THOMPSON – Bryan Narducci’s streak of perfection at Thompson Speedway in an SK Light Modified has been a domination mostly devoid of theater.
Narducci ran away from the field in his first career start at Thompson at the 2017 Sunoco World Series at Thompson and since then his supremacy of each feature on the way to winning in his first six starts has been the calling card.
Wednesday Narducci made up for all that missing drama in one spectacular race.
Narducci, of Colchester, used a last corner pass of Steven Chapman to win the 20-lap SK Light Modified feature Wednesday at Thompson Speedway.
The victory made Narducci a perfect seven-for-seven in SK Light Modified starts at the track.
“I definitely worked my tail off for that one,” Narducci said. “Ever since I was younger I’ve always wanted to win a race here with a bottom shot or a cross over in [turns] three and four, something extravagant.”
Chapman, of Ellington, was second and Bert Ouelette of Ellington third.
Narducci started eighth, but contact on the opening lap dropped him back to ninth and he seemed stranded there for much of the first half of the race.
“Cory DiMatteo was spotting,” Narducci said. “He was like ‘Just be patient, you’ll be fine once it gets singled out. And it was like, every time I’d get in a good lane they wouldn’t go. I was like, ‘Oh here we go, this is great, it’s all over.’”
Narducci was running ninth for a lap eight restart, but finally found the lane to go, picking up five spots in one lap.
The red flag flew on lap 12 for a hard wreck involving second place running Noah Korner, who walked away from a hard broadside hit off of turn two.
Narducci was third for the ensuing restart, but ended up embroiled in a feisty battle with Brett Gonyaw in turn three. On lap 16 Narducci got by Ouelette for second, but Chapman looked beyond catchable out front.
Narducci quickly erased the deficit though and cut what was a three-car length lead for Chapman on the backstretch on the final lap down to nothing with a diving move into turn three.
Narducci was able to win the battle off of turn four to score the victory. Narducci was a longtime fan and admirer of the late Ted Christopher, who was killed in a plane crash in Sept. 2017. Christopher, the all-time winningest driver at Thompson Speedway, would have celebrated his 61stbirthday Wednesday.
“It was Ted Christopher’s birthday …,” Narducci said. “So I figured nobody was better at the bottom shot than him, so I figured I might as well cap it off like that.”
Brent Gleason of Lisbon drove away from the pack over the closing laps and made a sputtering ride last to win the 20-lap Limited Sportsman feature.
It was the first victory since Aug. 2017 for Gleason.
“It’s been a long time coming,” Gleason said. “We’ve struggled very very hard for the last year and a half. I put a new package together last year and it did not work out. We have worked hard, week in and week out. This thing almost didn’t even make it today. We didn’t make it the last race. It died with two to go. This thing was coughing and sputtering for the last eight laps. I was praying to make it.”
William Wall won the 25-lap Late Model feature. Matt Lowinski-Loh was second and Mark Jenison third.
Scott Michalski of Brooklyn edged Jared Roy at the checkered to win the 15-lap Mini Stock feature. Dave Trudeau Sr. was third.
Kid didn’t cleanly pass a car all night
I agree he used up a couple nerf bars on his way to the front.
How did all of those SK Lites wreck so much WITH SPOTTERS???
When the second place guy spins himself out coming out of turn 2 in front of the field theres very little time for the spotters to react. If you listened to the radios you would have heard that.
and if the second place car used his brakes he wouldnot have run back up the track