A fun Fourth of July

at Irwindale Speedway

 

The author attended the Twin Firecracker 50’s at the beautiful Irwindale Speedway on the Fourth of July. A big crowd turned out for an entertaining program that included twin 50-lap features for the Pick Your Part late model stock cars, a jet car demonstration, a demolition derby for front wheel drive compact cars and of course fireworks.

Trevor Huddleston as the fast qualifier started his #50 machine on the pole position for the first 50-lap feature with Jagger Jones, grandson of the 1963 Indianapolis 500-mile race winner Parnelli Jones alongside in his #55 car. After a patriotic salute by the field with American flags carried during the pace laps, at the drop of the green flag, Huddleston moved into the lead closely pursued by Jones, but by the 10^th lap, Huddleston had distanced himself from the field and Jones was under attack from Lawless Alan.

Alan ran a lower line through the turns than Jones lap after lap and after many laps Alan took over second place. In the latter stages of the race, Jones was challenged by Nick Joandies, but Jagger edged out Nick by a fender at the checkered flag for third behind Huddleston and Alan. Kayla Eshleman finished in the fifth position 2 seconds behind Jones and Joanides.   

For the start of the second fifty-lap feature which began just a few minutes after the finish of the first feature the top ten finishers in the first race were inverted. Unfortunately, the scheduled pole position starter Hailie Deegan daughter of motocross racer Brian Deegan was unable to make the call. The first half of the race was relatively uneventful, until there was contact in turn two back in the pack and several cars were eliminated. On the restart, Huddleston moved around Alan and as the pair battled for the lead through turn four their cars touched and Huddleston spun backwards harmlessly to a stop midway down the front straightaway.       

Huddleston rejoined the field at the tail, and was soon joined in the back of the field by Lawless Alan after he was assessed a penalty by NASCAR officials. On the restart with 22 laps to go, there was contact between the leaders and the ensuing melee reduced the field to six cars with Joanides, Eshleman and Alan all eliminated. After a red-flag stoppage to allow track safety workers to clear away the wreckage, the race resumed and Huddleston soon surged into the lead ahead of Ryan Schartau and Jagger Jones and held on to win in race shortened to 45 laps.

Trevor Huddelston captured victory in both features, and Jagger Jones copped third place finishes in both events. In the author's opinion, these are two young racers to watch for the future.

As always, Irwindale Speedway was clean, the admission price and parking fees were reasonable all the track workers were polite and helpful, and the program ran on time. Kudos to the new ownership group.