The Announcer - By Brian Varmecky

(February 8th, 2007 - www.wmtrl.com)

- Huffaker opens a commanding lead!!

     With a 3-race sweep this past weekend in Dallas, Pablo Huffaker has taken a commanding lead in the World Championship race. His 273 point weekend has placed him 1st in Total Points, 1st in Average Points, and 1st overall. Second place Mark Hall is over 200 points behind.
     Hall had 3 late reports from Madison, and is now in a much better position to defend his World Championship. Over the past 4 years, Hall has the 2nd best win percentage (48.9%), behind only Gary Porter (49.3%).
     Michael Vaters is the highest ranked independent driver, as he has been running hard to earn another Thunder Nationals crown. Dan Patrick is the highest Chevrolet independent, and has won 50% of his events.
     Bobby Parr has been having an excellent rookie season, winning 3 of his 8 finals in 10 events. Parr, driver of Live Nation’s “Team Suzuki” truck, currently leads the Rookie of the Year standings. Bigfoot’s Keith Sturgeon is in 2nd, and Whit Carlton is in 3rd. In the standings, rookies are denoted with a circled-R.
     Carl Van Horn is struggling in 81st place, with only 1 win in 9 events. His 0.910 EWRA shows that he’s had a difficult schedule so far, with most of his events coming at large domes. Veteran Allen Pezo has been having a slow start, as well, winning only twice in 10 tries, and ranking 72nd. Defending CFP champion Brad Campbell is winless in 8 events, and his teammate Jason Grill has 6 runner-ups in those events.
     Next weekend will see another 40+ events, with all the big guns back at the track competing for more WMTRL points. Keep checking this website and The Monster Blog for event coverage and results!

 

- Week In Review

LATE MADISON (IMAGE) – Mark Hall sweeps 3 events, with Doug Noelke and Jocelyn Perrin (twice) taking 2nd place. Hall leads the Monster Nationals point series, and is currently 2nd in the world.

 

LATE BELTON (CFP) – Rookie Keith Sturgeon scored two wins for Team Bigfoot in Belton, defeating Richard Blackburne and Sean Duhon in the finals.

 

AMARILLO (TNT) – James Tigue maintained a 50% win percentage, as he earns 1 of 2 final round wins. He defeated Devin Jones on Friday, but lost to Doug Charles on Saturday.

 

CHARLESTON (USHRA) – On Friday, Gary Porter took out Dan Patrick in the finals. Saturday afternoon, the two met in the semis, with Patrick (the fast loser) advancing to the finals, where he defeated Pat Summa. Patrick and Porter met in the finals Saturday evening for the weekend win, with Patrick and “Samson” coming out on top. Dan Patrick is currently ranked 9th, and Gary Porter is ranked 3rd.

 

CHATTANOOGA (T-NATS) – Diehl Wilson showed why he is a former Thunder Nationals champion, as he sweeps the weekend in Chattanooga, including all 3 freestyle wins. Bruce Haney, Scott Hartsock, and Ed Eckert all had their chances in the finals, but Wilson denied them all. He has jumped 10 spots to #18 in the World.

 

COLUMBIA (USHRA) – Marc McDonald won both events in Columbia, remaining undefeated for the weekend. Rod Schmidt and Dale Mitchell were runners-up.

 

DALLAS (USHRA) – Pablo Huffaker won his 71st, 72nd, and 73rd events in the past 4 years with his 3-race sweep in Dallas. A talented, 8-truck field helped maximize his point total, as Huffaker earned 91-points for each win. Rookie Bobby Parr was runner-up each night, and is currently the leader in the Rookie of the Year standings, 10 positions ahead of Keith Sturgeon.

 

EDMONTON (USHRA) – Don Frankish and Nathan Weenk thrilled their home province fans, each earning a win at Rexall Place. Frankish defeated Frank Krmel on Friday, and Weenk took out Charlie Pauken on Saturday. Pauken finally had things go his way, as he defeated Weenk in the finals on Sunday afternoon.

 

FARGO (USHRA) – Since the start of the WMTRL in 2004, no other driver has won more times than Randy Brown, and he earned another win and runner-up in he Fargodome. Brown beat Mark Schroeder on Friday, but fell to Tony Farrel in “Blue Thunder” on Saturday.

 

FLINT (TNT) – One of the wildest new teams in the industry is the duo of Michael Hawkins and Isaiah Morales, and they dominated Flint, Michigan, with Hawkins taking 2 wins, and Morales earning the third.

 

GREEN BAY (AMP) – No report.

 

HOUSTON (USHRA) – Tom Meents earned the biggest pot of the week, 119 points in Houston. Jimmy Creten’s runner-up effort was awarded with 92 points, which moved the Bounty Hunter into 12th. Linsey Weenk and David Smith were semi-finalists, and rank 10th and 11th, respectively.

 

KEARNEY (CFP) – It was a hard fought and surprising weekend in Kearney, NE on the competitive Winter Nationals tour. Rob French made the finals all 3 nights, but only won on Friday, when he defeated Rick Long. Series leader Sean Duhon won on Saturday afternoon, and out of no-where, first-weekend driver Kevin King took Iron Horse into the winner’s circle on Saturday night!

 

LOVELAND (CFP) – No report.

 

PEORIA (USHRA) – It seemed like Rick Raab might re-spark his winter win streak after he defeated teammate Scott Poirier on Saturday, but Raab would not escape the first round for the remainder of the weekend. Chad Fortune eliminated Jim Koehler in the finals on Saturday afternoon, and Poirier earned the win over Chris Bergeron on Saturday night.

 

ROCKFORD (T-NATS) – Neil Elliot took out teammate Chuck Warner at the Friday Thunder Nationals, but sat-out racing on Saturday with mechanical problems. Two weeks in a row of missing races has dropped Elliot down to 13th. Andy Slifko was the winner on Saturday, also defeating Chuck Warner in the finals.

 

TALLAHASSEE (USHRA) – Mike Vaters has been having a great season, and entered the weekend ranked 5th, but rookie Candice Jolly quenched the fire, defeating Vaters in the finals on Friday, and then defeating Trey Meyers on Saturday’s finals! It was Jolly’s first career racing wins and has improved her ranking to #57, making her the highest ranked female driver. (But Jocelyn Perrin is ranked 59th!)

 

TUPELO (TBO) – No report.

 

VANCOUVER (USHRA) – The unique no-dirt, 20-car, Minneapolis-style event in BC Place created for some wild racing, but in the end, it was Norm Miller picking up his first win of the season and 90 points. Chad Tingler placed 2nd.

 

- Upsets of the Week

Columbia, SC – Lionel Easler opened up his Saturday with a win over Rod Schmidt in “Grave Digger” in the first round.
Tallahassee, FL – The big story of the weekend was Candice Jolly earning her first two career racing wins on the concrete drag in Leon County. She won in a field that included veteran and former Thunder Nationals champion Michael Vaters, whom she beat in Friday’s finals.
Edmonton, AB – Nathan Weenk picked up his first win of the season by defeating Charlie Pauken in “Grave Digger” in the finals on Saturday night.

 

- Spotlight

     Tom Meents joins the standings this week ranked 20th in the world. He has won 3 of his 4 finals in 6 events, including Minneapolis (91 pts), January’s Houston (127) and February’s Houston (119) and runner-up in Indianapolis (90 pts). In Atlanta, he defeated Allen Pezo in the first round, but suffered damage in the win and could not continue. In Detroit, Pablo Huffaker met Meents in the first round and eliminated Max D from the competition.

     One of Meents’ biggest problems over the years has been breakage, especially during introductions. So far this year, breakage has hurt him twice, but he has performed excellent every other time. Running mostly large, 1-night events means that missing racing for a weekend puts a big hurt on his championship drive, but those big events also come with big points, which has helped to increase hi AP to 76.67, which is 3rd best in the world.

     Meents missed the Top Ten last season, as breakage and a red-hot Linsey Weenk limited him to only 12 wins in 35 races (34.3%), a full 10% off his winning percentages in 2004 and 2005. His schedule provides for the highest-highs and the lowest-lows, but if his truck can survive the pre-race performances, Meents has proven to be one of the top racers in the sport and is a threat to rise in the standings by leaps and bounds.

 

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