor failed to last the distance and 9a Dave Bennett spun out of contention. Heat three was the best race of the night across all classes. Cars were frequently three wide as 56a Ross Linklater, 9c Ricky Brett and 2nz Craig Todd came through the field from the back. Amazing how fastest to the back produces the goods isn't it? Linklater held the lead but Brett snuck up the inside to grab the win.

81a Mark Blakely built up a big lead in heat four. Mid-race he began to sound like Pop n Good popcorn in a microwave and had to pull off. 16a Shaun Cooke had survived the mid-pack ferocity and took full advantage. Not so lucky to survive the mid-pack ferocity was 12a Anton Johnson. Johnson appeared to clip a fellow competitor entering Town Bend and went for a wild ride.
Winners - 2nz Craig Todd, 19a Brock Mascovich, 9c Ricky Brett, 16a Shaun Cooke

1nz Carl Wilson lit up heat one with a series of good passes as he worked his way from the back to mid-field. Heat two featured some good battles. 75a Tommy Rusher took off from his mid-field start, passing 18a Greg Pickerill and 27a Alan Wakeling before rounding 19a Jamie Duff entering the first corner. Tommy couldn't keep his pace up and a wide moment coming out of Town Bend let Duff up the inside. Behind him Pickerill and Wakeling traded places as several drivers struggled to adapt setups to the track surface.

Heat three was to be the 71a Jamie McDonald show. J-Mac was in fine form, reeling off a series of passes. Unfortunately 21a Mark Browne got sideways infront of him in Pine Tree Bend and J-Mac had nowhere to go except to the infield and a DNF. 27a Alan Wakeling was another to impress in this race. 8a Ryan O'Conner came to life in heat four. O'Conner was aggressive but measured in his approach, making several passes. Not even 10usa Ricky Logan could match O'Conner's progress although Logan was in a new car having damaged the chassis last week.

Such was O'Conner's performance he secured top spot and drew a "no inversion" for the feature. O'Conner wasn't taking any chances on the start, bolting away. The action was back in the pack as J-Mac came through from last spot on the grid. One move in particular was outstanding. J-Mac went around the outside of one car coming out of Pine Tree and then raced up the inside of the next bloke in a very quick change of lines. J-Mac made it to mid-pack where he got slightly sideways infront of 9a Havard Daniels. The ensuing contact saw J-Mac spin to the infield and out of the race, narrowly missing the noise apparatus!

Up front lapped traffic became a factor. 1nz Carl Wilson couldn't clear 48t Jason Scott and drifted backwards as 10usa Ricky Logan and 27a Alan Wakeling took advantage. In the late stages O'Conner didn't appear interested in lapping 11a Raymond Griffin. This gave Logan half a chance and it was a grandstand finish. Logan almost made it past but it wasn't to be as O'Conner took an outstanding victory in his first season in Sprintcars.
Winners - 10usa Ricky Logan, 78a Daniel Eggleton, 1nz Carl Wilson, 45a Corey Haigh, 8a Ryan O'Conner (feature)

It was total disaster for 88usa Davey Ray. Ray was back to driving the Simon Longdill machine but failed to turn a lap all night as the car had a mystery gremlin. Race 1 saw 96a Chris McCutcheon lead away in a very competitive field. 13a Brad Mosen assumed second until he lost power momentarily, allowing 54a Michael Pickens to pounce along with 81a Michael Kendall. Pickens ran down McCutcheon but unlike last meeting Pickens was unable to make the pass. This McCutcheon kid can drive folks - if you want an outsider for the 50 lapper you could go a lot worse. 43usa Brad Kuhn made up a few spots from the back of the pack.

Race 2 was all about one man - 3usa Jerry Coons Jr. Coons Jr was in unbelievable form. He was up to third from grid 11 when a late yellow closed the field up. Coons Jr took full advantage, passing 21a Carl Worboys for second. Heat three saw 33a Graham Standring start his night with a roll. 13a Brad Mosen charged through from the back after narrowly avoiding an early skirmish. Mosen was to be relegated a spot for something I must have missed. Heat four set the tone for the rest of the evening. Coons Jr and Pickens skipped clear. Try as he might, Pickens couldn't make an impression on the hot shot American. Behind them a big incident saw 1nz Shaun Insley, 16a Andrew Stewart and 95a Tony Fabish all record the dreaded DNF.

Standring couldn't make the start of heat five as 47usa Cory Kruseman finally showed his true talent. Starting alongside 12usa Dave Darland, Kruseman made pass after pass to finish third, three spots ahead of his compatriot. The International race was a fizzer with Ray and Darland unable to take the start for the Americans. Kruseman got by Pickens early but couldn't maintain the pace as Pickens got by, as did 11a Shayne Alach. Nobody appeared to have anything for Coons Jr.
Winners - 96a Chris McCutcheon, 47usa Cory Kruseman, 12usa Dave Darland, 3usa Jerry Coons Jr (2 incl test), 11a Shayne Alach, 1nz Shaun Insley (B-Main)

Well we almost had 40 laps of non-stop racing. 3usa Jerry Coons Jr led away from the start. 54a Michael Pickens slipped under 47usa Cory Kruseman entering Pine Tree Bend and those two put some distance between themselves and the rest with Coons Jr slowly pulling away. 96a Chris McCutcheon was putting up one heck of a fight in holding off the rest of the pack behind Kruseman. 25a Scott Buckley got up to challenge and eventually made a move stick. 1nz Shaun Insley and 33a Graham Standring made moderate progress through the field after having to come through the B-Main. After about 15 laps Pickens looked to the high line in a belated bid to make some ground on Coons Jr who was picking his way through the lapped traffic nicely.

Pickens move didn't look to be making much difference on the high line. Just after half distance Coons Jr started slowing and Pickens mowed him down and made the move to the satisfaction of the crowd. Coons Jr pulled off, having found a new way to lose a feature. The bloke could easily have won all three features thus far. Meanwhile 11a Shayne Alach had made a run, including a nice outside pass on 47usa Cory Kruseman to take second. Alach was a fair way behind Pickens with a few lapped cars in-between.

43usa Brad Kuhn was another making progress but he was to incur the wrath of the blackboard. Kuhn ignored it for lap after lap and the officials ended up giving up! With six to go smoke started coming from the Pickens car. With every lap it seemed to get worse. With four to go the yellows came on for the first time. Not because someone had spun, no the officials had decided that Kuhn couldn't possibly ignore the blackboard under yellows. As the officials flashed the blackboard at Kuhn time after time it became comical.

What part of "I'm not coming off the track" where the officials not getting??

Anyway, Kruseman had retired which meant Kuhn was in third. The yellow could have had a huge impact. Thankfully it didn't as when the officials finally realised Kuhn was ignoring them we got back to racing. Pickens jumped away from Alach who was having to fight off Kuhn. 81a Michael Kendall was up to fourth and that's the way it finished. Kuhn got a DQ for ignoring the black flag - more on this in the officialdom section.
Winner - 54a Michael Pickens

Oh Dear. After two awful performances in the last two meetings and the SNZ officials backed it up with another sub-standard showing. They started out allright with a terrible 1/4 Midget start being called back. The Ricky Brett spin on Chris Gwilliam in TQ heat one was a racing incident and when an F2 took to the grass to avoid a crash and got an advantage I thought the officials were going to turn things around. Sadly that was as good as the officiating got. The Mosen relegation was something I didn't see but what I did see was 96a Chris McCutcheon passing on a restart before the start/finish line. In a preceding TQ race 81a Mark Blakely went awfully close to doing the same thing. Neither incurred punishment.

The cause of an incident also seems a bit difficult for the officials to work out. If you get too sideways in front of someone else, causing them to come to a stop it's not a "racing incident". This happened twice tonight and the officials got it wrong both times. In Midget heat five 12usa Dave Darland got pinged two spots for use if the grass. No word on the other three drivers in this race who also used the grass to their advantage. The comical nature of this call was further enhanced by the B-Main when 95a Tony Fabish made a huge grass cut to make a pass coming out of Town Bend without penalty. There were more grass cuts than a Masport convention and the officials managed to ping one driver.

Then there is Brad Kuhn not pulling off on the black flag. I quote from a previous Percy review.

"11a Shayne Alach was black flagged for noise, ignored it and finished the race. Hang on, surely that's ignoring the black flag? How can you black flag someone and let them ignore it? It sets a precedent for all other competitors to ignore the black flag."

And guess what happens folks, Kuhn ignores the black flag. Who would have thought when at a previous meeting another competitor receives no penalty for ignoring the black flag? The officials were that bad it took them about 6 laps to realise he wasn't coming off. But the plot thickens, this from the official Springs website.

"The race wasn't without controversy though, with American Brad Kuhn excluded from third position after the race with the muffler on his racecar looking like it was about to fall off."

So there wasn't actually anything wrong at the stage he was given the black flag? The officials who can't spot a car on the grass can apparently spot a muffler about to come loose. Well folks if the muffler was about to come off I imagine the noise coming from the car would have been louder. Didn't seem any louder to me but there you go. To top it all off the officials failed to call back the Sprintcar feature where O'Conner clearly took off well before the chalk line of the green flag. There were also three seperate occasions during the night when green lights came on when the cars were gridding up.

All in all you have to wonder just what on earth is going on at the moment with the Western Springs Officials. 2/10