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Jonathan Allard
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Jonathan
Allard charges to 14th at Dave Helm Memorial
By Gary Thomas
Tulare, CA - October 14, 2007...Battling an extremely
fast and treacherous racetrack on Saturday at the Tulare Thunderbowl Raceway, Chico’s Jonathan Allard fought
back from a late race spin to charge forward and earn a 14th place
finish in the World of Outlaws sanctioned Dave Helm Memorial. The 2006 King
of California had a perfectly set up race car from Ashley Smith and he put
the Williams Motorsports No. 0 on the high scary side where few competitors
dared to run during the later portions of the feature.
The night started out with 42 competitors taking to the
clocks for single lap qualifying runs. Jonathan came out 22nd in
the qualifying order and his lap of 14.143 put the K & N Filters, Red
Line Oil machine 17th quickest, just two one-thousandths of a
second behind the 16th fastest car . This played big for
Jonathan because the World of Outlaws format only takes the top 16 drivers
in qualifying for the heat race inversion and with him having to finish top
two in his heat to make the dash, it made for a tough path ahead. He was
able to do a nice job in his heat though and brought home a third place
finish to transfer into the feature.
When the 35 lap Dave Helm Memorial main event lined up
on the track it saw Jonathan starting from the 17th position.
The Tulare
area had received some rain the previous day and the 1/3 mile clay oval
remained hooked up and tacky all night long. It made for tough conditions
as the track remained fairly narrow and was choppy up top which made for
some old school cowboy it up style sprint car racing. The traffic deep in
the pack was very thick and Jonathan had to pick his spots wisely.
Jonathan was on the move early as he could maneuver the
GT Trends, Sharp Insurance No. 0 anywhere on the track. JA was attacking
the Thunderbowl Raceway clay and got around big
name drivers like Jac Haudesnchild,
Paul McMahan and Danny Lasoski, before closing in
on the Kasey Kahne
Racing No. 9 of Joey Saldana for a top 10 spot. After hounding Saldana for
a few laps he had to deal with McMahan again and while he was battling with
the Tony Stewart Motorsports machine, he spun to a stop in turn two on the
25th circuit. Jonathan was pushed back off and rejoined the rear
of the field for the final 10 lap shootout.
He continued to run on the edge as the green came back
out and was able to get around a handful of cars by the time the final
yellow of the race flew on lap 33. When the green lights flashed again he
stuck the K & N Filters, Williams Motorsports No. 0 to the high side
and charged around several competitors over the last couple laps to bring
home a hard fought 14th place finish. "The only thing I was
worried about was running out of tear offs," Jonathan said after the
race. "We had a great car and are happy to be able to race neck and
neck with this kind of competition. I gotta thank
all of our sponsors for supporting us and we’ll now move on to Manzi and Perris this coming weekend."
The 2007 racing season is quickly coming to an end as
the final month of action is now underway. Jonathan and Williams
Motorsports are scheduled to run with the World of Outlaws once again this
weekend as the Zero machine will take to the track
at the Manzanita Speedway in Arizona
on Friday and the Perris Auto Speedway in Southern California
on Saturday. Following this weekend Jonathan is scheduled to compete at the
Cotton Classic in Hanford
on October 27. For the latest news and updates as finish off the ‘07 season
log onto http://www.allardmotorsports.com
Ideas, suggestions, questions or comments can
be sent to: SprintCar PR.
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