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A Legend’s Master Class
Midget legend Johnny Heydenreich put on a master’s class in driving the dry slick Sycamore Speedway on a chilly Scout Night Saturday May 9th. Thanks to Justin Tea for sharing his video of the night so fans can see just how it is done. Heydenreich’s #22 Beast-Focus started on the pole alongside Lamont Critchett’s #27 Ellis-Honda and the battle began at the drop of the green flag. Critchett used the high line to take the lead but couldn’t get enough traction coming off to develop any separation from Heydenreich,3 time and defending club champ Patrick Bruns in the #10B MWR-Ecotec, or Sean Murphy in his family’s #5 Spike-SET Ecotec. The front four slid around for nine laps trading positions several times a lap before Critchett lost a fuel pump belt and coasted into the infield.
On the ensuing restart the back half of the field got tangled up with one of the corner marker tires and a long yellow was needed to sort things out. Bruns’ beautiful #10 used a slow deliberate pace on the restart but Heydenreich got by, leaving Bruns to defend against the very fast #5 of Murphy. The champ rallied in the closing laps to catch and challenge Heydenreich but the legend was not to be denied his first Illini Racing Series feature. Behind Bruns and Murphy was 2011 champ Ray Seach, on loan from the UNOH Motorsports program in Spenser Racing’s #3 Stealth-Ecotec, and the always improving Andrew Hennig, PUIUI Motorsports student, in the family Buzzard-Ecotec.
Earlier in the night, Murphy took the first heat over Seach and Crichett following a hard fought battle that saw Critchett risk a high side pass in turn three that dropped him as far back as fifth with just two laps to go. In the second heat, veteran Kurt Mayhew’s #21k Buzzard-Ecotec topped Bruns and Heydenreich. Fifteen cars participated in the event which was completed well ahead of the predicted rain showers.
The Illini Racing Series teams wash off the dirt and put pavement set-ups on their cars for our next event Saturday May 16th at the historic Rockford Speedway.