Streaky Sneva seeks series supremacy
Racing championships are traditionally won on consistency.
So if Blaine Sneva holds onto the 19-point advantage he has and wins the 2006 Northwest Modified championship, he’ll break from the traditional mold.
Coeur d’Alene’s Sneva leads Mark Weaver of Colville going into the final race of the season, a two-day event this weekend at the Wenatchee Valley Super Oval.
“We’ve had some real good luck and some real bad luck,” Sneva said. “We’ve gone through four motors this year. We either won or we broke.”
Sneva started out with three straight victories to begin the campaign. He’s taken that early streak through some recent slim times.
“We’ve been having trouble with the oiling system,” Sneva said. “We have not been able to put a finger on it.
“Two motors suffered broken valves, one plain malfunctioned and one motor was the one we ran all last year so it was time.”
But the swinging pendulum of luck reversed direction last week at Stateline as Sneva ran well.
“We were fast time,” Sneva said. “We must have been off on one of the bearings. We spun a bearing and broke a rod. The rod broke the cam and it was a disaster.”
Last week’s disaster sprung his motor builder, Jeff Castle, into action, said Sneva.
” (Castle said) ‘I’ll get you going. I’ll get you going,’ Sneva said. “Our motor builder has been real good.” Castle had better be good – as Sneva gets the motor back tonight and has just Friday to put it in before heading to Wenatchee for Saturday’s qualifying. One of Sneva’s five race wins this year came on the quarter-mile at WVSO. The main is on Sunday.
INSSA title on line
Another tight title chase will be decided on Saturday night at Stateline Speedway when the Inland Northwest Superstocks conclude their season.
The INSSA cars team with Stateline’s Hobby Cars and Street Stocks in Saturday’s program that begins with time trials at 6 p.m. Three drivers are mathematically in the hunt, but third-place driver Andy Brown concedes he needs a lot of help to overtake leader Mike Behar and second-place Dan Garber.
Wife edges husband
Sharon Shelley-Ray drove a Swindahl dragster to the Spokane Pro Gas Association championship, edging out husband Randy Ray by just two points in the final standings.
But it wasn’t the way she would have like it all to end. The champ had to nervously watch from the grandstand last Saturday night at Spokane Raceway Park after she broke and axle and had to see if the margin she had built would hold up.
“I had mixed emotions,” Sharon Ray said as she watched her husband try to play catch-up.
He needed to win two rounds in his 1967 Barracuda to take over first. Randy Ray went out in the second round, handing the title to his wife, a first-grade teacher at Hamblen Elementary.
Pit stops
Bracket drag racing is on the schedule Saturday at Spokane Raceway Park. Time trials start at 5:30. … Rounds three and four of the Fall Series will take place Saturday and Sunday of this weekend at Extreme Motocross in Airway Heights. Gates will open at 7 a.m. with racing at 10. … The Spokane Kart Racing Association run its eighth and ninth points races Saturday and Sunday at the Spokane Motorsports Complex in Airway Heights. Racing begins at noon each day. … Joe Kopp will close out the 2006 AMA Ford Quality Flat Track Championships Saturday at Columbus, Ohio. Kopp is in sixth place in Twins points and finished third in the Singles division.
Streaks and stats
The numbers just didn’t pencil out for Spokane’s Shelby Thompson. Despite a third-place finish Saturday, Troy Conrad’s fifth place was enough to hand the Tacoma driver the Late Model Championship Series season finale at Monroe, Wash., by just 13 points. … Sixteen-year-old Marty Westlake won Sunday’s Trentwood Lions Club Demolition Derby for full-sized cars at the Spokane Interstate Fair. Saturday’s Compact Demo win went to Joel Shrader. … Spokane’s Andrew Zimmer wrapped up the Super Kart USA Cascade Region Go Kart Series, where he raced in the Junior TAG class. After six races, Zimmer is second in points. … Brandon Riehl won the Wenatchee 125 on Saturday, the final race for the NASCAR AutoZone Elite Division. Gary Lewis was fifth, winning the points championship. Spokane’s Matt Hall was ninth.