Galletta's Karting Club - 2010 Season, Event #4 - Sunday, June 27th, 2010:

Russell Bartlett picked up his first feature win at Galletta's in the Galletta's #9 kart, which has been in Victory Lane for two straight weeks! Here he poses with Jeff Tetro and Jeff's girlfriend. 12-karts, bumper-to-bumper action throughout, and we even survived a small rain shower, which made the track VERY fast! Videos will be updated soon (and please be patient with those YouTube videos - one is coming and I'll try to get all of them up before next race if I can. The first two weeks are done and two more to go)!

 

The heats again exposed just how close our racing has been. Heat 1 finished just how it started with no passing. Heat 2 was similar other than Chad Leroy's wild ride into a tire while going for the lead and running out of track battling for 2nd with Russ Hockey.

10-Lap Heat 1 Order-of-Finish: 1st. Michael "mc" Howell (Galletta's #0) 2nd. Russ Bartlett (Galletta's #9) 3rd. George Russell (Galletta's #2) 4th. Melissa Stevens (Stevens #19) 5th. Chris Stevens (Galletta's #8) 6th. Shadoe Russell (Doeman #26)

10-Lap Heat 2 Order-of-Finish: 1st. Arnold "AJ" Nason (Galletta's #6) 2nd. Russ Hockey (Hockey #00) 3rd. Matt Stevens (Galletta's #33) 4th. Tim Galletta (Galletta's #7) 5th. Jeff Tetro (Galletta's #1) 6th. Chad Leroy (Galletta's #5)

The feature was hit by a rain delay where - based on suggestions from Matt Stevens and Mike MC Howell - the karts paced around the track kept the surface relatively dry. When the rain let up and the water soaked in, it made the entire track smooth and with a lot of good bite when the green flag finally did drop. The feature was highly competitive and bumper-to-bumper as well due to this small shower. When the racing is THIS close, patience can often be the biggest difference between 1st and 9th.

 

Mike Howell started on the pole and led early until he overdrove in turn 4 and bounced off a tire wall. That turn 4 was a bit slick due to the rain because Chad Leroy had another oddly entertaining wreck during the feature, again slipping off of turn 4, bouncing off a tire wall, careening onto the track where Russ Hockey had the misfortune of running over his tire. Russ Bartlett took the lead early and held off assorted challenges from Russ Hockey, George Russell and Chris Stevens to record his first feature win at Galletta's, again with a header pipe that fell off the #9 with around 10 laps to go.

6/27/2010 45-Lap Feature Order-of-Finish:
1st. Russ Bartlett (Galletta's #9)
2nd. Chris Stevens (Galletta's #8)
3rd. Matt Stevens (Galletta's #33)
4th. Tim Galletta (Galletta's #7)
5th. Michael "mc" Howell (Galletta's #0)
6th. George Russell (Galletta's #2)
7th. Melissa Stevens (Stevens #19)
8th. Russ Hockey (Hockey #00)
9th. Chad Leroy (Galletta's #5)
10th. Jeff Tetro (Galletta's #1) [DNF]
11th. A.J. Nason (Galletta's #6) [DNF]
12th. Shadoe Russell (Doe #26) [DNF]

[DNF] = Did Not Finish all 45-laps

Make-Up Race Credits:
13th. Randy Platt (Galletta's #6) [Credited via 7/11/2010]
14th. Kelly Miller [credited via 8/1/2010]

As for the points, Timmy Galletta is still leading strong based after his 2nd and 1st place performances in the 1st two weeks followed by solid showings in the last two having to work from the back. Matt, however is slowly creeping up towards him, as he always does. George Russell has been consistently racing up front and finishing well. George would have done better if not for he and Melissa Stevens wrecking together while battling for 2nd with 5 laps to go, which in turn enabled Chris to also creep back up the points list with a 2nd place finish. Before the heats, a small hot-lap session enabled Mike Howell, Russ Hockey, Russ Bartlett and Jeff Tetro to get in a "make-up" race where they were awarded credit as tying for last (13th) place on their prior missed events to keep them all in competition for the points race while not hurting those who did make the race. Each used make-up race is shown as the "@" symbol on the points chart.