It had been a couple of years since Joey Saldana had raced in Texas prior to this weekend, but he quickly remembered how much he enjoys racing in the state after winning on Friday night in the World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series return to Lone Star Speedway in Kilgore and he backed that up with a victory to cap off the weekend in the Texas Shootout at Houston Raceway Park on Saturday night. It was his first win at the track located in Baytown in his 14th start at the facility.
“It was a great weekend in Texas for sure,” said Saldana. “I can’t wait to come back here again and the fans saw a good show tonight. I can’t thank Budweiser and Kasey enough for what they do. I’m very proud of this entire team right now. All of the hard work is really paying off.”
The $10,000 triumph at the high-banked ¼-mile was Saldana’s series leading fifth aboard the Budweiser Maxim to start the 2009 season. He also moved to within just four points of 20-time series champion Steve Kinser, who is second in the series championship standings as they chase three-time and defending series champion Donny Schatz. Saldana now has 44 career World of Outlaws A-Feature wins and is just two shy of Bobby Davis Jr., who is 10th on the all-time win list.
The race began on Saturday night with a quick caution that led to a complete restart that saw Jac Haudenschild lead the field into turns one and two, with Johnny Herrera coming all the way from fourth to sweep past Steve Kinser, Joey Saldana and Haudenschild who had started on the pole. Saldana started fourth and moved to third on the opening lap. He moved into second the following lap and took the lead on the third circuit, using the high side of turns three and four to power his way past Herrera.
Saldana quickly began to pull away as the battled for second raged as first it was Kinser tracking down Herrera and then Haudenschild. For most of the race, the second spot provided the best battle on the track, with eight different drivers trading the runner-up spot over the course of the 40-lap event using every inch of the racing surface. In open race track, Saldana had a couple of very sizeable advantages, though in lapped traffic the other frontrunners were able to close the gap.
“We were chasing our car all night and the crew: Willie (Kahne) Kolten (Gouse) and Kale (Kahne) worked hard all night,” shared the winner. “Kale changed a lot of torsion bars and we got a lot better feeling car toward the feature. I didn’t know where to go. I didn’t know if I should go to the bottom or the top.”
With just two laps to go, Craig Dollansky passed his teammate Saldana in turn two in lapped traffic, but Saldana was able to retake the lead on the back straightaway as Dollansky was bottled up a little bit by a lapped car and also was nursing a left rear tire that had a puncture in it. Saldana powered his way back in front and was able to extend that margin at the checkered flag, as Dollansky had his hands full with Donny Schatz who worked his way from the 14th starting spot in the Top-Three.
“It was a good race and had to hit your marks,” noted Saldana. “Craig (Dollansky) tried to get by me there coming off of (turn) two and I just stopped and got a good run off the bottom. It was a great win for us.”
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