Swindell Sails to Win No. 11 with Dominant Performance at Grays Harbor
Dollansky finishes second to maintain World of Outlaws championship points lead
ELMA, Wash. – Aug. 29, 2012 – Things are getting back to normal for Sammy Swindell.
He found himself in Victory Lane for the second consecutive World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series event and the third time in the last five races on Wednesday night at the scenic Grays Harbor Raceway, which hosted its first Outlaws race since 2008.
It was his series-leading 11th victory of the season and moved him to a tie for second place in the championship standings – only 39 points behind leader Craig Dollansky.
“This is the best we’ve got so hopefully it just carries on through the rest of the year,” said Swindell, who hadn’t won at Grays Harbor Raceway since 1997.
“We did have maybe six, eight weeks there where we weren’t where we needed to be and was struggling some. We found out the reason for that and rectified that, fixed all that stuff and we’re back to where we were at the first part of the year.”
Swindell rocketed to the lead on the opening lap from inside the second row and he then led all 30 laps. In fact, Swindell lapped up to 11th place in a feature that was slowed by four cautions.
And as dominant as Swindell was, Dollansky never settled for the runner-up position. After four cautions during the first half of the event, the final 18 laps were caution free. The duo entered traffic on lap 17.
Dollansky began slowly reeling Swindell in through traffic in the final half-dozen laps before what appeared to be his break with two laps remaining. Swindell was dramatically slowed on the cushion while trying to lap Henry Van Dam. The momentum loss allowed Dollansky to close within a car length.
“I felt like we had a pretty good car in lapped traffic and I would have liked that race to keep going five more laps or so,” Dollansky said.
Swindell maintained his advantage in the closing laps to secure the victory with Joey Saldana edging Donny Schatz for the final spot on the podium.
“It’s a good, solid night,” Saldana said. “To start fourth and finish third, especially with these guys, that’s good. (I) definitely want to get a win so we’ve got to keep digging.”
Steve Kinser finished fifth. Kerry Madsen charged from 11th to sixth and Shane Stewart from 12th to seventh. Cody Darrah placed eighth and Jac Haudenschild earned the KSE Hard Charger Award for driving from 18th to ninth. Chad Kemenah rounded out the top 10.