Horton, Ballenger, Tharp, Blanken, Merritt visit victory lane at Volunteer Speedway

Horton, Ballenger, Tharp, Blanken, Merritt visit victory lane at Volunteer Speedway By Robert Walden Volunteer Speedway – Media/Public Relations BULLS GAP, Tenn. (March 31, 2018) — After daytime high temperature reached the 70-degree mark Saturday in East Tennessee, once darkness arrived it turned off quite chilly. But with the blue moon (last that will occur until 2020) illuminating nighttime skies over Volunteer Speedway, a strong overall pit car-count of 90 entries provided intense Championship Points Racing action on the high banks to keep a very good Easter holiday weekend crowd on edge of their seats. Jordon Horton of Sneedville captured the Steel Head Late Model victory, while Rusty Ballenger of Seymour recorded the Crate Late Model win, with Matt Tharp of Luttrell bringing home the Sportsman Late Model victory. Gary Blanken of Russellville captured the Modified Street win, while Lee Merritt of Knoxville recorded the Classic victory. The “Sneedville Sniper” Jordon Horton stopped the clock at 13.056 seconds in Steel Head Late Model qualifying to earn the pole starting position for the 30-lap feature. Horton powered out into the lead over fellow front-row starter Barrett Lowe, Layne Clifton, Bobby Giffin and David Crabtree. Just outside the top five John Tweed, Gary Crittenden, Austin Neely, Michael Smith, Ellery Leake and Mitchell Childress were running high, low, and in the middle grooves around “The Gap.” Giffin saw a solid run end prematurely while running in the fourth spot as he slowed and entered the pits on lap 11. With the race reaching the halfway distance, Horton was in command out front leading Lowe, Clifton, Crabtree and Tweed. Crabtree first worked his way around Clifton on lap 18, and then on lap 22 passed Lowe to move into second place and set his sights ahead on Horton. Crabtree was up-on-the-wheel and coming after the leader Horton. But Horton held on for a flag-to-flag run to victory over Crabtree, Lowe, Tweed and Clifton. … Leake, Crittenden, Neely, Childress and Andy Standridge rounded out the top 10 finishers, with each taking the checkered flag on the lead lap. Trevor Sise was fastest over the 19-car Crate Late Model field in time trials at 13.342 seconds. On the first attempt to start the feature Brandon Tipton spun to the inside at exit of turn two, while up at front of the field racing down the backstretch into the third turn, fourth-starting Bobby Mays went for a wild ride when the throttle hung wide-open on his machine and he slammed against the outside wall around turns three and four to bring the caution out. The second try to start the 30-lap feature saw Sise take the lead over Tim Byrd, Danny Yoder, Rusty Ballenger and Eli Beets. Behind them battling two- and three-wide for position were Vic Hill, Chris Chandler, Jason Welshan, Adam Tolliver, Greg Martin, Gary Crittenden and Tim Maupin. Byrd dropped out of the race on lap 7, and Yoder began falling back losing spots to Ballenger, Hill and Welshan, Sise was feeling pressure up...