1/64 Scale
2010 Updates
2010 Season Highlights:
In 2010 Ed achieved national recognition from SPEEDTV.com in their Decade’s
Dazzling Dozen, in Sprint Car & Midget Magazine’s February issue he was listed
as one of their Drivers of the Decade, then he made the national ranking in the
North American 410 Sprint Car Poll in March. The World of Outlaws included
Ed and his #2L Sprint car in their Xbox 360 game shipped to stores nationwide in
February. R&R Enterprises produced Ed’s #2L in two sizes 1/18th
and 1/64th and sent them to vendors
in the United States and Australia. He competed in 49 races at 11
different tracks in 4 states, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Iowa and Ohio.
His stats show 7 Feature wins, 9 second place finishes, 29 top five and 35 top
10 finishes. He made 44 “A” Mains, 4 “B” Mains and 1 “C” Main. He
ran in 13 World of Outlaw shows, 3 All Star events, a Pennsylvania Posse
Speedweek show at Bedford and the rest of the races were open competition.
Ed started 16th and finished 6th
in his only Modified race. Despite missing 3 point races at Lernerville
Speedway (while racing at Charlotte in May and Knoxville in June and August), Ed
finished 2nd in the season-ending
point standings - missing the Championship by 10 points. He was the
leading feature winner at Lernerville with 4 and racked up 6 National Guard heat
wins. At Mercer Raceway Park there were 16 point races and Ed was there
for 12 of those, winning 2 features and coming in 3rd
in the final Sprint standings. In the 10-race DIRTcar Challenge
Sprint Series that attracted 70 cars, he won a feature and finished 3rd
in points. In celebration of the 50th
Annual Knoxville Nationals, the track held a special event to honor the
“Alphabet Soup Drivers” and Ed was part of that invited gathering on the second
floor of the Hall of Fame which was followed by an autograph signing open
to the public. Later, he was invited to be on the podium in the Museum
with Bruce Ellis and his Pennsylvania Posse drivers who answered questions from
a standing-room-only crowd. His total career feature wins are now 226 with
105 of them at his home track Lernerville Speedway.
March & April
Lynch Racing tries
to find a race on Saturday, but had no luck - 4/24/10
The crew worked Saturday morning to make repairs from Friday night,
and after Mercer Raceway Park cancelled around 1:30PM, the
crew loaded up to go to Sharon Speedway's opening night for Sprints.
Despite driving through four rain showers on the way, the track's
pit area was dry and about 40-50 rigs were already there for
competition. But a light drizzle started and put everything on
hold. At 5:15PM the announcement came from Shirley Aikens over
the pit PA system that the races were cancelled.
The team is undecided about racing on Friday since Lernerville will
have a Late Model All Star special.
Ed recovers from being collected by a
spinning lapped car to finish 7th at Lernerville - 4/23/10
Ed was definitely ready for the first in a 10-race series titled
DIRTcar Challenge Sprint Series at Lernerville Speedway Friday night
after the amb i.t. timing system recorded his final winning lap in
heat two at 111.604 (three miles an hour faster than any of the 23
cars signed in) but, he didn't get to make a bid for the win because
a spinning lapped car collected him after he had come from 12th to
third in 11 laps giving him front-end damage and the best he could
muster coming from the back was seventh at the checkered flag.
Lining up third in the second Sprint car heat behind Charlie Holben
and Carl Bowser, it was Bowser who jumped to the lead over Ed and
held on for seven laps of the eight-lap race. The yellow came
out for a car spun off turn four as the two were coming into turn
four, setting up a one-lap dash to the finish. That's when Ed
turned his fastest lap, passing Bowser on the inside in turn two.
The other heat winners were Rod George and Dale Blaney.
Tires and gears were changed on the #2L in preparation for the
25-lap feature which would run first and the top 12 in the heat race
finishes went into the draw for starting positions in the feature
and Ed's number came out 12th. Therefore, he started behind
Gary Rankin and Jack Sodeman, Jr. who had first row honors.
Danny Holtgraver and Charlie Holben made up row two, followed by Bob
Felmlee and Kevin Schaeffer, Rod George and Bowser. In row
five it was Pete Miller iii and Brian Ellenberger, then came Blaney
and Ed.
Sodeman took the lead and two laps later, the yellow came out for
Holben, Miller and Felmlee. When the green replaced the
yellow, Sodeman continued to lead Rankin, George, Holtgraver,
Ellenberger and Ed, who was up to sixth.
With Sodeman still showing the way, Ed got by Ellenberger and
Holtgraver and was up to fourth two laps later. But
Ellenberger didn't give up and was scored ahead of Ed on laps six
and seven. By lap nine, Sodeman was ahead of George after
Rankin exited the track. Ed was into third and pressuring
George for second working on lap 12 when the spinning car of Sheila
Rankin collected him in turn three. Ed suffered front end
damage to the nose wing, front bumper and front axle.
Ed was pushed off and cautiously tried his steering and front end
set up for several laps and then started to pass cars from 21st
place. When the next yellow flew on lap 15 Ed was 12th.
One lap later, Sodeman exited the track with drive line problems
while leading, thus George inherited the lead.
The crew will make repairs Saturday morning and check the forecast
which looks like rain at the time this release was written.
Lernerville cancels show at 4:00PM Friday
- 4-16-10
Friday afternoon the crew hustled to load everything in the hauler
as the skies darkened. The trailer back door was flipped up
and then the downpour came as everyone hustled back into the garage.
It was just before 4:00PM and it was a phone call to the track that
confirmed the "official rain out."
The team will watch the weather and consider going to Mercer on
Saturday.
Ed wins at Mercer Raceway Park on
Saturday - 4/10/10
Weighing a two-hour tow versus a four-hour tow, Ed and the crew
headed for Mercer on Saturday night instead of Attica, besides they
wanted to improve on last week's appearance at Mercer when they had
finished fourth in their heat and fourth in the feature and their
decision paid off in spades when they finally put a setup on
the #2L that matched the race track resulting in Ed making his first
trip to victory lane in the 2010 season.
Although it took longer than anticipated to run the track in, it was
a fast-moving show once the races started, with the Sprints
scheduled to be second all night behind the Modifieds. The two
heats for the 20 Sprints on hand were in the books in record time,
with Ed lined up fourth in the second heat behind Rod George, Jack
Helget and Brandon Matus and after eight laps, he finished second to
George. First heat pole-sitter Danny Holtgraver came on strong
in the last turn to beat leader Jack Sodeman at the flagstand.
Ed and the crew went to work, making changes on the #2L that
included new tires, changing gears and in general, tightening up the
car…….hoping to hit the winning combination for the 20-lap feature.
The Modified feature that ran ahead of the Sprints went non-stop,
thus the Sprint feature cars pushed off at 9:00PM with Jack Helget
and Carl Bowser leading the way. Ed started third with Charlie
Holben outside, then Russ Sansosti and Bob Felmlee in row three.
George was inside of row four with Jeff Taylor outside ahead of
Holtgraver and Chris Shuttleworth.
Lernerville Speedway cancels Friday night
races because of weather - 4/9/10
The team has not decided if or where they want to race on Saturday.
Ed finishes 4th in Mercer's Sprint Opener
on Saturday - 4/3/10
With 21 Sprints on hand, three heats were lined up by pill draw and
Ed started 7th in the first heat and finished fourth behind front
row starter Dan Kuriger, Bob Felmlee and Pete Miller. Brian
Ellenberger claimed the second heat after his front row start, while
Carl Bowser won the third heat after starting on pole.
The top 12 had a re-draw and Jeff Tayllor and Jack Sodeman, Jr. made
up the front row. Jason Dolick and Carl Bowser made up row
two, while Kuriger and Ed were in row three. However, the race
got off to a shakey start as two cars flipped coming out of turn two
and everyone from the fifth row back was collected in the red flag
incident with no laps in the books.
The restart did get three laps in before another red came out.
Ed avoided Bowser who was nose-to-the-sky and spinning on his tail.
Ed went to the outside and missed him, but two cars behind him
flipped. The restart on lap four showed Sodeman, Jr. leading
Dolick, Andy Lutz, Ed, Taylor, and Ellenberger.
Happy Easter to the racing community from Lynch Racing.
They will race next on Friday night at Lernerville.
Ed has to settle for second in
Lernerville's Opener on Friday 4-2-10
Although the amb.i.t. scoring showed the lead at the flagstand
changing five times among three drivers, Ed and Brian Ellenberger
sometimes switched lead positions several times within a lap as the
Sprint 25-lap feature proved to be a treat for the large crowd on
hand for a warm opening night of the 2010 season at Lernerville
Speedway on Friday, April 2, 2010, but at the checkered flag, Ed was
0.5 seconds behind and settled for second place.
It was Ed's first race since the World Finals at Charlotte in
November and his first time on all four Good Year tires (now
required at Lernerville) for about 10 years. With 18 Sprints
on hand, two heats were run and Ed was in the first eight-lap heat.
He struggled after starting fifth and finished 5th in a race that
had one yellow flag and two reds.
The field was told it would be a complete restart and now Ed was
lined up third, because Rankin was one of the accident cars.
Just one lap was scored before Jack Sodeman, Jr. broke a stop and
hit the front stretch wall and went off on the wrecker.
Through all this Schaeffer led those first three laps, before Ed got
by to lead laps 4,5 and 6. It was Ellenberger setting a fast
pace to lead lap seven, but despite some really awesome wheelies by
the #2L (which was not a good thing) on the front stretch, Ed
battled back to regain the lead on lap eight. He maintained
the lead through lap 18, despite several side-by-side laps with
Ellenberger.
Ed is planning to go to Mercer Raceway Park on Saturday night.
Lernerville Opener Set For Friday, March
26, 2009 is Moved To April 2 - 3/26/10
Ed gets first laps of the season Saturday
at Lernerville's Test & Tune - 3/20/10
Lynch Racing was glad to have an opportunity on Saturday to test and
tune two sprint cars that the crew had been preparing for the
up-coming season. With the help of Bud Joyner and his truck
and trailer carrying one car, they loaded another car in the tow rig
and headed for Lernerville Speedway where open practice was being
held for seven divisions of race cars between noon and 5:00PM.
The early going had problems with dead batteries in the lift,
forgetting where things were stored for the winter and other normal
first-time at the track stuff. They worked through those
things and eventually had the first car in the chute to be pushed
off for hot laps at 2:00. But, that session didn't go as
planned and the #2L stopped on the back stretch almost in turn three
and coasted in for a pit stop already. They worked on the fuel
injection and had it ready to go out again in 20 minutes.
The second push off was just to get heat in the engine and once that
was accomplished, he was on the amb.i.t. clocks at 2:30 for seven
laps in the 17 and 18 second brackets. By 3:30 the had the
second car ready for a turn and most laps there were in the 17's
ending that session with a 16.954 lap.
Changes were made on the second car and the crew was satisfied with
those times at 4:10PM which were Ed's fastest of the day with a lap
of 15.599.
But, before loading up, Ed III climbed into the cockpit to
experience very dry slick track conditions that were much different
than his two previous lap sessions following race nights at
Lernerville. He did a good job for his four laps on the
clock…..getting faster each time, with a best lap of 18.513.
Lernerville is set to open the 2010 racing season on Friday, March
26 at 7:30PM and the team plans to be there.
Highlights of Ed’s Off Season Show He Made Every
Major Poll - 3/7/10
·
Drivers of the Decade – Sprint Car & Midget - February
·
North American 410 Sprint Car Poll – Sprint Car & Midget - March
In February, monthly columnist Bruce Ellis penned a nine page
article for Editor Doug Auld’s Sprint Car & Midget magazine titled
“Drivers of the Decade.” For his story, he checked the records
for winged 410 cubic inch sprint car races run in the United States
from the years 2000-2009. “Just racing against good
competition isn’t enough to get on this list. The results must
be there as well. Wins are important. If a driver wins
100 features, that’s significant,” explained the writer.
Ellis wrote the following about Ed, “124 wins is a lot of wins,
regardless of whom you are racing with. Actually Lynch had
more wins in the United States than Donny Schatz during the
decade…and yes, we realize the competition in Western Pennsylvania
isn’t quite at the level of the World of Outlaws, but we’re just
sayin’…he won three All Star races and three Lernerville track
championships during the decade…validation came with the night he
won the WoO sanctioned Silver Cup worth $35,000 at Lernerville in
2007…further creditability comes from his record at the Knoxville
Nationals where he qualified for the A-Main four times during the
decade against the roughest competition in the sport.”
May
Ed makes Tri City's first-ever WoO A-Main
on Sunday - 5/31/10
Despite the long haul from the Charlotte race the night before, the
#2L team arrived home at 5:45AM Sunday, they had to put in a
productive morning of work in the garage - including a full chassis
set-up and fine tuning the engine - before loading up and leaving
for Tri City Speedway at Franklin PA at 1:00PM.
Ed pulled a 49 pill out of 60 to determine his time trial order for
the track's first-ever World of Outlaw show and with 36 cars on
hand, it turned out that the pill draw almost determined how your
night would go. It turned out that all but two of the
magic cutoff number of 16 for the inversion, came from the first 16
cars to take time.
By the time Ed went out 28th, the best he could do was to time 22nd
overall, which lined him up sixth in the second heat and only the
top five would go to the A-Main. Toni Lutar, Rod George, Lucas
Wolfe, Andy Priest and David Gravel all started ahead of Ed.
With seven laps of the eight laps completed and Ed running fifth,
the yellow flag came out for Brandon Matus who spun in turn two.
World of Outlaw rules call for the race to end on two consecutive
laps. Ed gained a position and finished fourth behind pole
sitter Lutar, Wolfe and George. The other heat winners were
pole sittes Dave Ely and Joey Saldana and the fourth heat went to
fourth place starter Jason Sides.
The front row of the 25-lap A-Main showed Steve Kinser and Sides
leading the field with Wolfe and Jac Haudenschild in row two.
Ed would be starting deep in the 26-car field, in 20th spot.
Two WoO drivers took provisionals, Ben Gregg and Brian Ellenberger,
while local driver Bob Felmlee replaced Rob Eyler who suffered
fuel line trouble while staging for the feature.
To the surprise of the large crowd on hand, the A-Main went non-stop
with Kinser leading laps 1-8 and Sides took charge of laps 9-25.
Ed's race was a battle all the way as he was in a group of three and
sometimes four drivers (Chad Kemenah, Tony Lutar, Tim Shaffer and
Paul McMahan) that were fighting for the same spot. Ed had
one of his best showings on a slick track, advancing six spots to
finish 14th.
Lynch Racing plans to be at Knoxville's National Sprint Car Hall of
Fame Induction weekend of World of Outlaw races Thursday, Friday and
Saturday.
Ed was OK until a lapped car interfered
at Charlotte Saturday - 5/29/10
Lynch Racing made their annual Memorial Day weekend trip to The Dirt
Track at Charlotte to compete in the 30-lap Circle K/NOS Energy
Showdown sanctioned by the World of Outlaws and broadcast on SPEED,
but he was unable to better his eighth place finish of last year,
because on lap 10 while while Ed was running 12th, the lapped car of
Tim Perry was running in the groove and slowed in front of Ed and
cut across in front of him heading for the infield (I guess) and Ed
hit him with his front bumper, sending Ed spinning.
Ed restarted last and tried the outside in turn three and the car
got no grip and he spun and glazed the wall and then drove to the
infield and later the pits. He was credited with 21st in the
feature.
The race was originally scheduled for Friday, but with 31 Sprint
cars and 40 FASTRAK Late Models in the pits unloaded and ready for
hot laps, the skies unloaded with a heavy rain at 5:40PM.
After the track drained, Randy Grove who was in charge of track
preparation, send his packer cars out. That was short lived
because it started to rain again and officials were forced to
postpone the event until Saturday night.
With all the NASCAR events across the street at the big track this
week, there were no motel rooms so the crew had to sleep in the rig
in the pits. In the morning everyone used the track showers
and watched Randy start on the 4/10 mile red clay surface at 7:30AM.
The drivers re-drew for time trials. On Friday, Ed had a 35
and for Saturday he now drew a 50. Not all 31 cars returned
and the 24 that stayed were divided into three heats after time
trials. Ed went out 21st and turned ninth fastest time -
which meant he was going to start outside front row of the third
heat.
His heat did not go well. The engine had a hesitation at the
start and did not take off when pole-sitter Sammy Swindell's did.
In addition to the hesitation, the #2L did not handle well either!
He managed to hold on for a fifth place finish behind Swindell, Joey
Saldana, Jason Sides, and Paul McMahan to advance to the A-Main.
The other heat winners were Steve Kinser and Chad Kemenah.
The Dash finish determined the first 10 in the 30-lap feature and
they were Saldana and Donny Schatz, Kemenah, Danny Lasoski, McMahan,
Lucas Wolfe, Steve Kinser, Swindell, Jason Meyers and Toni Lutar.
Ed started 11th with Jac Haudenschild to his outside and Jason Sides
and Kraig Kinser behind him. On lap 10, with Schatz leading
Wolfe and Saldana, Ed was holding his own running 12th when he came
out of turn two going down the backstretch, and the lapped car of
Tim Perry slowing, but in the racing groove and had the incident.
Ed will run two World of Outlaw shows
this week on Friday and Sunday - 5/28 and 5/30/10
Ed drove the #2L Sprint car and #777
Bolland Modified at Lernerville - 5-21-10
After taking the morning off to watch Sye (Ed's youngest son) in his
successful showing in the Junior Olympics, the Sprint car crew
loaded up the #2L for the Friday races at Lernerville Speedway,
despite the possibility of rain which never materialized, but, that
was a good thing because Modified driver Kevin Bolland was out of
town and the crew of his car #777 asked Ed if he would drive their
car in the night's special which was a 30-lap BRP Modified Tour
Opener for the 2010 season.
Because of the Special for Modifieds, they had top billing and were
going to be first all night long. Ed quickly touched base with
the Bolland family and climbed behind the wheel of the #777 for fast
laps, which went well with Ed turning the second fastest time of
16.921 behind Brian Swartzlander's fast time of 16.860. With
27 Modifieds in the pits, Ed drew a high pill that started him 7th
in the first of three heats. It was rough going for him, but he
managed to squeak out a sixth place finish behind winner Brad Rapp,
with Rex King, Jr. and Ryan Hall winning the other two heats.
Ed said, "It was fun driving for the Bollands and their crew.
They were very accommodating and gave me more help in being able to
feel my right front tire." His heat finish put him deep in
the feature field that had two of the best on the front row - Rex
King, Jr. and Dave Murdick. There were four yellow flags in
the first 20 laps, with Murdick leading the way.
Sometimes using the cushion, and sometimes making the bottom of the
track work, Ed was able to keep moving up and by the half-way on lap
15, he was about to crack the top ten. He was 8th with
ten to go and continued until he ran out of time in sixth place at
the checkered flag crossing behind Murdick, Rex King, Jr., Brian
Swartzlander, Rex King and Rupp in the top five. Ed started
16th and finished sixth followed by Mike Turner, Jeremiah
Shingledecker, Dean Pearson and Mark Frankhouser.
The Sprints had 24 cars on hand with Dale Blaney the only car in the
12 seconds per lap, with Danny Holtgraver next, followed by Ed still
in the 110.235 range. Holtgraver, Blaney and Pete won the
heat races, while Ed started sixth and finished fourth in the last
heat. This sent Ed to the 25-lap feature after the
redraw.
Holtgraver and Blaney made up the front row, with Carl Bowser and
Eric Williams in row two. Brent Matus and Bob Felmlee were in
row three, then Jack Sodeman, Jr. and Ed in row four. But,
before the field could complete the first lap, Sodeman crowded
Ed into the front stretch wall as Ed then cut to the inside in turn
one, Sodeman then came down across the track, nearly taking off the
front end of Ed's car all cars managed to miss him. When the dust cleared, Ed
was sitting in turn one and had to restart last. With no laps
scored, the green flag waved again over the 20-car field and Blaney
and Holtgraver were off to see who could claim the win.
But Ed was not about to give up and started to pick off cars on
every lap. He cracked the top five on lap nine and set sail
to gain more spots on the "choppy track" as described by Late Model
winner Chub Frank. Passing cars on the inside and out, by lap
14, Ed was up to third behind Blaney and Holtgraver. He did
get Bob Felmlee with an outside move coming out of turn four just
the lap before. By the time Ed was into second, Blaney was a
straightaway ahead and Ed had to settle for second. Holtgraver,
Sodeman, Jr., and Felmlee landed top five finishes.
Rounding out the top ten it was Kevin
Schaeffer, Charlie Holben, Scott Bonnell, Brent Matus and Rod
George.
The crew will look at Saturday's weather before making a decision on
where to race.
Ed gets another Hard Charger Award at
Mercer - 5/15/10
With 16 Sprints on hand, two heats were run with Ed lined up third
behind Rod George and Charlie Holben in the second heat. After
six laps, a yellow came out for Holben's broken rear axle, but
George ran strong to the finish with Ed and Bob Felmlee following.
The first heat was won by Carl Bowser followed by Danny Holtgraver
and Ralphie Spithaler and Mike Lutz.
The redraw for feature positions resulted in Bowser and Pete Miller
making up the front row. Holtgraver and Branden Spithaler
lined up ahead of Chris Best and Rod George in row three. Next
came Ralphie Spithaler and Ed in row four. Following his
heat, Ed and the crew made just about every change possible - front
axle, gears, tires, etc. in order to roll the turns better, so
they were anxious to try their ideas.
The first attempt to start the 20-lap feature, ended in a red flag
when outside front row starter Miller got out of shape exiting turn
two and the balance of the field did a great job of taking evasive
action to avoid him. With cars scattering in all directions,
Ed did get into the back of George, but everyone except Miller was
able to re-fire and continue.
The field crossed over, allowing Holtgraver to move up to the
outside front row spot and took a second green flag to start what
would turn out to be a rare non-stop feature event. With
Holtgraver leading the way, Ed
The laps were winding down and Ed was on Holtgraver's tail.
The crowd was aware of battle to the finish and Ed was able to
accommodate, running side-by-side with Holtgraver and at the same
time, dealing with lapped traffic. In the closest finish of
the year, Ed was beside Holtgraver's rear wheel at the finish line.
Those two were followed by George, Bowser, and Bob Felmlee in
the top five. Lutz, R. Spithaler, B. Spithaler, Todd Bauer and
Chris Best rounded out the top ten.
Ed salvages a podium finish at
Lernerville on Friday - 5/14/10
It was a battle all night as every car that Ed had to pass (either
for a position or as a lapped car) after starting 10th, created a
problem and Ed had to pace himself and cash in on a third place
finish, happy to have his #2L in tact after a feature of near misses
Friday night at Lernerville Speedway.
With 21 Sprints on hand, just two heats were run and luck of the
draw had Ed starting 9th in the second heat. Even though the
#2L was the fastest on the AMB i.t. transponders with a speed of
107.015 in hot laps, with Bob Felmlee starting in the front row, it
took Ed until the half-way mark of the heat to clear the traffic and
move into second spot. But the track had become faster, which
rarely happens, and Felmlee in the lead had turned a very fast lap
at the drop of the green of 111.145 mph and was 1/2 a lap ahead by
the time Ed moved into second on lap four.
Felmlee won by 4.3 seconds over Ed with
Rod George and Danny Holtgraver finishing in the top four.
Jack Sodeman, Jr. won the first heat by .571 seconds over Kevin
Schaeffer, Charlie Holben and Pete Miller III. Next came the
rolling cage of wooden balls at Smokey's Pit blackboard and Ed's
number meant an eighth place start in the 25-lap feature.
The Sprint feature was first on the program and pulled on to the
track with Carl Bowser and Brian Steinman leading the pack and Danny
Holtgraver and Charlie Holben in row two. Miller and Rod
George made up row three while Schaeffer and Ed were in row four.
Next, it was Brent Matus and Sodeman and Scott Bonnell and last
week's winner Bob Felmlee in row six.
Bowser looked like he would lead the rest of the way when the field
returned to all green-flag racing. Ed finally got by Holben to
claim third spot and set his sights on George. From lap 12
through lap 20, Ed cut into George's advantage until it was less
than two car-lengths. But, then came more lapped cars and one
of them, Lindsay Enscoe, went to the outside groove and took a right
just as Ed was about to go by her on the outside. Ed had to
spike his Ultra-lite Brakes and practically stand his car on its
nose.
He probably blew out a residual valve and without brakes, he had to
back off and salvage what he could. George went on to give
Bowser a look on the inside and made his move on lap 24 to lead that
white flag lap and then the checkered flag lap. Bowser crossed
second, then Ed in third, Charlie Holben and Holtgraver rounded out
the top five. Next came Miller, Sodeman, Jr., Schaeffer,
Felmlee and Priester in the top ten.
Ed and his crew did garage work Saturday
and might try Port Royal on Sunday.
Following the Memorial Service for Ed's Aunt Jane Coleman on
Saturday at 11:00AM, the race team gathered at the garage and tried
to find a track within a three-hour driving distance that wasn't
rained out. Mercer Raceway Park cancelled early around 1:00PM,
but Sharon Speedway said their races were still on…..but rain was
around them. They later cancelled.
Ed comes from 5th to a close 2nd at
Lernerville on Friday night at Lernerville - 5/7/10
The top four of each heat were eligible for the re-draw for feature
starting spots which awarded Holtgraver and Felmlee the front row
spots. In row two it was Sheldon Haudenschild and Cap Henry,
then Ed inside Kevin Schaeffer in row three, followed by Carl
Bowser, Cole Duncan, Rod George and Jack Sodeman, Jr. to complete
the first ten starters.
Felmlee blasted ahead to lead Holtgraver, Henry and Ed at the start,
and the front four continued in formation for the first four laps
before the first yellow flag for Todd Bauer and Miller who slid over
the top of the track in turn two. With no change up front,
the yellow came out again for Duncan who half-spun in turn two after
nine laps were completed.
Ed hounded third place Henry on the restart and finally got under
the 19-yr old who is going for All Star Rookie of the Year, in
turns one and two to claim third spot on lap 13 as Henry slipped
over the top of the track to bring out the third yellow. Henry
rejoined the field in last spot.
When the green replaced the yellow, Ed was able to pull inside
Holtgraver and pass him for second place coming off turn four, to
set sail for Felmlee. However, on lap 18, Henry blew his right
rear and was lucky enough to just slide off the top of the track
again in turn two.
With the final seven laps going all green, the A.M.B. i.t. times
show Ed was cutting into Felmlee's lead on laps 21, 22 and 23 when
Ed's laps were faster than Felmlee, but the lengthy yellows took its
toll on Ed as on laps 24 and 25, and his low fuel level caused him
to finish slightly off Felmlee's pace by .922 seconds.
Holtgraver, Sodeman, Jr. and Haudenschild ranked in the top five
while Bowser, George, Schaeffer, Priester and Duncan rounded out the
top ten.
Saturday morning at 11:00AM the Lynch family will attend a Memorial
Service for Jean's sister Jane Coleman at the Vandergrift
Presbyterian Church. They will look at the weather following
the service to see if it is possible to race at Mercer or Port
Royal.
Ed comes from 11th to 5th at Mercer on
Saturday 5-1-10
Because he won the last show here on 4/10/10, Ed was supposed to
start 12th, but one of the qualified cars, Dan Kurieger, had engine
trouble that scratched him for the rest of the night and moved Ed to
11th in the 17 car field.
The front of the Sprint feature (which ran second) looked like this
with Mike Lutz and Rod George in row one, then Chris Shuttleworth
and Dan Holtgraver were in row two. Eric Williams and Bob
Felmlee made up row three ahead of Gale Ruth, Sr. and Charlie Holben.
Chris Best and Carl Bowser were in row five ahead of Ed and Scott
Priester in row six.
It was Lutz from the pole to lead George for the first lap before
Williams brought out the caution. Ed was 10th at that time.
Ed moved up to eighth by the time the second yellow flew on lap
eight for Francis Sesco. Once again the front two Lutz and
George had a clean track in front of them and they caught the back
markers before the final yellow flew on lap 15 for Williams, again,
with Ed in seventh.
With five to go, Ed got by Bowser and Holben which brought Ed up
to 5th in those final laps. Therefore, it was a second win
this year for Lutz who was followed by George, Holtgraver,
Felmlee, then Ed, who passed the most cars for the night after he
came from 11th to fifth. Rounding out the top ten it was Bowser,
Priester, Shuttleworth, Holben and Brian Stinman (who was one lap
down).
There were two heats for the 17 cars signed in and Ed was scheduled
to start sixth in the second heat. Only two laps were in the books
when Sesco hit a water barrel in turn four which brought out a
yellow with pole-sitter Holben leading and Ed in fourth. At
the finish, it was Holtgraver ahead of Holben and Ed in third.
The first heat went to Lutz over Felmlee and Bowser.
June
Ed had his #2L dialed to perfection in
the 2nd PA Posse Speedweek at Bedford Speedway Sunday - 6/27/10
Those who qualified for the FEATURE ZONE, were paged to come to the
front straight-away and draw for A-Main starting positions.
Ed drew a number two, and therefore he started outside Alan Krimes
on the front row of the feature. Hodnett and Mark Smith made
up row two, while Stevie Smith and Freddie Rahmer were in row three.
Pittman and Layton were next.
Coming up will be Friday at Lernerville, Saturday Twin 15-lap features at Mercer and Sunday will be Dave Blaney night at Tri City for a special DIRTcar Sprint Challenge Race.
Ed wins 2nd feature and special medal at
Mercer on Fireworks Night in front of SRO crowd Saturday - 6/26/10
With 23 Sprints signed in for Mercer's big fireworks night, a
standing room only crowd enjoyed a night of Sprints, Modifieds, Late
Models, Mini Stocks and Stocks. Three heats were scheduled to
run qualifying the top four in each heat to be eligible for a top 12
redraw. Ed lined up sixth in the third heat, behind Jeff
Taylor, Jack Helget, Andy Priest, Dan Kuriger and Carl Bowser.
Priest took the win and Ed was second. Bob Felmlee took the
first heat over Rod George with Brian Steinman taking the second
heat over Lindsey Enscoe.
The team plans to race at Bedford on Sunday.
From 20th, Ed advances to 6th in his
first Sharon appearance of 2010 - an All Star Speedweek show
Thursday - 6/24/10
The night presented a challenge right from the start with a high
pill draw of 68 out of 75, which sent Ed out 39th of the 42 cars to
qualify using the one lap time-trial rule mandated by the All
Stars when they have more than 40 cars.
The Rubbin' Repair DASH went to Felmlee with Bill Rose, Byron Reed,
Stevie Smith and Sheldon Haudenschild earning their way into the "
A" by way of the University of Northwestern Ohio B-Main.
However, Haudenschild did not have a legal muffler and he was
replaced by Danny Holtgraver who was fifth in the B-Main.
Now, with the All Star ruling of "running the same right rear all
night long", Ed just about changed everything else from front shocks
to headers, to tire pressure, to gears, before taking his 20th
starting spot in the 24-car feature field.
After the "Pick 6" redraw from the crowd, the front three rows of
the feature showed Scott Bonnell, Walker, Brandon Wimmer,
Daryn Pittman, fast qualifier Dale Blaney and Brad Sweet. Ed
was way, way back in row ten with Lee Jacobs on the inside..
It was rough going at the start with Ed going backwards, having
trouble keeping his front wheels on the ground. If fact, Ed
was last and had his pit crew on the Mosites Motorsports push-off
and retrieve vehicle ready to "retrieve."
Two laps later on lap 14, Cap Henry was crowded into the back
stretch guardrail for the second and final yellow. Shaffer now
had taken the lead and Ed was 14th.
When the green replaced the yellow, Ed was on the move…..passing
David Gravel, Bill Rose, Greg Wilson. Bob Felmlee, Dean Jacobs,
Byron Reed, Daryn Pittman and Scott Bonnell before the end of the
race.
At the checkered flag it was Shaffer, followed by Brandon Wimmer,
Tyler Walker, Dale Blaney, Brad Sweek and Ed in sixth.
Weekend racing plans are to go to Mercer on Saturday and then try
Bedford on Sunday. As of this writing
Ed is 4th (highest finishing Goodyear
car) in the Auto Racers for Kids Charity event at Sportsman Speedway
Sunday - 6/20/10
Ed is the highest finishing Goodyear car, starting fourth and
finishing fourth, in a rare appearance of Sprints at Colwell's
Sportsman Speedway at Knox PA on Sunday, June 20, 2010 where 34 cars
were on hand to show their support for Auto Racers for Kids Charity
spearheaded by Erie PA driver Scott Bonnell.
For the first time since 1998, Ed and his team headed for Sportsman
Speedway after Mercer and with his boys, Ed III and Sye, his father
Ed, Sr. along……it was
a perfect Father's Day get-together. They had a sleep-over in
the rig on Interstate 80, arrived in the early afternoon and watched
the track preparation underway.
There was a Ti22 Dash for 5th, 6th and 7th place heat cars and a
chance for some extra money, while the rest of the cars were
scheduled for a 12-lap B-Main to transfer three more cars.
In preparation for the main event, the crew had changed torsion
bars, stagger and shocks. Ed was definitely in the minority with
his four Goodyears on, but since most of the places he runs require
that brand of tire, he does not own anything else. However,
tonight only seven cars of the 34 were on Goodyears and Ed was the
highest finishing Goodyear car.
Another yellow was needed after 22 laps and now the field went
single file behind the new leader Pittman. The top five at
this point behind Pittman were Shetler (who was showing smoke) and
Kent. Ed, running fourth, had moved his wing all the way back
to try to get more traction, and then fought to keep the front
wheels on the ground. Broderick was a solid fifth.
On the restart, Ed got past Kent for third, but Broderick lost the
handle, bringing out another yellow and the scorers did not
get a lap in, which nullified Ed's pass of Kent.
Ed gets a podium finish after starting 7th
at Mercer Raceway Park Saturday – 6/19/17
The team made minor changes (gears, spacers and tires) in
preparation for the Sprint feature that would run after the 30-lap
Modified feature.
A redraw for the top 12 in heats produced the front row of Priest
and Brian Steinman. Rod George and Chris Best made up row two,
while Lindsay Enscoe and Danny Holtgraver started ahead of Ed in row
three. Ed and Bowser made up row four.
When the green replaced the red with five laps to go, Priest led
his car owner Kelsey George’s father Rod George, Ed, Holtgraver and
Mike Lutz. Ed could never get to the preferred outside groove
with Priest and George running there. The finish was a first
Sprint win here for Priest, who has 39 other wins at Mercer , then
George, Ed, Holtgraver and Lutz. Felmlee, Miller, Steinman,
Tony Beaber and Enscoe ranked in the top ten.
Ed gets win number 102 in Lernerville
Sprints by a wide margin of 12.997 seconds- 6/18/10
Ed was perfect in his qualifying heat leading all laps from his pole
position, turning a time of 13.660 on the white flag lap where his
speed was 105.317 mph over Rod George, Bob Felmlee, Andy McKisson
and Kevin Schaeffer. Nevertheless, the #2L underwent changes
to the shocks, tires and wing adjustments, all in preparation for
the feature.
The big story tonight was the domination of the "clean cars"
with Ed's car entering turn three coming for the checkered flag
while the second place of Felmlee was coming out of turn four.
At 9:42 P.M. , Ed took the checkered flag with a margin of
victory of 12.997 seconds over Felmlee. Considering Ed had
laps himself of 15.619 on his way to Victory, it was only a matter
of time that he would have lapped the entire field.
Behind Ed at the finish, it was Felmlee, Schaeffer, Rod George, Carl
Bowser and Jack Sodeman, Jr. on the lead lap then it was Danny
Holtgraver, Dan Kuriger, Andy McKisson and Brian Steinman.
Ed gets Mercer's Hard Charger Award going
from 7th to 2nd Saturday - 6/12/10
The weatherman didn't do Mercer Raceway Park any favors, predicting
rain for Saturday all week long, but he was wrong and the track was
right…..getting the entire show plus bike races in the record books
and once again, Ed earned the Hard Charger Award.
With Felmlee leading Bowser, McKisson and Ed, just one lap was
completed when Lutz got out in the loose stuff in between turns
three and four and then his car got in a divit just before the wall
causing him to do an easy tip over on his side. He was able to
continue at the rear of the field.
Ed was leading on lap 17, but a lapped
car prevented the win at Lernerville - 6/11/10
Ed and the team returned to his home track, Lernerville Speedway, on
Friday after being on the road at Charlotte and Knoxville for the
last two weeks, but found that his luck with lapped cars has
not changed and for the third time this year he had to take evasive
action at Lernerville to avoid a miscue by a lapped car (sometimes
the car was two laps down -but tonight the driver was three laps
down) and it ended up costing Ed a good feature finish.
The night started off with 24 Sprints who were scheduled to run
second behind the Late Models on this night of Lernerville's famous
and entertaining fireworks. Three heats were scheduled with Ed
starting fifth in the second heat. Despite turning the fastest
lap on the AMB i.t. transponder system in his heat, Ed finished
second to pole sitter Rod George. The other two heats
also went to their pole sitters Danny Holtgrave and Carl Bowser.
The redraw for the 25 lap feature showed Ed on the pole for the
first time this year,
with Jack Sodeman, Jr. outside and Brent Matus and Russ Sansosti in
row two. Sodeman's setup proved to be better at the start and
he led the first six laps before the first yellow for a car that
slid off the track in turn three. On the restart, it was
Sodeman again until Ed got a good run on him and found a sweet spot
in turn two to pass him for the lead. But Sodeman came right
back when Ed spun the tires on the back stretch, taking the front
spot again.
Rain spoils all racing plans at Knoxville
Raceway on Saturday of HoF Induction weekend - 6/5/10
The crew had a busy day Saturday at Charlie and Nancy VanHouelingen
(our Knoxville hosts) family's garage because Ed, Jr. and Ed Sr., Ed
III, Eric, Steve and Charlie decided to change engines and gears,
fire it up and then wash the #2L in preparation for the third and
final night of the three-day WoO show over the National Sprint Car
Hall of Fame Induction weekend.
The 360 Sprints were part of the program and they were pushed off in
the infield, getting heat in their engines as the push trucks and
packers finished packing the 1/2 mile track. The 410 driver's
had their drivers' meeting and flagman Doug Clark reminded them it
would a fast show because there was a weather issue.
At 6:40PM scattered rain drops began to fall and ten minutes later,
it started to pour and that lasted about 30 minutes, soaking
everything. First the track crew let the track drain, then at
8:00PM afleet of 25 push trucks began to pack the track once again,
but after 45 minutes, they were pulled off and the grader went out
on the track.
Lynch Racing will be running locally for the next few weeks.
July
Ed is second in
Mercer's DIRTcar Sprint Challenge Series show Saturday - 7/31/10
For the second night in a row Ed ran in the DIRTcar Sprint Challenge
Series, Friday night at Lernerville and Saturday night at Mercer
both with identical car counts…26, but after winning Friday Ed
finished second at Mercer behind Jack Sodeman, Jr., who finished
second to Ed on Friday night.
Three heats were run with Ed starting fifth in the first heat behind
Butch Beasley, Jim Nicesley, Sodeman and Jason Golick. Only
the first four would be eligible for the redraw and Sodeman won over
Golick, Ed and Eric Williams. The other heats saw young Russ
Sansosti win over Pete Miller III, Andy McKisson and Bob Felmlee,
while Brian Steinman took the third heat ahead of Andy Priest
(subbing in Martha Dionese car), Danny Holtgraver and Brent Matus.
ARDC Midgets were present for their annual visit and brought a
healthy car count requiring three heats and then there was a display
of vintage midgets who also took a few parade laps around the track,
while the drivers went through the stands with their helmets for
donations for fellow Sprint car driver Charlie Holben, who suffered
extensive burns eight weeks ago at Lernerville Speedway.
The Sprint feature was extended to 25 laps and the redraw put Golick
and Brent Matus on the front row, with Priest and Williams in row
two. The crew changed tires and gears on the #2L and Ed would
be fifth inside Sodeman, with Miller and Felmlee next, then McKisson
and Holtgraver in row five. The other cars in the redraw were
in row six - Sansosti and Steinman.
The early laps of the "Challenge" had all four of the yellow flag
incidents with polesitter, Dolick leading through the first three
over Matus. Ed got by Williams and Priest to be third on the
third lap. During the next two laps, Ed was trying to work the
inside, lining up Matus first. Before, he could gain any
ground on the inside, Sodeman saw the bottleneck there and went to
the outside, dropping Ed to fourth when the yellow came out on lap
five for a three car pileup inside turn two.
Sodeman's move to the front came in time to get by race-long leader
Dolick before the final yellow on lap 11 for Lindsay Enscoe, who
spun on the front stretch. Dolick now felt the pressure from
Ed for his second spot and Ed finally completed the task as hand and
was officially running second. Sodeman lost no time as
he zipped through llapped traffic. By the time Ed cleared
those same lapped cars he started to gain slightly on Sodeman, but
it took too long and Sodeman went on to win with Ed in second (maybe
for the eighth time this year). Felmlee, Holtgraver and
McKisson. Finishing sixth through tenth it was Priest, Rod
George, Golick, Williams and Miller.
Ed's next race will be Friday at Lernerville Speedway.
Ed leads all 25
laps of the DIRTcar Challenge Sprint Series race worth $2,000 at
Lernerville - 7/30/10
How many times this season has Ed had bad pill draws, but that was
not the case as luck was on his side for Friday night's Dirtcar
Challenge Sprint Series 25-lap event that paid $2,000 to win and he
took full advantage of a good redraw that started him in the front
row of the feature and he went on to lead every lap and take the
point lead in that series.
There were 26 Sprints on hand for Lernerville's second run in the
Series with three heats scheduled to send the top six in each to the
A-Main, while the rest went to a B-Main. Ed's number 13 in the
original pill draw was good enough to start him outside Brian
Ellenberger in the front row of the third heat. At the drop of
the green flag, it was a drag race down the front stretch, but Ed
rolled the turns perfectly and was just ahead of Ellenberger down
the backstretch. The two stayed close and finished in that
order (making it six heat wins for Ed) followed by Andy McKisson,
Bob Felmlee and Brent Matus. The other heats were won by Danny
Holtgraver and Jack Sodeman, Jr. The crew changed gears for
the feature on Ed's car.
Remarkably, the feature redraw (which did not penalize Ed as last
week's feature winner) set the front row for the 24-car field with
Ellenberger and Ed, followed by Pete Miller III and Dan Kurieger in
row two. Next came Brandon Matus and Sodeman, Jr., then Danny
Holtgraver, Kevin Schaeffer, Bob Felmlee, Andy McKisson and in row
six it was Rod George and Todd Bauer.
Ellenberger who skipped a two-day World of Outlaw show at Oshweken
Speedway to run some local shows, was able to stay in second spot
for 19 laps, but never led a lap because Ed was in the preferred
high groove at the beginning of the race. Despite four yellow
flags for minor spins by various drivers on laps 1, 9, 14, and 19,
Ed's restarts were picture perfect and he was ahead and locked down
to his groove. Several times, Ellenberger tried to dive inside
going into turn one or coming off turn four, but each time Ed's
momentum carried the #2L to the lead at the flagstand.
When the top went away, Ed was able to switch to the middle groove
and despite the fact that the track times were slow tonight, he
managed to the rest of the field at bay. With so many
yellows spaced the way they were, Ed never got into heavy lapped
traffic where some of the slower drivers were running three wide.
On several occasions this year, lapped traffic has been his nemesis,
but tonight, the yellow flags took care of clearing the track ahead
of him.
Ed told track announcer, Dow Carnahan, "Luck was on my side tonight
and my car was fast just about anywhere." For Ed it was career
win number 105 here, making him six total wins for the year (two
were at Mercer and one at Bedford). His total Sprint wins are
226.
Ed was fast all night and picked up his 104th
Sprint car win at Lernerville on Friday - 7/23/10
All day Wednesday and Thursday, Lynch Racing was working hard to get
caught up from all the bent or broken parts and wings that
were a result of the Silver Cup race at Lernerville on Tuesday, not
to mention the hours Eric spent cleaning the mud covered floor and
reorganizing all the tools in the trailer that were helter-skelter
after the engine change between the heat and B-Main when the team
was tested to the max and had everything conceivable happen in the
course of the evening.
Also, it's hard to believe that "luck of the draw" had Ed starting
both his heat and the feature from the front row and he used that
good fortune to lead every lap in the eight-lap heat and 25-lap
feature to cap off a 94 degree day with blistering speeds all night
long.
Ed had an uphill battle all night at
Lenerville's Don Martin Silver Cup on Tuesday - 7/20/10
The World of Outlaws presented their twin 30's Tuesday night at Lernerville Speedway in the Annual Don Martin Silver Cup race which
Ed looks forward to each year, but the night turned out to be an
uphill battle and not at all what he had planned as he had to use
the Provisional spot he won previously in a Lernerville race to
start the first 30-lapper and ended with a 16th place finish in the
nightcap.
The start of everything was delayed because of rain, but once things
got going, it was a fast moving night. There were 39 cars
signed in the pits and Ed's pill draw put him in the third group of
four to hot lap. He was OK in the ranking until the first and
second group were given another session and the times there were
much faster. He went out 29th and timed in at 12.994, which
seemed to be OK for the inversion of 16 cars for the four heats,
until Dale Blaney, the last car to quality, timed in at 12.894 and
that bumped Ed to 17th overall.
He lined up fifth in the first heat behind Lucas Wolfe, Kerry
Madsen, Joey Saldana and Lance Dewease. Sammy Swindell
followed, then Tim Shaffer, Jac Haudenschild, Don Kuriger and Dave
Delisle. Ed lost ground through out the eight lap distance,
finishing eighth behind Madsen, Wolfe, Saldana, Swindell, Dewease,
Shaffer and Haudenschild. The other heats were won by Steve
Kinser, Jason Sides and Adam Wilt.
After a short discussion, it was
decided to change engines in the #2L. They pulled the car in the
hauler and proceeded to remove the engine and install another
engine, but even though the swap was completed in record time for
the crew, the track was hurrying the program along and it didn't
take that long to run three eight-lap heats and a six lap dash.
They were calling out the B-Main lineup and Ed was just getting in
the car and the crew was buttoning everything up, but he was pushed
to the line late and instead of the pole position where he was
scheduled to start, he was relegated to 17th starting spot.
Ed then used his Provisional spot that he won here a couple of weeks
ago and officially started 26th in the first 30-lap portion that had Blaney and Jason Sides on the front row. There were restarts
before a lap was scored.
The first was for Haudenschild and
Daryn Pittman and the second yellow came when Stevie Smith jumped
the cushion in turn four and got up on the front stretch wall and
and landed on Ed's car as he was coming by. Ed really never
saw Smith, but had seen Shaffer on the gas and off and because of
Ed's right sideboard he never saw Smith until he landed on Ed's car.
Ed went to the work area where the crew just tried to pound out his
right sideboard and send him out again. The race then went
until lap 14 before a yellow came out, but Ed was not handling well
with the right sideboard so smashed in, that handling was an issue
especially in the turns. Blaney led through18 laps then
Dewease got by and when 25 laps showed on the score board, Steve
Kinser got into the turn four wall and caused another yellow.
Lap 27 saw a flip by Madsen, who was running third at the time,
right at the flagstand front stretch wall. Three more yellows,
extended the race to 32 laps and Blaney ran out of fuel and went
pitside. Dewease won over Schatz, Sides, Paul McMahan and
Jason Meyers. Ed was credited with 20th.
During the 18 minute break changes to the #2L included a top wing,
shocks, torsion bars and headers. The horn sounded and it was
time to hit the track.
The lead-lap cars were reversed, putting Tyler Walker and Brian
Ellenberger on the front row for the last 30-lap race, with Ed
starting 20th. Five laps were in when the leader, Walker spun
in turn two and recovered to place well back in the field.
Shaffer caused a yellow on lap 11 and Ed was three positions
forward, but when he tried to run in that pack, there was contact
and he spun bringing out a yellow on lap 13. He went to the
back of the field and raced until the last yellow came out on lap 24
for Jonathan Allard and Wilt. Saldana led from lap six
to the checkered and Craig Dollansky came on strong to finish
second. Meyers, Schatz (who earned the title of Champion of
the race because of his combined finishes 2nd and 4th) and Paul
McMahan rounded out the top five. Sides, Swindell, Sam
Hafertepe, Dewease and Kraig Kinser ranked in the top ten. Ed
finished 16th.
Ed plans to be at Lernerville Friday night.
Ed is eliminated before he gets a lap
in at Tri City's All Star race Sunday - 7/18/10
The unexpected happened to Ed Sunday night at Tri City Speedway
where he was set to compete against the All Stars on his way home
from his top ten finish in Eldora's Kings Royal Saturday night.
A field of 31 cars were on hand and time trials had been completed
in which Ed had to stand on his first lap for his official time
because his front wing broke a bracket on the second trip around the
1/2 mile oval just north of Franklin PA. His first lap of
16.370 ranked second in the total standings with Tim Shaffer turning
a 16.478 on his first lap, but his second lap of 16.138 was the
fastest of the night.
The cars were divided into three heats (staggering and inverting
six) and Ed was to start sixth in the second heat where the front
row included Brian Smith and Lance Dewease, with Dave Blaney and Cap
Henry in row two. Ed started outside Greg Wilson in row three.
Bill Rose, Bob Felmlee, Brent Matus and Brandon Matus followed.
The field took the green flag, went down into turn one. Blaney
spun and tried to keep it going, but collected Ed.
Blaney drove to the pits and didn't return fo finish the heat, while
Ed had severe front-end damage and had to go off on a wrecker.
He assessed his damage which was extensive, the crew loaded up and
went home.
There is never a good time to trash a race car, but with the Silver
Cup on Tuesday, it poses a real problem.
Lernerville's biggest Sprint car race of the year is Tuesday.
Ed has an 8th place finish in the 27th Annual Kings Royal race
against the best at Eldora - 7/17/10
It was no surprise that 49 of the best Sprint car
drivers showed up at Eldora Speedway for the 27th Annual Kings Royal
Saturday night to begin what has become known as the "month of
money" and Ed picked the right time to put a complete package
together, timing well enough to make the inversion, transferring
from his heat to the feature and coming home with a top ten finish
in this World of Outlaw sanctioned 40-lap event paying
$50,000 to win.
The pill he
pulled for time trials had him going out 29th and he ended up 16th
in the final ranking on a night when the inversion was 18 and that
slotted him to a starting spot on the pole of the 4th heat.
Alongside Ed it was Sam Hafertepe. Then Cale Conley and Kyle
Sauder. In row three Paul May was inside and Dean Jacobs was
outside, then Bill Rose and Australian Domain Ramsay. Ed was ahead
going into turn one, but Hafertepe rolled the corner and was ahead
down the backstretch and went on to have a margin of 1.946 over Ed
at the finish. Saider finished third, the final car to advance to
the A-Main.
The first heat
sent Stevie Smith, Paul McMahan, and Jac Haudenschild to
the feature, while Daryn Pittman, Joey Saldana and Tim
Kaeding came from the second heat.
Kerry Madsen, Donny Schatz and Jason Sides advanced from heat
three. From heat four Danny Lasoski, Sammy
Swindell and Jason
Meyers moved on and finally Steve Kinser, Dale Blaney and Greg
Wilson went from the final sixth heat. That locked in 18 cars for
the Kings Royal and the two fastest qualifiers that didn't transfer
from the heats, Cale Conley and Kasey Kahne added to make 20.
Four cars from the C-Main, Tyler
Walker, Lee Jacobs, Brian Ellenberger and Brian Paulus went to the
B-Main and got their times back, thus Walker started on pole again
and won the B-Main. Walker, Tim Kaeding, Chad Kemenah
and Dave Blaney earned the last four spots in the feature.
The drivers were introduced to the large crowd and escorted onto the stage individually and each had an opportunity to walk up the red carpeting, climb the stairs and sit on the King's throne that was between two five-foot trophies (one for the winning driver and one for the car owner). To call attention to the center stage and the King's red velvet chair, two eight-foot torches with flames two feet high helped to set the scene.
The heat winners were inverted setting
the first three rows as follows: Kinser, Lasoski,
Hafertepe, Madsen, Pittman and Smith. McMahon and Saldana were in
row four and Schatz and Ed were in row five. In the early laps
before the first red flag for a flip by Saldana, who was running
sixth, Ed had handling issues and was losing ground and was 14th.
On that red, only two minutes were allowed for fuel only. With
Kinser leading Madsen, Hafertepe and Schatz, on the
double-file restart Kinser chose the outside
and five laps were run before Haudenschild flipped on lap 16. This
time the teams were able to make adjustments and that was a good
thing for Ed as he had lost another spot.
With the crew adjusting and changing offset in an effort to give Ed
a better handling car, they hit on something better and he starting
gaining spots when the green flag flew again. Another red flag came
out five laps later on lap 21 for a flip by Pittman and once again,
Ed suggested other changes and the guys made more adjustments.
There was marked improvement and Ed made his way back to 10th where
he had started. In the meantime, Madsen
shot to the lead on the restart and opened a big lead over Kinser.
The final red came with two laps to go and to the surprise of most
of the grandstand, what had looked like a sure win for Madsen over
Kinser, reversed itself when Madsen's engine stumbled on the restart
and Kinser blasted by into the lead and went on for the win. Ed
gained another two spots and actually had passed Tim Shaffer for
seventh with one lap to go, but Shaffer got him back.
Ed's Mom Jean had been chosen by Larry Boos and
Eldora to be on stage and say the magic words........"By the power
bestowed upon me , I hereby crown thee King Steve the 27th" in front
of a large group of press, photographers and TV cameras.
Madsen finished second followed by
Lasoski, Schatz and Wilson in the top five. Sammy Swindell was
sixth despite two position penalties, then Shaffer and Ed in 8th.
Kemenah and Kaeding rounded out the top ten.
Ed has plans to run the All Star race at
Tri City on Sunday.
Ed came from 12th twice and missed a win by .919 seconds
Friday night at Lernerville - 7/16/10
Because he won the last Sprint feature
at Lernerville, Ed knew he had to start 12th Friday night, but what
he wasn't counting on was being forced into the infield as he
started down the back stretch on lap six after working his way up to
sixth and was in the process of passing fifth place Carl Bowser and
4th place Danny Holtgraver with an inside move, but Bowser's left
front wheel hit Ed's right front wheel, forcing Ed into the infield
and by the time he could get the #2L back on the track, he was 12th
again.
The Sprints were scheduled to be third all
night and the 21 cars were divided into two heats and luck of the
draw put outside pole in the second heat which he won a wide margin
over Brandon Spithaler, Rod George, Jack Sodeman, Jr, Scott Priester
and Lindsay Enscoe. The first heat went to Bob Felmlee over
Holtgraver, Bowser, Andy McKisson, Dan Kuriger and Brent Matus.
The Late Models had quite a time in their
feature plague with yellow flag laps and then the Modifieds had
their turn. So, what looked like an early night, turned
out to have the Sprint feature on the track at 10:00PM.
The redraw there showed McKisson and Bowser in
the front row for the 25 lap Sprint A-Main. Then came Kuriger
and Mauts with Enscoe and Scottt Priester in row three.
Felmlee and Spithaler lined up in row five ahead of Sodeman, Jr. and
Ed in 12th spot.
Ed kept his wheels turning, but by the
time he made it back on the track, he was 12th again. But just
one lap later, Enscoe spun in turn four bringing out the yellow and
when the green waved again it was McKisson, Kuriger, Felmlee,
Holtgraver and Bowser. Ed made up two spots before that first
yellow and found himself now in 10th.
A red flag for a flip by Bowser on the
front stretch wall on lap 11 showed McKisson leading Kuriger,
Holtgraver, Felmlee and now Ed. On lap 13 the AMB i.t. timing
showed Ed gained one position over Felmlee, then one lap later he
passed Holtgraver. It wasn't until lap 17 that he got by
Kuriger and set sail to reel in McKisson, who was 12 car lengths
ahead.
Ed cut into McKisson's lead every lap, but once
again ran out of laps and fell short by .919 seconds at the
checkered flag. For McKisson, it was his first
Lernerville win. Finishing third through 10th, it was
Holtgraver, Sodeman, Jr., Felmlee, Todd Bauer, Kuriger, Spithaler,
Pete Miller III and Brent Matus.
Ed comes from 10th to 2nd on Mosites
Motorsports Night at Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Motor Speedway -
Saturday 7/10/10
Ed was always fond of PPMS, the Monster Half-Mile just west of
Pittsburgh and is still the leading Sprint feature winner there with
13, and Saturday night he fell just short of adding to that total
when he ran out of laps as he closed to less than a second (0.509)
on the leader Dan Holtgraver on Mosites Motorsports Night dubbed The
Flight of the Phoenix, where he started tenth and finished second.
Once a year the Miley family that owns PPMS schedules a Sprint car
race and Ed looks forward to that event. "The track is so wide
and it was prepared very well for our event," said Ed after nearly
pulling off a win that he wanted so badly on a track that got faster
as the night went on.
Again, the #2L turned the fastest lap of the night on the AMB i.t.
timing system with a time of 16.547 and a speed of 135.976 on lap 14
of the 20-lap feature event up from 18.003 in his winning effort of
his heat race where his top speed was 124.979mph.
In last year's only Sprint race here on June 6, Ed had a half-lap
lead, but tangled with a lapped car and was unable to finish, so
hopes were high again for Saturday night when 14 Sprints showed up
and hot laps were in the books and Ed's car was fast again.
Luck of the draw for the heats put Ed outside pole-sitter Kevin
Schaeffer with Danny Holtgraver and Carl Bowser in row two.
Brian Steinman and Jack Helget made up row three followed by Davey
Jones. Schaeffer led the first two laps before Ed passed him
to lead lap three and go on to the checkered ahead of Schaeffer,
Bowser, Holtgraver, jones, Steinman and Helget. Heat number
two was won by Jack Sodeman, Jr. over Andy Priest, Andy McKisson,
Rod George, Brandon Spithaler, Bobbi Rankin and Jeff Taylor.
A random draw resulted in an inversion of ten for the 20-lap
feature. Spithaler and Jones led the field to the green
followed by George and Holtgraver. In row three it was
McKisson and Bowser then Priest and Schaeffer. Row five had
Sodeman, Jr. inside and Ed outside in tenth. Spithaler led the
first lap from the pole, but Jones dropped to the inside, leaving a
clear shot for Holtgraver to lead starting with lap two.
Lernerville rains out by mid-afternoon on
Friday 7-9-10
Heavy rain hit Lernerville Speedway before 3:00PM Friday forcing
cancellation of the night's races. Thus, next Friday, July 16
will feature Fab Four Racing and Nostalgia Night on Dollar Dog
Night.
Ed and his team will be at Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Motor Speedway
Saturday night when Mosites Motorsports will present a special race
for 410 Sprints. When the gates open at 5:00PM the U.S. Army
Field Band will be entertaining the fans. Hot laps for race
cars will be at 6:00 and racing will be at 7:00PM.
Ed is 4th against NASCAR drivers at Lou
Blaney Memorial Race at Sharon on Wednesday - 7/7/10
Ed and the crew got to Sharon Speedway early on Wednesday because
they anticipated a large crowd and a packed pits because of the 2nd
Annual Lou Blaney Memorial Race, NASCAR Night with stars Tony
Stewart, Kasey Kahne and Dave Blaney on hand to race 410 Sprints and
sign autographs for fans, plus a special BRP race for Big Block
Modifieds and with 32 Sprints on hand, Ed did well, qualifying
through his heat and coming from eighth starting spot to finish
fourth on a "challenging" 3/8 mile track.
The pill draw was OK by the team's standard high number draw luck,
picking 25 out of 66. This set the #2L in fourth spot in the
third heat, which ended up stacked with NASCAR stars. WoO
driver Brian Ellenbeger got the pole with Sheldon Haudenschild
outside, while Danny Holtgraver and Ed were in the seccond row.
Next came Jack Whitmore, Dave Blaney, Tony Stewart and another WoO
competitor, Tim Kaeding.
To be eligible for the feature pill draw, Ed had to finish in the
top three and he did that by following Ellenberger and Haudenschild
across the finish line after eight laps. From the first heat,
it would be Mike Lutz, Tim Shaffer and Brandon Wimmer. The
second heat sent Dale Blaney, Cole Duncan and Paul Kish to the
redraw while Kasey Kahne, Bob Felmlee and Holtgraver went from heat
number four.
The day was clear and in the 90's and Sharon had many things planned
for intermission, including an on-track exhibition event for the
many vintage race cars on display. Finally, the 30-lap feature
was pushed on the track with Ellenberger and Lutz showing the way
from the front row. Tim Shaffer and Haudenschild made up row
two with Holtgraver and Dale Blaney next. Row four had Felmlee
on the inside and Ed outside in eighth spot. Next came Duncan,
Wimmer, Kahne and Kish. Stewart and Dave Blaney started 19th
and 21st respectively.
Four early yellows for single car incidents came around laps seven
and eight before the first red flag came out for Tim Kaeding who
crashed in turn three. Each time, a lapped car was placed ahead of
Ed as he had worked his way into the top five. When officials
determined they had a combination of 46 total green and yellow flag
laps they called for a "fuel and air only" stop. But, instead
of bringing all the cars to one area so their crews' activities
could be policed, the cars were spread all around the track, making
it impossible to keep the adjustments limited to fuel and air.
Another yellow was needed on lap 15, the half-way mark for Cole
Duncan, who thought he had packed a wheel and the final yellow came
with 20 laps in for Rod George with mechanical trouble on the back
stretch. Lutz continued to lead Ellenberger at this point and
Shaffer got by Blaney for third and Ed was in fifth.
Ironically, Ellenberger and Stewart did not cross the scales before
going to their pit area, but Track Manager Dave Willowby said that
didn't matter and paid them for third and fifth respectively.
Ed plans to be at Lernerville on Friday and Pittsburgh's
Pennsylvania Motor Speedway on Saturday for Mosites Motorsports
night.
Ed celebrates July 4th with crew, friends
and family at Tri City and gets 4th in the Sprint Challenge Sunday
7/4/10
The #2L crew plus Ed, Jr., his sons Ed III and Sye celebrated July
4th with watermelon and Gatorade in the pits at Tri City Speedway on
a 90 degree Sunday that featured their Sprint Challenge Race on Dave
Blaney Night and his induction into the Tri City Hall of Fame.
In the hot lap session for the 20 Sprints on hand , Ed was the
fastest with an AMB i.t. time of 15.255 and a speed of 117.994mph.
Three heats were run with Ed in heat #3. Jack Whitmore and Danny
Holtgraver were the front row starters with Ed and Brandon Spithaler
in row two, then Brent Matus and Bob Felmlee. Holtgraver took
off at the start and Ed was held up momentarily by Whitmore, but
then Ed moved into second with Felmlee third. The finish
showed Holtgraver ahead of Ed by 0.478 sec . the NASCAR star,
himself, Dave Blaney in the Gene Jenkins #55 car won the first heat
over Jack Sodeman, Jr. and Rob Eylar who took the second heat over
Jared Ridge. With the heats in the books. The top 12 Sprints
from the heats then were eligible for a redraw on the front stretch.
Announcer Brian Spaid had Frisbies with numbers on them for a
driver to select, when their name was called. The drivers, of
course, were facing the crowd and couldn't see the numbers. Ed
was lucky this time and picked up the Frisbie #1 and threw it to a
fan in the grandstand.
Thus, the first six rows of the feature were now set as follows:
Ed, Bob Felmlee in row one. Spithaler and Suprick made
up row two. Holtgraver and Sodeman, Jr. were in row three
ahead of Jared Ridge and Blaney in row four. Rob Eyler,
Jeff Taylor, Rod George and Matthew Reed were the last of the
qualified drivers to draw.
All eyes were on the front-row cars of Ed, Jr. and Felmlee as they
completed the first of 25 laps virtually side-by-side. This
tight battle continued with Ed leading the first seven, before that
set-up issue started to cause Ed handling problems . Felmlee
capitalized at this point and passed Ed to take the lead at the
flagstand on lap eight.
One lap later, Blaney took advantage of Ed's problems with his
changing stagger and made his move to take possession of second
spot. On lap 12, George moved ahead of Ed dropping him to fourth.
It was on lap 16 that Blaney made his winning move, dropping Felmlee
to second, Now, it was George in third and Ed in 4th and
Sodeman in fifth. As the laps wound down, the top five
continued to deal with lapped traffic.
At the checkered flag, it was Blaney by 3.859 seconds over Felmlee,
followed by George, Ed and Sodeman, Jr. in the top five.
Rounding out the top ten only Matthew Reed and Holtgraver completed
the 25 laps, down one lap in eighth place it was George Suprick,
then Matus and Spithaler in the top ten.
Plans are for the team to compete at Sharon in the Lou Blaney
Memorial on Wednesday, July 10; Friday would be at Lernerville
and Saturday would be at the Mosites Motorsports Sprint Special at
Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Motor Speedway.
Ed comes within ½ car length of first and
gets sixth in Mercer’s Twin 15’s on Saturday – 7/3/10
The 40-lap FASTRAK feature followed and track re-grooming was
necessary before the second Sprint feature. The crew had plenty of
time to change shocks, gears and tires. Of course, Spithaler
and Miller were on the front row for that one with Ed starting ninth
and Bowser tenth. After six laps, a three car tangle on the
outside coming out of turn two involved Scott Priester, Chris
Shuttleworth and Todd Bauer caused a second yellow and Ed was still
ninth.
With just nine laps to go, Ed did get past Bowser, Rod George and
Spithaler but ran out of laps and had to settle for sixth behind
Miller who led all the way for his first feature at Mercer, Felmlee,
Sodeman, Holtgraver and Kuriger.
Plans are to run Tri City on Sunday, then the Lou Blaney Memorial at
Sharon on Wednesday, Lernerville on Friday and Pittsburgh’s
Pennsylvania Motor Speedway on the special Mosites Motorsports night
for Sprints.
Ed started 12th and fell back, but came
on strong to win Friday at Lernerville - 7/2/10
The final yellow came on lap 15 and after following Kuriger and
Bowser for another lap, Ed lined them up for a pass on lap 17 -
first getting by Bowser and a lap later taking third from Kuriger.
At this time, Ed may have run over debris on the track, because his
right rear tire started to go down. Meanwhile, up front,
Holtgraver replaced Priester as the leader on lap 18. While
those two were battling it out and running side-by-side for a lap on
lap 20 with Priester regaining the lead on lap 21. Ed passed
Holtgraver on the inside to take 2nd on lap 22.
AUGUST
Ed is 3rd in the Auto Racers for Kids
Charities at Mercer on Saturday - 8/28/10
The fourth and final Auto Racers for Kids Charities spearheaded by
Scott Bonnell, had a strong turnout of 36 Sprint car drivers
Saturday night at Mercer Raceway Park and Ed had a good night with a
strong run in his heat and having a podium finish in the accident
riddled feature.
Ed participated in two of these Charity runs: the first at
Sportsman Speedway at Knox and this last one at Mercer with a fourth
and a third place finish respectively.
By pill draw, the cars were lined up in four heats with Ed slated to
start seventh in the third heat which was loaded with talent.
Jack Sodeman, Jr. and Jeff Taylor were in the front row and Ralphie
Spithaler and Ryan Smith were in row two. Bob Felmlee,
Mercer's point leader, and Danny Holtgraver were ahead of Ed in row
three. Ed started seventh with Brandon Spithaler outside him
and finally Mikey Lutz. Ed had a great start and by half way
of the 10 lap heat, he was up to fourth. Only the top three
would be locked into the feature and two laps later, Ed was in third
and looking for more. He passed Felmlee to move into
second on lap nine and then caught and passed race-long leader
Sodeman at the flagstand for the checkered flag.
The first heat was won by front-row starter Brian Ellenberger,
followed by Rod George and Carl Bowser. Heat two went to front
row starter Aaron Shaffer then came Brent Matus and Gale Ruth, Jr.
who passed a fading Russ Sansosti on the last lap. Heat four
was claimed by third starting Daryn Pittman, followed by Chris Best
and Scottie Priester.
A Dash for the fourth and fifth place finishes, resulted in a race
of six laps that determined positions 13 through 20. A B-Main
qualified another four drivers. The top 12 drivers from the heats
reported to the grassy area near the flagstand, where local children
participated in a numbered tennis ball redraw. A driver picked
a child and the child then chose a numbered ball. Scottie
Priester got the pole with Ed's little girl picking a number two for
him. Ellenberger started third with Sodeman, Jr. outside in
fourth. Next came Best, Shaffer, Ruth, Jr., Felmlee, George
and Pittman in 10th, then Brent Matus and Bowser.
Ed led early, then Sodeman took the point on the outside just before
Matus caused the first yellow flag on lap ten. This group uses
double-file restarts in the feature and Sodeman chose outside.
Ed and Sodeman gave the crowd plenty of close action, but Holtgraver
lost power one lap later and the same situation allowed Sodeman to
pick the outside again. Two more yellows came on lap 14 and
finally, the last yellow turned into a red flag "fuel and air only"
stop with 15 laps in the books.
Shortly after the fuel stop, there was a four-car mis-hap on the
front stretch resulted in another closed red. Sodeman, Jr.
conntinued to lead to the finish and with five laps to go, Pittman
passed Ed on the outside on the backstretch. With the field
coming to the checkered, Sodeman held a 10-car length advantage over
Pittman while there was an equal distance back to Ed in third.
Lutz came up from 21st to finish fourth ahead of Felmlee.
Rounding out the top ten it was Ellenberger, George, Andy McKisson,
Dan Kuriger and Holtgraver.
Ed will run the All Star Circuit of Champions race at Lernerville
this Friday.
Ed comes so close to winning the final
point race and championship at Lernerville - 8/27/10
The regular racing season came to a close Friday night at Lernerville Speedway and although Ed had missed three regular nights
of racing when he went to Knoxville twice and Charlotte once, he was
determined to give it his best effort to overcome the19 point
deficit he needed to make up in order to pass present leader Danny
Holtgraver for the Sprint Car Championship, however he fell short of
that goal by 10 points and just missed getting the feature win
tonight by 0.715 seconds.
The night showed the Sprint car field was the largest of the Fab
Four Divisions with 24 cars signed in and running three heats lined
up by luck of the pill draw. Ed was in the second heat and
started third behind Bob Felmlee and Dale Blaney. Brandon
Matus started outside Ed with Brian Steinman and Jimmy Seger in row
three followed by Carl Bowser and Holtgraver. Felmlee led from
wire to wire with Blaney running second until Ed, working the inside
groove, got by to nail second at the finish. Seger followed
Blaney to complete the top four who would be eligible for the
feature redraw. Meanwhile, Holtgraver finished fifth and Ed gained
three points on him. In heat number one, front-row starter
Brian Ellenberger won over Dan Kuriger, Jack Sodeman, Jr. and Rod
George. The third heat saw young Cole Duncan carry a big lead
to the end over Brent Matus, Herman Bertolini and Bill Kiley.
With 15 cars locked into the A-Main, five more would come from the
B-Main to make a 20-car field for the 25-lap feature of Championship
Night. Pole sitter Kuriger discovered engine woes and elected
to start last, so that set up a criss-cross for the feature.
Seger was the new pole sitter and Ed moved from inside the second
row to outside front row. Herman Bertolini and Blaney were in
row two followed by Rod George and Bill Kiley, then Brent Matus and
Duncan, Felmlee and Ellenberger followed. In row six it was
Sodeman, Jr. and Kevin Schaeffer, then Holtgraver in 13th.
At the drop of the green, Ed was outside Seger and even with him
through turns one and two, then Ed pulled ahead as Seger bobbled
coming out of two. Down the back stretch, Ed was leading with
Blaney closing fast and in turn four, Blaney dove inside and did a
slide job on Ed crowding him tight against the wall. Ed had to
lift and Blaney powered ahead. By the time Ed got his car back
under control and pointed in the right direction, he had lost
several spots to George, Seger again and Ellenberger. After two
restarts, Ed got back by Seger into fourth. He had just passed
George on the inside in turn three and was up to third when the red
flag came out for a flip by Sodeman off turn three.
On the following restart, Ed ran down Ellenberger and set sail for
Blaney, closing to within one car length weveral times, but lapped
traffic was dictating the moves Ed could make. On lap 18, Ed
cut into Blaney's lead by 0.455 seconds, but lapped cars fell just
right for Blaney and he maintained his top spot. For the
last two laps, the two diced in and around a group of five lapped
cars, but Blaney managed a 71hundredth of a second lead at the
checkered flag over Ed.
Following in third, it was Ellenberger, Duncan and Holtgraver in the
top five. Rounding out the top ten it was George, Seger, Carl
Bowser, Brent Matus and Sodeman, Jr. Ed shaved nine points off
Holtgraver's point lead, but fell 10 points short as Holtgraver
picked up his first-ever Championship.
Ed plans to be at the Children's Charity Race spearheaded by Scott
Bonnell at Mercer Saturday night.
Ed broke a brake line on lap 4 and still
managed a 7th place finish at Lernerville - 8/20/10
Major repairs were made during the week when the #2L was taken down
to the bare frame and built back up again, finally installing an
engine Friday morning for that night's show at Lernerville
Speedway, but an unexpected problem developed when timing the engine
late that afternoon and a decision was made to replace the rearend
just about the time the crew should have been loading up, however,
the switch was made and they arrived in time to take hot laps,
making a 28 Sprint car field for the night.
Ed was three miles an hour faster than Danny Holtgraver in hot laps
with a time of 13.266 and a speed of 108.548mph. Three heats
were on the board with Ed scheduled to start fourth in the first
heat that had Holtgraver on the pole and Aaron Shaffer beside him in
the front row. Brian Steinman started inside row two with Ed
outside. Rod George and Carl Bowser made up row three,
followed by Sheldon Haudenschild and Dale Blaney, then Brent Matus
and Dave Delisle. Holtgraver jumped to an immediate lead in
lap one and Ed followed in second. Blaney made it up to third
by lap three with Rod George up to fourth on lap four. At the
checkered flag, they finished in that order, all advancing to the
feature and eligible for the redraw.
Around lap four, Ed broke a brake line running fifth and had a hard
time handling the racing and expecially the five following restarts.
He was challenged several times and managed to hold off George and
Blaney through a restart on lap 12. By lap 20, Blaney got by
and so did Sodeman, Jr., but Ed got by Sodeman again one lap later.
Ed came close to making the A-Main, but
ended up 16th in the B-Main 8/14/10
Ed and the team arrived home from Knoxville, Iowa at 5:00pm and made
an all-out effort to get unloaded in record time, but not before he
reflected on his 2010 Knoxville Nationals experience. Everyone
who was there for his Qualifying Night Wednesday) knows that all he
had to do was finish fifth (he was already up from 9th to 6th after
one lap) in his A-Main Wednesday and he would have been set in the
A-Main Saturday night.
But everyone who reads www.edlynchjr.com Website, knows his big
night for gathering points was Wednesdy and he did make the A-Main
and starting 9th, he was already up to 6th at the end of one lap.
But having to take evasive action when David Gravel spun and
stayed on the gas, Ed backed into the outside fence. Then as he
missed the spinning car of Gravel, he sat there with the yellow
light on. Bronson Maeschen came full-bore into the turn and
hit the #2L. Both cars had to be towed and were done for the
night. With a little luck, there wouldn't have been a spinning
car and Ed could have finished fifth or better and been locked into
the Knoxville Nationals A-Main.
Because the Scrambles were washed out Friday, the A, B and C-Mains
for Saturday were lined up straight up by points with the high point
men up front. The 22-lap B-Main that Ed was in, went non-stop
and set a New Track Record, running the 22-laps in 6 min. 06
seconds.
In hot laps for the B-Main, Ed felt comfortable and the only change
the team made was gears. The original start was a no-go
because Tyler Walker, who had started last, jumped two rows before
the green flag waved, then he went down the front stretch and jumped
the cushion in turn one and flipped into the outside fence.
On the complete restart, front row starter Stevie Smith led with
pole-sitter Paul McMahan running second. Ed started deep in
the field in row eight, but was on the move and had passed six cars
by lap eight using the inside groove. He started getting loose
and had to switch to the outside lane and do the best he could as he
lost positions.
After the race, the crew found that the left rear tire had shrunk
1.5", although the air pressure was not a problem, and, of course
that changed the stagger. The Good Year engineers were
informed and were concerned, but had no explanation for the change
in circumference.
The 50th Annual Knoxville Nationals A-Main was a classic display of
driving by Sammy Swindell, who handled lapped traffic perfectly and
held off everything Donny Schatz could throw at him. Their
repeated slide jobs were real crowd pleasers. However, while
leading, Swindell blew a left rear tire in turn four on lap 47,
handing the lead to Schatz.
But Tim Shaffer, who started seventh, was in second spot and passed
Schatz who lost a cylinder and oil pressure as they were coming for
the white flag. Shaffer took the top prize of $150,000 and
Schatz finished second while Shane Stewart, Craig Dollansky and
Kerry Madsen rounded out the top five. The E-Main went to Greg
Nikitanko, the D went to Jonathan Cornell and Danny Lasoski took the
C-Main. Swindell won the Jesse Hockett Mr. Sprintcar Award and
Title for finishing the highest in 10 races for the 410 cars.
On the trip home (in Illinois) there was a problem with the trailer,
but the team made road-side adjustments and continued with the trip.
Ed commented, "I'm glad I had the opportunity to race against the
best in the country in front of that big crowd (grandstand
attendance was announced at 23,108 - not including suites or pit
area). The show was tape delayed and will be shown August 28
at 4:30PM.
Ed will start 16th
in
After the second night
of qualifying for the remaining 50 cars was completed on Thursday,
the points were combined and they show the top 20 will make the
A-Main for the Knoxville Nationals, the next 20 will be in the
B-Main, while the next 10 will be locked into the C-Main for
Saturday night.
Ed’s total points are 407 and that slots him into 16th
in the B-Main with drivers Mike Reinke, David Gravel, Cale Conley,
Randy Hannagan, Ricky Logan, Dean Jacobs, Keith Bloom, Jr., Brad
Sweet and Gary Wright who will start the B-Main behind the
B-Scramble cars. Local driver Brian Brown has the most points
(484) of the 100 drivers.
Friday Ed is to be at
the Knoxville National Sprint Car Hall of Fame second floor at
Then later on Friday at
Ed’s youngest son Sye was entered in the Mini-Nationals at the
Slideways Karting track Thursday and the whole team, plus Charlie,
Ed makes the A-Main at
With an even 50 cars
on hand for the first of two Qualifying Nights for the 50th
Annual Knoxville Nationals, Ed did OK in time trials, advanced from
his heat to the A-Main and was passing cars, but after one lap he
was forced to go high to miss a spinning car and slid backwards into
the turn one outside fence then was hit by another car that did
extensive front-end damage to the #2L and Ed was done for the night.
Once again, the
temperature was above 90 in Iowa and the crew headed to the track
around
Ed was in the second
group for hot laps and the track got faster by the third group where
Cale Conley ended up being the fastest of all cars in hot laps with
a time of 15.412 and a speed of 117mph.
Tim Shaffer who went
out fifth ended up with fast time of the night with a time of
15.372.
Ed went out 20th
and timed in at 15.738 on his first and only lap due to electrical
problems.
That slotted him 24th
overall and lined him up fourth in the fourth heat behind Brad
Sweet, Australian Domain Ramsey and Jack Dover.
The heats inverted
eight cars and were 10 laps in distance.
With Sweet leading and
Ed in second with one lap down,
there was a tangle
against the outside wall in turn one involving
Only one car of the
top ten time-trialers made the A-Main from their heats and that was
Crocker, so to say the B-Main was loaded is an understatement.
During the
break in the program, fans were treated to the Budweiser Clydesdale
horses in their parade gear that made a complete lap around the
track as the flashbulbs went off in the Main Grandstand, the Hall of
Fame suites and the back stretch bleachers.
First
the C-Main advanced Craig Kinser and Justin Henderson to the back of
the B-Main.
The first eight cars
to line up for the B-Main consisted of the eight fastest timers –
Shaffer, Dave
Blaney, Jason Johnson, Conley, Jason Meyers, Randy Hannagan, Kerry
Madsen and Joey Saldana.
The top four finishers
that advanced to the back of the A-Main after 12 laps were Shaffer,
Johnson, Saldana and Madsen (who actually finished fifth, but was
awarded fourth when Meyers went to his pits before going to the
scales).
The top eight who
qualified for the A-Main were inverted, thus the line-up showed
Kemenah and Brandon Wimmer on the front row followed by David Gravel
and Heskin.
Row three had Jason
Sides and Johnson then Lynton Jeffery and Erin Crocker.
Ed started inside
Bronson Maeschen in row five.
At the drop of the
green, Ed looked strong and passed one car on the back stretch and
another before turn three and one more in turn four.
He was up to 6th
going past the flagstand.
As he approached turn
one to start lap two, Gravel, who had started third, spun on the
inside and started to come up across the track.
Ed went high to miss
him and got in the loose stuff and slid backwards into the outside
fence.
Maeschen had no where
to go and slammed into Ed’s front end, doing extensive damage and
those two went off on wreckers, while Gravel was untouched and
finished the race.
Late in the 25-lap
race, Shane Stewart who won the 360 Championship race here Saturday,
caught the leader Kemenah in traffic and passed him for the win
while third running Dollansky followed suit and went into second to
complete the podium finish.
Heskin, Sides, Wimmer,
Kerry Madsen (from the B), Jeffrey, Johnson and Shaffer (also from
the B) made up the top ten.
Ed comes from 14th to 4th at Lernerville
on Friday 8/6/10
The 23 cars ran three heats and Ed had no luck with a high pill draw
that had him start seventh in an eight car heat race. After
being the fastest car in hot laps and the only car in the 104.272
bracket (second quickest was Carl Bowser at 100.566), then the track
quickly dried and changed and Ed's second heat was headed by Jack
Sodeman, Jr. and Kevin Schaeffer. Bob Felmlee and Scott
Priester were in row two while Doug Kekich and Jimmy Light made up
row three. Ed started inside row four with Bobbi Rankin
outside.
His heat went all green until a yellow after seven laps were in of
the scheduled eight lap heat. Most had Ed in fourth at that
point (even the AMB i.t. electronic scoring), but the officials
lined Ed up fifth instead of fourth and it was green and
checkered and Ed finished fifth behind Sodeman, jr., Felmlee,
Schaeffer and Priester. The other heats were won by
pole-sitters also, Bowser and Andy McKisson.
After just two laps with McKisson leading, there was a five-car
mishap in turn four. with Ed up to eighth on the restart
line-up. Sodeman was one of the cars involved and he must have
had damage, because he was the cause of the next yellow on lap
three. The track crew appeared to be spreading a dust over a
trail of liquid that leaked from Sodeman's car. With 11 laps
in the books,, Steinman lost power in turn two and Ed was up to
fifth.
There were no more stoppages and despite Ed turning his fastest lap
of the feature on lap 18, The leader McKisson was long gone
with no serious challenge from Ellenberger who finished second.
Rod George, who started fourth did finish third and had Ed hounding
him the last five laps, The finish showed McKisson leading
Ellenberger, then came George and Ed. Bowser, Holtgraver,
Kuriger, Brent Matus, Felmlee and Schaeffer were in the top ten.
The team will take off for Knoxville on Saturday morning, therefore
Ed will not be running Mercer, however, Lynch Racing is sponsoring a
heat race in Mercer's third annual Race for the Cure, to raise money
for Cancer Research. We will be sending updates on this
website regarding all the Knoxville experiences, probably starting
the first of the week. Currently, there are 109 entries and Ed
qualifies Wednesday with 54 cars. More news will be coming
from Knoxville shortly.
September
Ed makes the WoO Commonwealth Clash
A-Main at Lernerville, but is the first car out with a blown left
rear - 9/25/10
The World of Outlaws made their final appearance of the year
at Lernerville Speedway, this time on
a Saturday night in September, and Ed was in the field of 34 cars
that showed up for the Commonwealth Clash that featured the Sprints
as a stand-alone attraction, which was a welcome relief from the
trend lately of having multiple divisions show up for a lengthy
show.
All the best plans the team had toward achieving a good finish were
dashed when Ed blew a left rear tire on lap nine of the 35-lap
feature in turn two and came to a halt at the top of the track on
the back stretch with too much damage to the #2L from the shredding
tire to continue. As pieces of the tire ripped part of
the fiberglass cowl away and tore the power steering lines off the
car, then hitting Ed's left arm and shoulder as his crew watched
helplessly from the infield where the teams were in the ready state
in case there was a yellow and their driver should need a quick pit
stop.
Not realizing how extensive the damage was, Ed's bewildered crew
watched as he had the push truck behind him and went straight to the
'real' pit area outside turns three and four, while they were all in
the infield waiting to change his tire.
The evening started off in typical fashion with a high pill draw for
Ed and he would go out 25th for his time trial. The track was
pretty wet and after hot laps when Ed was fifth fastest, but then
the first two groups were given another hot lap session and
following those, Ed was now eleventh with times in the low 13 second
bracket. But, when the official time trials got underway, nine
cars were in the 12 second bracket, and Ed was one of them.
Tim Shaffer set fast time of 12.844 with Donny Schatz next, followed
by Dale Blaney, Jason Meyers, Jason Sides and Ed in sixth with a
time of 12.926 seconds and a speed of 125.309 miles per hour.
Behind Ed still in the 12 second bracket, it was Sammy Swindell,
Kerry Madsen and Paul McMahan. With the top four staggered and
inverted in four heats, Ed was to start third in the second heat
behind Craig Dollansky and Danny Lasoski. Beside Ed in row two
was Donny Schatz, Brian Ellenberger, Kraig Kinser, Mike Lutz and
Lindsay Enscoe.
Dollansky took off and led Lasoski and entire eight lap distance of
Ed's heat. Schatz pulled ahead of Ed after the first lap as Ed
held fourth through the half-way mark, but a side-by-side battle
with Kraig Kinser showed the two battling to the checkered
with Kinser winning the battle. But since the top five advance
to the A-Main in tonight's WoO event, Ed made the A-Main. The
other heat winners were McMahan, Sam Hafertepe, Jr. and Brad Sweet,
who filed in for the injured Joey Saldana.
With McMahan winning the Dash, he won the pole position to the
feature, with Schatz being the fastest car in the top five in heats
that did not qualify for the Dash, he was added to the Dash as well
as Dale Blaney. Those three started in those positions in the
feature. Jason Meyers started fourth ahead of Steve Kinser and
Lasoski. Dollansky and Lucas Wolfe were in row four.
Sweet and Hafertepe were next, ahead of Tim Shaffer (who won the
B-Main after rear-end woes scratched him from his heat after setting
fast time). Jason Sides started 12th, then Ed in 13th inside
Sammy Swindell.
The only change to Ed's car was a different set of gears prior to
the feature. but it was McMahan who looked in command on the
first half of the race. Swindell was ahead of Ed at the end of
the first lap. Then Madsen pulled ahead of Ed on lap three.
Jac Haudenschild was next to detect Ed, Jr's problem with his low
tire. By the time Andy Priest got by Ed, the handling problem
became more evident. Just after the signal for eight
laps completed, Ed's tire was the problem and he was done for
the night, credited with 24th spot.
Schatz won out over McMahan, Shaffer, Blaney and Dollansky.
Rounding out the top ten, it was Meyers, Sweet, Haudenschild,
Lasoski and Swindell.
Ed plans to be at the Williams Grove National Open for the coming
week-end.
Ed gets a podium finish after starting
9th in the Tri-Star Pittsburgher Saturday night - 9/18/10
For the first time in years, Saturday night Pittsburgh's
Pennsylvania Motor Speedway scheduled a second Sprint car race
of the year, and for the first time ever, it was part of the
Pittsburgher which normally was their big season-ending Late Model
race on their Monster half-mile and Ed was part of the 22-car field
that showed up to be part of this history-making event.
Counting this race, PPMS now has 76 Sprint car races in their books
with 40 different winners over the years. Ed is the leading
feature winner with 12 while Johnny Beaber ranks second with seven
and Mark Cassella is third with four. Another
interesting statistic is that Ed Lynch, Sr. is on the list with two
Sprint feature wins, not to mention his big memorable Modified win,
when he came from one-lap down because of a flat tire to win a
50-lap event.
Ed's pill draw started him sixth in the second of two Sprint car
heats. Brent Matus and Chris Pochira were in the front row
with Craig Folmer and Danny Holtgraver made up row two.
Herman Bertolini started inside Ed in row three and behind them it
was Davey Jones and Brian Ellenberger, Dan Shetler, Davey Sammons
and Adam Anderson.
Holtgraver grabbed the lead immediately with Ed following in second
and that's the way they finished after eight laps with Ed just 1.620
seconds behind. Ellenberger was third ahead of Sammons, Matus
and Shetler. Those six would be part of a redraw for the
20-lap feature. From the first heat the qualified drivers were
Carl Bowser, Travis Philo, Kevin Schaeffer, Jack Sodeman, Jr., Roger
Campbell and Jeff Taylor.
It was a long day at PPMS because of all the divisions and the #2L
crew arrived in the pits at 2:00PM and it was 9:47 when their
feature pulled on the track. The feature re-draw put
Holtgraver and Sodeman, on the front row followed by Schaeffer and
Matus. Row three had Shetler and Philo followed by Campbell
and Ellenberger. Ed drew a nine which started him in row five
with Taylor. Row six had Bowser and Sammons.
After an aborted initial start, the race got underway with
Holtgraver leading Sodeman, Jr. for the entire 20-lap non-top race.
Ed was up to seventh after one lap and climbed to fifth by lap two.
Meanwhile, the front two were stretching out their lead with a clear
track in front of them. Ed got by Philo to claim fourth with
Shetler next on his agenda.
By lap five, lapped cars were part of the puzzle and Ed made his way
to third on lap seven. Depending on how the lapped traffic
fell, Ed turned laps eight through lap 14 slightly faster than the
leaders, trying to cut into their track advantage. Because of
the leaders early advantage with the clear track, it was difficult
for Ed to overcome the track distance the leaders had. At the
end of the distance, there were only nine cars on the lead lap.
Holtgraver and Sodeman, Jr. finished one and two with Sodeman 1.473
seconds behind Holtgraver and Ed that same distance behind Sodeman.
Ellenberger and Bowser rounded out the top five followed by Philo,
Shetler, Sammons, Schaeffer all completeing the 20 laps.
Brandon Matus was tenth, one lap down.
The World of Outlaws come to Lernerville on Saturday, September 25
for the Commonwealth Clash and Ed and his team will be there.
Ed was eliminated by Arnie Kent in
Mercer's Western PA Sprint Championship race and in the Dirtcar
Sprint Challenge Series he was leading - 9/12/10
When Ed started the 25-lap feature, he was leading the points in the
Dirtcar Sprint Challenge 10 raceSeries (this would be the final race
in this series) and he would start ninth (in a race he previously
had won) and was up to seventh in just six laps, when Arnie Kent who
started fifth and had driven with all four wheels in the infield in
turns three and four on two previous laps, did it again. But
this time he was out of control - after hitting the infield berm so
hard that he lost control of his car Kent started flipping from the
inside of the track all the way across the track to the outside
groove where Ed had been running for several laps.
"I saw him flipping and wondered where he would land because he was
higher than my line of vision," said Ed, "I never thought he would
land on me. The first thing I knew, he had taken off my
top wing and flipped on top of me with his engine screaming.
He flipped me and continued flipping himself."
The extensive damage he caused to the #2L in addition to the top
wing and front wing, included breaking the front axle, wheels,
tires, tail tank, shocks, bumpers, torque tube, rearend, torsion
arms and more, ended Ed's night. But thankfully his J&J car
held up under the punishment and he was able to climb out and walk
away. Ironically, that was the third time in one year that a
flipping car landed on top of Ed.
Twenty-four hours previously, there had been 29 Sprints in the pits
that were lined up in three heats. Ed's pill draw was 36 out
of 65 which lined him up fifth in the third heat behind Bob Felmlee,
Chris Pochira, Nate Stine and Ralphie Spirhaler. Rod George
was outside, followed by Brent Matus, Jack Whitmore and Dan Kuriger.
To be eligible for the top 12 redraw, a driver had to finish in the
first four. Felmlee led all laps from the pole, but Ed made
some good moves and ended up second ahead of George and Kuriger.
Brian Ellenberger won the first heat and Danny Holtgraver won the
second.
The feature redraw gave Ellenberger the pole with Kuriger outside.
Row two would have Holtgraver and Mike Lutz. Kent started
fifth followed by Jack Sodeman, Jr. Todd Bauer and Felmlee. Ed
and Andy McKisson were in row five. Then row six had Eric
Williams and George.
The rain came before the B-Main was on the track and on Sunday, five
cars did not to return. Therefore, all cars present made up
the 24-car field for the feature and their race followed heat races
for the crate Late Models, Stock Cars and Mini Stocks and two
B-Mains for the BRP Modifieds. Dust was a problem at this
point and track officials spent over 30 minutes watering and running
in the track.
The green flag finally flew for the Sprint feature, but a four car
tangle in turn two caused a complete restart. The next yellow
came on lap five with Kuriger leading Ellenberger. Ed ran two
laps on the inside, but switched to the outside and was on the move
up to seventh when his night came to an end after just six laps.
The next race for Lynch Racing will be on Saturday, September 18 as
part of the Pittsburger week-end at Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Motor
Speedway.
Mercer’s WPa Championship and final
Dirtcar Sprint Challenge Series will be on Sunday 9-12-10
Ed finishes 4th in the Oil Region Classic
at Tri City Speedway Sunday - 9/5/10
After Ed made the right call to spend Saturday working in the
garage, rain in the Franklin PA area cancelled Tri City's first day
of their two-day Oil Region Classic featuring the WoO Late Models, a
DIRTcar Sprint Challenge race, a FASTRAK Late Model Race and United
E Mod series event, all of which were on the card for Sunday which
turned out to be a clear, cool, sunny day.
Although the 18 Sprints on hand ran their hot laps and heats first,
starting at 6:00PM their feature was five hours later. The
WoO Late Models time-trialed, ran heats, B-Main and a 50-lap feature
as well as the FASTRAK cars with their complete show and all the
qualifying heats and B-Mains for the E-Mods.
During Sprint hot laps, Ed's second lap was a 14.600 seconds and a
speed of 123.288mph which would have been a new track record if it
would have been in competition instead of hot laps.
A pill draw determined the line-up for the Sprint heats and Ed
started fourth in the first heat behind Dan Kuriger and Brian
Ellenberger in the front row, then Rob Eyler started inside Ed in
row two. Danny Holtgraver, Eric Williams, Jack Sodeman, Jr.
and Jeff Taylor followed.
Ed stayed in the outside lane and finished second behind Ellenberger
despite turning laps five and six faster than the winner
Ellenberger. They were followed to the checkered by Holtgraver,
Eyler, Kuriger and Sodeman, Jr. The second heat belonged to
Bob Felmlee who was followed by Carl Bowser, Rod George and Aaron
Shaffer.
A child in the main grandstand was asked by roving announcer Brian
Spaid, to pick a number for the inversion of the qualified cars
going to the A-Main. That number was six, thus Rod George and
Danny Holtgraver would bring the field to the green flag.
Starting in row two, it was Carl Bowser and Ed, while Bob
Felmlee and Brian Ellenberger were in row three.
Holtgraver led lap one over George with Ed getting by Bowser to
claim third. The top three ran the first six of 25 laps in
that same order. But Ed had thrown an experimental set-up on
the #2L that was hard to handle, costing him that third spot as
Felmlee came past him on lap six. At the one-half-way mark, it
would be Holtgraver over George, then Felmlee just ahead of
Ellenberger.
But, it wasn't to end that way, because Bowser found some grip
and took the position away from Ellenberger on the final lap.
Therefore, the top five boasted Holtgraver with his first-ever win
here at Tri City, followed by Felmlee, George, Ed Lynch, Jr., and
Bowser. Rounding out the top ten it was Ellenberger, Sodeman,
Jr.,Brent Matus, , Eyler and Kuriger.
Ed sets fast time and has a Podium finish in the
36-car All Star race at Lernerville - 9/3/10
Ed's rig was already in the pits when the predicted narrow band of
heavy rain hit Lernerville Speedway between 4:00 and 5:00PM Friday
creating a muddy river down the middle of the pits, but since the
pit area has a slope to it, when the sun came out again, the area
had drained well, the officials made the decision to start selling
pit passes and the All Star show titled Dual in the Dirt for Sprints
and Late Models was going to take place.
Most of the season, Ed's pill draws have been high. Tonight was a
real test for him again as his pill draw was low and he would go out
second on the heavy track. To add to the pressure, even though
the car count was 36, at the drivers' meeting it was announced there
would only be one time trial lap. However, Ed was up to the
task and clocked in at a 13.075 seconds, which held up as fast time
of the night over Tim Shaffer
who went
out 28th and had a time of 13.225.
With the top six in times staggered and inverted for four heats, Ed
started sixth in the first heat behind Doug Kekich and Rod
George in the front row followed by Bob Felmlee and Lance Dewease in
row two. Inside Ed was Bill Rose. In row four it was
Lernerville's newly crowned champion, Danny Holtgraver and Sheldon
Haudenschild, then Herman Bertolini. Felmlee wasted no time
passing pole sitter Kekich for the lead and George held second about
six-carlengths back and Ed advanced three spots to finish third
ahead of Dewease. Jack Sodeman, Jr. came from fourth to win
the second Heat, while Brandon Wimmer took the third heat from his
outside pole position. The final heat went to Dan Kuriger from
his front row starting spot. Byron Reed won the B-Main.
The 30-lap A-Main had a pick-six from kids selected at random in the
grandstand to fill the top six starting spots, thus Greg Wilson
sould start on pole with Dale Blaney outside. Row two showed
Sodeman and Dewease, then row three with Shaffer and Ed in sixth.
Jimmy Segar, Felmlee, Carl Bowser and Keith Kauffman maded up the
front ten.
The field made four attempts at getting the first lap of the feature
in the books. Spins by Bowser, Dean Jacobs and Holtgraver plus
a four-car tangle coming off turn four contributed to those restarts
and necessitating a red flag fuel stop. Of course, the top
spots were juggled each time, only to have to return to the original
line-up. Finally, two laps were recorded with Ed in fourth and
from that point on, the long stretch of 23 green flag laps showed
the fans plenty of side-by-side racing as well as the art of weaving
through lapped cars.
When the final yellow came out on lap 25 (the officials made it lap
24) Shaffer had lapped up to the fifth place car and Ed was able to
reel in Dewease for third spot, that battle never ended until the
checkered flew as Dewease even tried the high line in turn two that
won one segment of the Don Martin Silver Cup for him earlier this
summer.
Ed never left the bottom after that and
held third spot. There were six lapped cars as a cushion for
Shaffer, then Blaney with one lapped car then Ed and Dewease,
several more lapped cars and fifth place Wilson at the finish.
Rounding out the top ten and down one lap it was Sodeman, Cole
Duncan, Brian Ellenberger, David Gravel and Felmlee. The top
three were interviewed on the front stretch by All Star announcer
Owen Fritz.
Ed plans to be at Tri City on Sunday for their Sprint Car Challenge
race.
October
Ed was running 4th early in the DIRTcar
Stampede but a broken power steering ended his night on Saturday -
10/23/10
Blaney went on to take the win over Holtgraver, Brian Ellenberger,
Duncan and Bowser in the top five. Brandon Spithaler, Rod
George, Bob Felmlee, Gale Ruth, Sr. and Good rounded out the top 10.
Ed was credited with 19th spot.
On SPEED the tape delayed Williams Grove National Open showed Ed
battling for a transfer spot in the B-Main and falling just one
position short.
Preparation starts Sunday for Ed and the crew as they focus on the
World of Outlaws 4th Annual World Finals at The Dirt Track at
Charlotte which will be carried LIVE on SPEED-TV in a huge four-hour
broadcast at 8:00p.m. on Saturday the 6th. The event is
November 4-5-6, 2010
Ed is part of the
2nd Annual DIRTcar Round Up "Steel City Stampede" after qualifying
heats on Friday - 10/22/10
As it played out, Ed did get a good pit spot and decided to stay for
the night, so he would not have the parking issue to deal with on
Saturday. His sons Ed III came straight from Pitt and Sye came
straight from 7th grade football practice to help their day qualify
for this weekend final race of the year at their home track.
A record 222 cars signed in to run 25 heat races. The pits
filled quickly and the overflow cars and rigs were forced to set up
in the infield. At the 6:30 drivers meeting the schedule was
on the board and hot laps for only the Late Models, Big Block
Modifieds and Sprints followed and the Sprint heats rolled on to the
track on time at 7:30PM.
Ed's pill draw had him starting sixth in the second of two
heats behind Brent Matus, Brandon Spithaler, a 7x car, Cory Good and
Brian Ellenberger inside Ed in rwo three. Eric Williams, Jack
Whitmore, Brandon Matus and Craig Folmer. Ed made it up to 2nd
behind Spithaler after three laps, but lost a spot to Ellenberger
when the yellow came out for a spin by Whitmore. On the
restart, Ed worked high and low and Ellenbeger, finally making the
pass with three laps to go and then taking the front spot with two
to go for the checkered flag on lap ten. Ellenberger finished
second ahead of Spithaler, Brent Matus, Williams and Good, who were
eligible for the redraw. Dale Blaney won the first heat over
Bob Felmleee, Danny Holtgraver, Cole Duncan, Carl Bowser and Gale
Ruth, Sr.
Pit Steward Smokey Schemp did all the redraws before the
evening was over, so that everyone knew where they would start in
Saturday's 25-lap $3,000-to-win feature. That redraw produced
the Sprint feature lineup to be, last year's winner Cole Duncan on
pole and Cory Good outside him. Danny Holtgraver and Carl
Bowser will be in row two. Ed will start 5th with Dale Blaney
to his outside. Brent Matus and Eric Williams will be in row
four, followed by Bob Felmlee and Gale Ruth. Brandon Spithaler
and Ellenberger will be in row six.
Breakfast will be served from 10:00AM to noon Saturday.
A charity wiener roast will be at 3:00 followed by an autograph
session at 4:00. Drivers' meeting will be at 5:00 with racing
at 6:00PM.
Following Saturday's race, Ed's final race will be in two weeks,
November 4-5-6, at the Dirt Track at Charlotte NC.
Ed will see a limited number of his Model
cars at Lernerville's DIRTcar Round Up Steel City Stampede at
Lernerville 10/12 - 10/13/10
Just in time for early holiday shopping, Ed will put a limited
number of his model #2L cars on sale Friday and Saturday during Lernerville's 2nd Annual DIRTcar Round Up Steel City Stampede.
The larger cars are priced at $85 and the smaller cars are $10.
Stop by his trailer in the pits and he will be happy to autograph
them for you.
Click thumbnails to view larger images
1/64 Scale
1/18 scale
Ed misses making the Williams Grove
National Open by one spot Saturday – 10/2/10
The crew worked hard in the motel parking lot Saturday morning
changing the steering and checking the setup points before they
loaded up and headed for Williams Grove for the final night of the
two day World of Outlaw Morgan Hughes National Open paying $50,000
to win.
The hard work paid off with a much better showing for the #2L
competing in a field of 56 cars tonight. Despite pulling a
high pill which put him last in the fourth of five hot lap groups
and when the session was complete, Ed found he was 12th
overall.
Time trials was up next and with the top 20 being qualified for the
inversion of five heats, Ed’s time of 17.128 slotted him 22nd
of the 56 cars with Sammy Swindell, the first qualifier, fastest
with a time of 16.676.
Ed’s time slotted him fifth in the second heat behind Daryn Pittman
and Kerry Madsen in the front row and Paul McMahan inside Tim
Shaffer in row two. Outside Ed it was Brain Leppo, then Jim
Siegel and last night’s winner Greg Hodnett. Behind them, it
was <Mark Smith, Cory Haas and Danny Lasoski.
The heats were eight laps and the finish was just as they started,
Pittman, Madsen, McMahan, Shaffer and Ed. But, only the first
fdur would advance to the A-Main and thus Ed would have to run the
B-Main. The other heats went to Lucas Wolfe, Sam Hafertepe,
Jason Sides and Jason Meyers.
In the 12-lap B-Main Ed started fifth again behind Donnie Kreitz,
Kraig Kinser, Keith Kauffman and Girard McIntire. There was a
red flag on lap three for Adam Wilt. But once again the finish
showed Kinser, Kreitz, Kauffman and McIntire. Ed finished
fifth and only four advanced to the A-Main that was a 40-lapper won
by Sammy Swindell.
The changes that were made were good ones and Ed just needed one or
two spots to pull off making the National Open against a very strong
field of 410 Sprinters.
Ed has trouble early at Williams Grove on
night one of the National Open Friday – 10/1/10
Ed and the crew made the annual trip to Williams Grove for the
National Open and were part of the big 58-car field that was on hand
for night one of the two-day World of Outlaw sanctioned event on a
sunny, cool Friday and were part of the group pitted off the
backstretch outside the track, but after getting heat in his engine,
he went out in the fourth of five groups to hot lap because of
drawing a high 56 pill, the time he turned in hot laps of 17.415
ended
up 23rd after the
session was over, but time trials were next and not good for the
#2L.
The car did not have a comfortable feel (maybe steering or maybe
something else) during hot laps, but Ed couldn’t figure out the
problem. When the green flag dropped to start his first lap,
Ed went down into turn one and jumped the cushion and backed it into
the outside fence. He got pushed off and came around to take
the green flag starting his second lap of time trials and managed a
time of 18.117 that slotted him around 35th.
He wasn’t sure where the car was headed even on the straight-aways
and so he elected to scratch for the night. Before they left
the track, they did get some welding done on the back of the car.
They will work on the car in the AM and come back tomorrow
(Saturday) and try again.
November & December
The 4th
Annual Lowes Foods World Finals runs before a standing-room-only
crowd at The Dirt Track at Charlotte Motor Speedway – 11/6/10
With Ed’s time trials already in the books from Thursday’s
qualifying night efforts, he was set to start fourth in the third
heat behind Donny Schatz, Lance Dewease and Chad Kemenah.
Following Ed, it would be Jessica Zemken, Freddie Rahmer, Ben Gregg,
Cody Darrah, Chad Layton, Toni Lutar, Wayne Johnson, Keith Baxter,
Danny Mumaw and Mark Cole. Ed ran third and was within
striking distance of Schatz on several occasions while Dewease
jumped into the lead. But Ed settled for third ahead of Ben
Gregg and Darrah thus making the A-Main. The other heats went
to Paul McMahan, Joey Saldana and Sam Hafertepe, Jr.
After all the heats for the other classes and the Modified feature
(that had a total of 26 flat tires) and Late Model feature , it was
announced that all Friday ticket holders had to exit the track and
be re-admitted in order to have their Saturday tickets scanned.
The track preparation crew headed by Randy Grove wanted to rework
the track before the Friday Sprint feature.
The Friday 25-lap Sprint feature had Sam Hafertepe, Jr. and Jason
Meyers in the front row, followed by Joey Saldana and Daryn Pittman.
In row three it was Dewease and Tim Shaffer ahead of Paul McMahan
and Donny Schatz. Row five had Lucas Wolfe and Craig Dollansky then
Ed inside Steve Kinser in row six. With eight laps down,
SaAdamm Hafertepe, Jr. spun while in second behind Meyers and that
brought out a yellow. Ed did not a good bite at the start and
he lost two spots and was now in thirteenth.
The red flag waved on lap 10 for a violent spin and hit on the front straightaway wall, just past the flagstand, by Jac Haudenschild who was just ahead of Ed. He also collected Sammy Swindell who was just behind Ed. A third car receiving damage in the mess was Brian Ellenberger. Ed was lucky to miss the crash, and was now running 11th. He had passed Dale Blaney, but Blaney passed him back on the restart and at the checkered flag, it was Meyers, Saldana, Daryn Pittman, Schatz and Shaffer in the top five. Next came McMahan, Steve Kinser, Wolfe, Sides, Kraig Kinser, Blaney and Ed in 12th
Saturday’s Sprint heats showed Ed starting seventh in the fourth
heat behind Dewease, and Chad Kemenah, Jessica Zemken, Sides, Danny
Lasoski, Saldana, Ed Lynch, Jr. Behind Ed it was Craig
Dollansky, Brian Montieth, Eighth it was Ben Gregg, Joey Moughan,
Chuck Hebing, 2T- Brian Smith and Rick Fraley. The outcome was
Dewease winning over Saldana, Jason Sides, Danny Lasosik, had
Kemenah. Dollansky, Zemken, then, Ed, Adam Wilt, Sheldon
Haudenschild, Chad Layton and Toni Lutar. The other heats went
to Pittman, Sammy Swindell.
Pittman won the Dash while Freddie Rahmer won the C-Main. Ed
lined up 10th
in the B-Main and that’s where he finished. Shaffer and
Hafertepe made up the front row followed by Zemken, Kyle Sauder,
Wolfe, Haudenschild, Cale Conley, Curt Michaels, Shane Stewart and
Ed were in row five. Only four cars advanced to the A-Main.
Jason Meyers started outside the front row of the feature and he won
it along with the WoO Sprint Champion. The race was broadcast
live, but watch for re-runs on SPEED-TV.
Ed gets hot laps in before the show rains
out Friday at The Dirt Track at Charlotte forcing a double show
Saturday –11/5/10
Sprint cars qualified for Friday and
Saturday’s World Finals at The Dirt Track at Charlotte on Thursday-
11/4/10
A big turnout of Sprints showed up Thursday
for the 4th
Annual World of Outlaw World Finals at The Dirt Track at Charlotte.
Once the overnight rain stopped at 11:30AM, Ed and the crew spent
the day fine tuning and getting the #2L ready for hot laps and
qualifying that evening.
Ed drew a higher number for the first
set of qualifying laps which would lock the cars in for Friday
night’s program. Each car entered the track just before turn
three and coming out of turn four, the green flag was displayed to
start the single lap of qualifying. Ed’s lap was near perfect
with a time of 12.680 which held up to be third fastest overall.
The top ten in times for Friday’s show looks like this – 1) Craig
Dollansky 12.538, 2)Tim Shaffer 12.607 3)Ed Lynch, Jr. 12.680 4)Daryn
Pittman 12.698 5)Steve Kinser 12.742 6)Danny Holtgraver 12.752
7)Chad Kemenah 12.791 8)Jason Sides 12.825 9)Paul McMahan 12.827
l0)Joey Saldana 12.833. Timing third will start Ed fourth in
the third heat behind Donny Schatz, Lance Dewease, Chad Kemenah and
Ed on Friday night.
Five Modified heats were next on the
program for the 52 Modifieds on hand, while previously the 76 WoO
Late Models signed in ran two consecutive time trial laps of which
the first is their time for Friday and the second lap will be their
Saturday times.
The Sprints were up next with another
round of time trials and Ed’s car didn’t perform as well and his
time was a 13.219, ranking 28th
in the 56 car field. That means he will start seventh in the
fourth heat on Saturday. Donny Schatz was fast qualifier with a time
of 12.699.
Friday the
Spectator gates open at 3:00PM and Opening Ceremonies will be at
4;45PM. Listen LIVE to Johnny Gibson on
www.dirtvision.com
One of the coldest World Finals to start
Thursday and run Friday and Saturday - 11/1/10
An Artic Blast is headed for Charlotte as well as all the top
Sprint, Late Model and Modified team in the country. This
weekend, November 4, 5 and 6, marks the 4th Annual World Finals
presented by Bimbo Bakeries and Tom's Snacks and co-promoted by
World Racing Group and The Dirt Track at Charlotte Motor Speedway
and sanctioned by the World of Outlaws.
Ed will be part of Time Trials Qualifications on Thursday night that
will set both the Friday night and Saturday night's race programs.
All cars participate all nights and to listen to the voice of Johnny
Gibson call the action nightly, tune in on your computer to
www.dirtvision.com
in addition, Saturday night's show will be LIVE on SPEED-TV starting
at 8:00PM ET and lasting four hours, broadcast for the first time in
high definition (HD).