Chad Lundquist/Nevada Appeal
Third generation sprint car driver Tim Kaeding took a break from winning World of Outlaws races to take a flag to flag win at Reno-Tahoe-Fernley’s fast 3/8 mile oval last Saturday night. Kaeding, who has seven World of Outlaws victories to his credit so far this season, spanked the field of 18 sprint cars, including dad Brent Kaeding, who finished ninth. Local racing divisions also were in action, with 11-year-old Buddy Kofoid taking the KWS Lite sprint car main over Danielle and Dan Simpson. David Paine ran away with the Mod Mini main, besting Stephen Crook Jr., Will Ritchey, and the rest of the field, and Tom Haxall beat Rick Miller, Shane Ramthun, and Tommy Sampson to the flag in the Hobby Stock main.
•••
There’s demolition derby action at RTF Speedway tonight, a doubleheader featuring a derby for small import cars and a second for big domestic cars. Action starts at 7 p.m. and general admission is $10. Next Saturday night will be the final points race of the season for the Fernley 95A series, with all divisions participating. The season-ending two-day Shootout is scheduled for Oct. 4-5 with a huge field of Dwarf cars expected. The scheduled Oct. 25-26 King of the West sprint car race has been canceled.
•••
Mackena Bell is back in action today in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Bell will start from fifth place after a qualifying run only three-tenths of a second off the pole time. You can watch her fifth-place finish in the race at Greenville-Pickens Speedway on Fox Sports 1 at 9 a.m. Sunday morning.
•••
Reverberations from the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Richmond are still rattling cages at Michael Waltrip Racing. The $300,000 fine they received for “actions detrimental to stock car racing” was merely the tip of the iceberg. When the points penalty dropped Martin Truex Jr. out of the Chase, the team took an even bigger financial hit. I have it on good authority that just making the Chase is worth between $3-4 million. And last week, NAPA Auto Parts announced it was dropping sponsorship of the team as of Dec. 31. That’s rumored to be about a $16 million hit. And we haven’t heard from Aaron’s or 5-Hour Energy yet. It’s a shame, because Michael Waltrip and his teams have been generally good for the sport. It just proves the old saying that one “Aw, crap” can wipe out 100 “attaboys.”
Truex, who may be out of a ride next year because of the sponsorship loss, qualified fifth for Sunday’s Cup race. Ryan Newman, who calls N
New Hampshire “the birthplace of track position,” is on the pole. Last time he took pole at the track, he won the race. Ten of the 13 Chase contenders qualified in the first 12 spots.
•••
Formula One is back in action this weekend in Singapore, with the series’ only night race. The big news out of the series this weekend is that former world champion Kimi Raikkonen will be leaving the financially troubled Lotus team in 2014. He will be rejoining Ferrari, the team for which he won their last world championship. Fernando Alonso, who is not known for embracing competitive teammates, will not be happy at this turn of events, but Ferrari management is known to care little about what their drivers think. To recall a couple of F1 radio transmissions of the past couple of years, if Kimi hears “Fernando is faster than you,” instead of pulling over he’s likely to repeat his most famous line, “leave me alone, I know what I’m doing.”