Hornet Class popular at Saratoga Speedway as season winds down.

This season the Hornet class has become the new entry class at Saratoga Speedway. On Saturday night there were 30 cars on hand, the highest car count of any class at the Black Creek oval in nearly twenty years. Along with the Hornets, the 3rd last race of the 08 season sponsored by Little Caesars Pizza featured the Crash to Pass cars as well as the Figure 8’s and Road Runners.

The Hornet class is open to four cylinder cars with minimum safety requirements. This allows someone interested in getting into racing to enter the sport with very little cost. With a non contact rule in place for the class there is very little maintenance on the cars. These cars are so easy to build that many of them have been built in one night, and is one of the main reasons that the car count has gone beyond expectations and why it keeps growing.

Saturday night the car count was aided by 11 Hornet cars from Victoria with 10 impressively coming into the speedway on a car hauler. In qualifying Phil Lagan, the 08 Western Speedway point champion set a new track record three different times with his fastest lap being a 18.956. He then went on to win the 35 lap main event ahead of fellow Victoria racers Phil Calnan and Jean Luc Lagan. With such a big car count the Hornets ran three heat races won by Andrew Buchanan, Victoria’s Tyler Woods and Calnan while Campbell River’s Darren Werebowy took the win in the B main.

In Crash to Pass racing Campbell River’s Travis Stevenson went a long way to claiming the season points championship by taking wins in the heat race then the win in the 25 lap main event ahead of Ryan Monks and Tom Dunns to boast his lead to over 200 points ahead of Monks with one race remaining.

A good field of Road Runners were on hand and put together two highly competitive races with point leader Kermit Dahl padding his point lead with the heat race win then a 2nd place finish in the 25 lap main event right on the bumper of race winner Riley Carter and ahead of Hanns Baan.

The increased car count in the Hornet class has seen a decrease in the Figure 8 car count as a number of racers decided to join in the non contact full track racing Hornets. This has left the Figure 8’s low on cars but still good racing as point leader Brandon Steen held of a determined Walker Welsh for the 15 lap main event win while Welsh held the hot hand in the heat race by taking the win.

The 2nd last race of the season with double points up for grabs goes this Saturday night with three championships to be decided in the Stock car, IMCA Modifides and the Dwarf cars and they will be joined by the Bomber and Hornet cars along with the last race for the Motorcycles whose point champion for 08 will be Dean Thompson.

In the Stock car class four drivers are still in the hunt with Victoria’s Kerry Steen holding the upper hand with a 74 point lead on Mike Dionne followed by Martin Beaulieu, who is 182 points back and Don Hallgarth who is 192 back.

In IMCA racing Victoria’s Tony Johnson holds a slim 1 point advantage on 06 and 07 point champion, Oyster River’s Chris Beaulieu, followed by Kevin Noble only 21 points back. Pat Brown is 24 back and Rob Ryan is 107 points away leaving all four a chance at the 08 championship.

The 2nd last Bomber race as they finish their season October 11th has Port Albernie’s Rob Gaudrealt leading the points race 48 points up on Campbell River’s Stewart Lee followed by Kyle Harrison at 117 back, Andy Meyers 285 back and the 5th and last driver still with a chance at the championship, Justin Beaulieu 315 points back.

The Hornet cars will also end their season October 11th making Saturday night their 2nd last race of the 2008 season. They have four drivers still with championship hopes and they are Dave Hargrave who sits in first ahead of Doug McLean followed by Lyle Bowlen and Joceyln Popwich with a outside shot.

Racing action this Saturday night have gates open at 5.30 followed by qualifying at 6 and racing at 7pm. Next Saturday night will be the season’s final race that will feature along with the Bomber cars, Crash to Pass, Hornets, Figure 8’s and the Road Runners, the great pumpkin race and a season ending fireworks display which is always a sight to see and remember.

An error from the last speedway report had the season ending banquet on October 17th when it is actually on November 15th at the Best Western Hotel with tickets available at the Speedway or for more info call 250-923-2982.