7/9/2022
Ocean Speedway
Netto wins an exciting Ocean Sprints main event on Friday
DJ Netto wins a wild Ocean Sprints feature in Watsonville Friday night
By Gary Thomas
Watsonville, CA…A main event that featured a little bit of everything on Friday saw Hanford’s DJ Netto come out on top to score his first Ocean Sprints presented by Taco Bravo victory of the season.
Sharing victory lane with Netto during the event were Robbie Sawyer with the IMCA Modifieds, Jacob Mallet Jr. with the IMCA Sport Mods, Kenny Stragalinos with the 4-Bangers, Shawn Jones with the Dwarf Cars and Jackie Yeung with the Police N Pursuit.
A wide and racy surface put together by Tom Sagmiller made for some excellent action in the 30-lap Ocean Sprints feature. Hanford’s Mitchell Faccinto hopped out to the early lead and hung tough through a couple caution periods during the early going. It soon became an intense three-car battle between Faccinto, DJ Netto and Aromas racer Justin Sanders. With the crowd coming to their feet Sanders jumped to the top spot on lap 13 and began pulling away from the field.
The complexion of the race changed however, when Sanders suffered a flat tire just before a restart and relegated the lead back to Faccinto after a couple hard fought laps. After going back green following a caution it then became a battle between Faccinto and Netto, as the two Central Valley racers went back and forth over a three-lap period. When another caution waved though it was noticed that Faccinto now had a right rear tire going down.
Netto pounced on the opportunity and assumed the lead that he would never relinquish. Castro Valley’s Jake Andreotti took a couple of shots on late restarts, but Netto drove off to accept the Ed Entz checkered flag even despite losing a right rear shock during the feature. Kaleb Montgomery battled his way up to second by the finish, while Andreotti ran third with a left rear going flat over the waning stages. Caeden Steele and Kurt Nelson rounded out the top-five.
The top-10 was rounded out by Price Rite Restaurant Equipment Hard Charger Zane Blanchard, Travis Labat, Gauge Garcia, Michael Pombo and Jason Chisum. Steven Kent earned the Beer Optics Hard Luck Award after getting upside down in the main event.
Ocean Sprints finish: 1. 88N-DJ Netto[1]; 2. 3-Kaleb Montgomery[6]; 3. 7P-Jake Andreotti[8]; 4. 121-Caeden Steele[4]; 5. 72W-Kurt Nelson[9]; 6. 7Z-Zane Blanchard[15]; 7. 61-Travis Labat[11]; 8. 21X-Gauge Garcia[12]; 9. 98-Michael Pombo[10]; 10. 25Z-Jason Chisum[14]; 11. 3T-Nick Ringo[13]; 12. 50-Bryce Eames[20]; 13. 33H-Eric Humphries[16]; 14. 38-Colby Johnson[22]; 15. 72S-Bradley Dillard[21]; 16. 3M-Adam Kaeding[18]; 17. 72JR-Chris Nelson[17]; 18. 88A-Joey Ancona[19]; 19. 21-Mitchell Faccinto[2]; 20. 2X-Justin Sanders[5]; 21. 37-Steven Kent[7]; 22. 17-Rickey Sanders[3]
Prunedale’s Fred Lind led early in the IMCA Dirt Modified finale, until Bakersfield’s Robbie Sawyer blasted to the lead on the restart. Sawyer led the remainder to tally his first career Ocean Speedway victory. Jim Pettit II, JC Elrod, Raymond Kelsen and Lind completed the top-five.
IMCA Modified finish: 1. 198-Robby Sawyer[4]; 2. 6-Jim Pettit II[3]; 3. 84X-JC Elrod[2]; 4. 01-Raymond Keldsen Jr[8]; 5. 77-Fred Lind[1]; 6. 20-Cody Burke[6]; 7. 4X-Anthony Slaney[5]; 8. 09-Eric Van Hooser[9]; 9. 55-Brian Cass[7]
The 20-lap IMCA Sport Mod feature was a hard-fought contest early on that saw Orion Messina charge to the early lead. Jacob Mallet Jr. appeared to be the fastest car on the track however, and claimed the lead right around the halfway point. Mallet picked up the win over Markus Frazier, Messina, Billy Robertson and point leader Jonathan Hagio.
IMCA Sport Mod finish: 1. 127-Jacob Mallet Jr[9]; 2. 15F-Markus Frazier[7]; 3. 30H-Orion Messina[2]; 4. 5-Billy Robertson[12]; 5. 46-Jonathan Hagio[8]; 6. 44-Austin VanHoff[10]; 7. 30C-Codie Hample[1]; 8. 89-Duane Bieser[13]; 9. 42B-Max Baggett[5]; 10. 3G-Chuck Golden[6]; 11. 22W-Charlie Hunter[14]; 12. 33-Jeff Mead[3]; 13. 13-Austin McMillian[4]; 14. 95-Justin Parr[11]
The Four Bangers showcased some of the best racing of the night, with their 15-lap feature being a very close contest. Kate Beardsley jumped to the point at the waving of the green flag but then felt pressure in the form of Kenny Stragalinos. With lapped traffic coming into play Stragalinos used it to his advantage, zig zagging his way through to take the top-spot and eventually the victory.
Four Banger finish: 1. 720-Kenny Stragalinos[4]; 2. 43-Kate Beardsley[2]; 3. 0-Jason Lazzerini[12]; 4. 2-Nicole Beardsley[5]; 5. 52-Tony Gullo[9]; 6. 2X-Bill Beardsley[6]; 7. 50-Tony Smith[8]; 8. 51-Charlie Hernandez[7]; 9. 112-Travis VanGilder[11]; 10. 50F-Shelbie Freeman[14]; 11. 37-Peter Vannerus[10]; 12. 10-Amaya Flowers[3]; 13. 810-Matt Hill[13]; 14. 5F-Shane Freeman[1]
The South Bay Dwarf Car feature was all about San Jose driver Shawn Jones, who easily captured the 20-lapper over Danny Wagner, Eric Wiesler, Trafton Chandler and Dan Zuger.
Dwarf Car finish: 1. 26B-Shawn Jones[3]; 2. 11D-Danny Wagner[1]; 3. 64B-Eric Weisler[6]; 4. 42B-Trafton Chandler[8]; 5. 26N-Dan Zuger[4]; 6. 10B-Barry Waddell[5]; 7. 69-Eddy Claessen[7]; 8. 88B-Travis Day[2]; 9. 57-Kieran Costas[10]; 10. 42-Keith Costas[9]
In the Police N Pursuit main event it was Jackie Yeung who raced to his first victory of the 2022 season.
Police N Pursuit finish: 1. 520-Jackie Yeung[1]; 2. 805-Roy Iler[6]; 3. 243-Kyle Wowak[3]; 4. 06-Kevin Elliott[2]; 5. 5149-Travis Crivello[4]; 6. (DNS) 14-AJ Waltrip
Article Credit: Gary Thomas
Submitted By: Gary Thomas