Springport Motor Speedway - June 7, 2008
MAURICE ASSUMES THE POINT LEAD
The points battle has been very tight up until the June 7th event at Springport. Scott Phillips has fallen behind following his crash early on at the Spartan Speedway race along with not being able to appear at the Springport race. Jim DeBaeke fell back after failing to show up for the Springport race. And the 2007 champion, Tim Phillips experienced problems before the feature began as his engine failed to start. Maurice stated, "All of a sudden, I'm in the point lead. This is not how I wanted to assume the point lead with this StreamNetRadio.com Dodge, but I guess I'll just keep doing what I'm doing and enjoy it. Who knows, my bad luck might be due soon as well. Our next points event will be at Spartan Speedway, and I seem to have a little trouble there."
Maurice certainly has Springport figured out as he once again set fast time. The heat and humidity along with slippery track conditions erased any chance of breaking his own track record there, but nevertheless, it was a quick run at 18.915 seconds.
Instead of breaking the field up into two heat races, this time the fastest four cars were lined up for a 4-lap fast car dash. Maurice started on the outside of row 2 with Tim Phillips on the inside. Dave Harrison started on the outside of the front row and the 4th fastest qualifier, Dave Taylor, started on the pole. Harrison was leading as the white flag flew with Maurice Randall right on his bumper. Maurice made a pass to the inside down the back straightaway and appeared to be headed for the win until his #93 Dodge got loose out of turn 4. Stating afterwards, "That was a fast, fun race, but I just couldn't hold the car straight coming out of 4. Harrison got a good run on me on the outside and we had a photo finish at the line. I didn't know who won yet." The winner was Dave Harrison by inches.
The feature race was very competitive as Maurice's car appeared to be a bit slower as the night wore on. He said, "I missed the setup a little and the car was still loose coming out of turn 4. I knew my best chance at winning would be another pass out of 2 if I was able to get up to the leader." Both Dave Harrison and Ed Welch were having the best runs of their careers and unlike Maurice, they got faster during the night. Dave and Ed had a big battle going for much of the race until Dave made the pass to take the lead. Maurice was right there and followed Dave through. The trio continued this formation until about 4 laps to go when Maurice made the same move on Dave Harrison as he did on Scott Phillips at the last Springport race. It was a big run through 1 and 2 and then to the inside of Harrison down the back straightaway. Following his win, Maurice said, "I'm going to have to figure out a different move when we come back to Springport in July. These guys will probably figure out how to block me coming out of two."
June 13th and 14th brings the next two events for Maurice as he and a few other Mini Cup drivers from the Great Lakes Supercup Series head down to Anderson Speedway and Mt. Lawn Speedway in Indiana to do battle with the Mini Cups from the Indianapolis area. These two events will be non-points races for the GLS teams.