Quincy, MI (Wednesday, August 18, 2021) - Kicking off the final leg of the 2021 DIRTcar Summer Nationals Hell Tour, 24 UMP Late Models unloaded alongside 39 Summit Racing Equipment Modifieds Wednesday night at Butler Motor Speedway. As the program unfolded, it became key that track position would be extremely important.
Devin Moran and Bobby Pierce led the field to the green flag for the 40 lap feature that capped the night on Wednesday. Moran got the jump on the initial start, but a pile up in turn four on the opening lap reset the stage. As for the crash, Thomas Hunziker got out of shape on the backstretch and couldn’t gather it back up before spinning in front of multiple cars on the bottom of the track. The spin collected Eric Spangler, Hillard Miller, and Tanner English, who was second in Hell Tour points coming into the weekend.
On the restart, Pierce put some weight behind the nickname “Smooth Operator”, jumping out in front of Moran and Ashton Winger. The biggest challenge of the night for Pierce came in lapped traffic near the midway point of the race. The bottom line was the dominate way to get around the ⅜ths mile high banked oval, putting backmarkers directly in the way of Pierce. As Winger was closing the gap another caution flew giving Pierce the clear track he needed to collect the win. Winger held on for second ahead of Moran, Mitch McGrath and Rusty Schlenk.
For the DIRTcar Modifieds, Bill Griffith and Brandon Bollinger brough the field to the green flag. Bollinger led the first few rotations before Mt. Carmel, Illinois driver, Will Krup found his way to the front of the field. Krup led the rest of the way for his second consecutive Summer Nationals win at Butler Motor Speedway.
The Hell Tour now gets ready to roll into I-96 Speedway Thursday night for another double feature event with both Late Models and Modifieds set to do battle. For more information on that event, log on to www.i96speedway.com. Horsepower Happenings will again be on location for behind the scenes updates throughout the evening.
Story - Zach Hiser, Horsepower Happenings
Photo - Jim DenHamer