Some fierce racing in the heats set the scene for a drama filled Sprint Car feature last night at Western Springs Speedway.

If Jamie McDonald is bothered by the fact that Allan Wakeling is leading the National Championship series he’s not showing it. But the pressure from the young driver may be throwing the veteran Wakeling’s game a little.

Wakeling drove like a man possessed in heat two but failed to take the win from Bill Clarkson Jnr. who did a superb job of holding the veteran driver off in what was one of the most exciting drives of the night.

Hamilton driver Greg Pickerill has shown some excellent form this season, winning the Boxing night feature race, and he dominated the first heat to qualify well up in the points for the feature start.

“We’ve got Bob Curtis from the USA helping with set-up and it’s really paying dividends” said Pickerill “I’m able to drive the car that much harder at the moment and we’re really making progress."

McDonald stood on the gas to win heat 3 in what is fast becoming his trade mark dominant style. Dean Brindle was second and hoping for a better night than his accident marred Boxing day meeting.

The marble draw start grid inversion put McDonald on grid 3 one row ahead of Wakeling’s grid 5. The pressure was showing as Wakeling pushed through to keep up with McDonald and on the first lap Brindle demolished his car against the wall in Town bend after a push and shove charge saw him flipping out of the race.

“I can’t believe that no one was penalised for that incident” said the furious Brindle “That’s an expensive crash for us through another guy’s bad driving.”

More barging resulted in a yellow light while safety crew cleared debris from the start finish straight after Pickerill and Wakeling came together hard out of Town Bend. Wakeling made the pass stick and took second place behind McDonald and Pickerill finished third despite a damaged front wing.

Kerry Jones had a lacklustre night but managed to finish 4th ahead of Tommy Rusher and Kevin Hinchcliffe. Bill Clarkson cut his tyre in the first lap incident with Wakeling and Brindle, he was able to fit a new one during the red light stoppage after Brindle’s roll-over, but never got on the pace and had to settle for a 7th place finish ahead of Hans Boere.

The points race for the National Championship series will finish on March 4th. All drivers will get the opportunity to drop their worst round.

Western Springs National Sprint Car series Feature race 3 January 2006

1st Jamie McDonald

2nd Allan Wakeling

3rd Greg Pickerill

4th Kerry Jones

5th Tommy Rusher

6th Kevin Hinchcliffe

7th Bill Clarkson

8th Hans Boere

DNF Havard Daniels

DNF Ossie Sokol

DNF Dean Brindle

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