Timms builds huge lead and survives late restart to collect $10,000 Volusia payday (Trent Gower Photo)
Last year Ryan Timms impressed by winning night one of the Germfree Southern Sprint Car Shootout in his Volusia Speedway Park debut. But the teenage phenom wanted more in 2024.
The 2023 prelim win was nice. But Timms’ focus was firmly fixed on the $10,000-to-win finale this time around. And the Oklahoma City, OK gasser pieced together an excellent drive win and bank the $10K on Saturday night.
Timms started the 30-lap Feature fifth and took over the lead on the 18th lap. He then built a huge lead and held on for the victory on a green-white-checkered restart to seal the deal.
“I’m just so stoked to be able to park this thing in Victory Lane and be up here on the podium in first place,” Timms said. “After the Heat Race and Qualifying and the first few laps of the main, I knew we had a fast car. I’m just so excited to be up here.”
Austin McCarl and Justin Peck led the field to green. It was Friday’s winner – McCarl – taking the early lap to pace the opening lap. But Peck ripped around him to take over the top spot on the second circuit.
Behind the lead duo both Timms and Sam Hafertepe Jr. were on the move. Timms leaped from fifth to third by the fourth lap. Hafertepe Jr. managed to roar from eighth to second in the same amount of laps. Timms and Hafertepe were both aided by heartbreak for McCarl on the fourth lap as “The Big Unit” spun while running second in Turn 4.
On the restart Peck pulled ahead while Hafertepe and Timms pursued. While Peck maintained a steady advantage, Timms went to work on finding a way by Hafertepe. The teenager worked the bottom of “The World’s Fastest Half Mile” while Hafertepe committed to the top. On Lap 11 Timms managed to slip ahead of Hafertepe for the runner-up spot.
When Timms first grabbed second, Peck pulled ahead and added a few more tenths to his lead. But Timms quickly got in the groove and began to chase him down. On Lap 18 Timms rolled the bottom to perfection to drive ahead of Peck for the top spot.
Timms then began to work through traffic flawlessly. Only two laps after wrestling the lead from Peck, Timms was over a second ahead. The gap ballooned to over two seconds two laps later. The phenom moved wherever he needed to navigate traffic as he distanced himself from the field. When he took the white flag, he was more than four seconds ahead of Peck.
But as he was in Turns 3 and 4 heading toward the checkered flag, the caution lights flashed for a car slowing on the back straightaway. The yellow erased Timms’ lead and set up a green-white-checkered dash to the finish.
When the green flag brought the action back to life, Peck stayed close to Timms’ tail tank. But ultimately he couldn’t build enough momentum to challenge on the final lap. Timms held him off to claim the finale and $10,000.
“I was pretty frustrated,” Timms said of the late caution. “But I knew the slider line wasn’t necessarily faster in (Turns) 3 and 4, but I knew it was fast enough where I could hold off second for two or three laps. I knew the main deal was not missing the bottom. It was getting kind of thin in the middle of (Turns) 1 and 2 where it was easy to miss.”
Peck held onto the runner-up spot after leading 16 laps. The Monrovia, IN native felt that missing a small amount of comfort in the car and troubles navigating traffic cost him a better shot at challenging for the win.
“Once I caught traffic I was a bit snug,” Peck said. “Ultimately, Ryan just ran a better race there in traffic. It seemed like every time a lapped car in front of me would go to the top so I’d go to the bottom, and the lapped car in front of them would hold me up on that same corner. I just didn’t pick my spots right, I guess. Like I said, he must’ve done a better job at that than me.”
Rounding out the top three was Hafertepe Jr. aboard the Hills Racing #15H. The Sunnyvale, TX native showed speed all week, driving onto the podium from row four each of the three nights. Like Peck, Hafertepe combatted handling troubles in traffic.
“We were just really tight behind guys,” Hafertepe Jr. said. “And when Timms got by us after that restart there, it really kind of botched us up. And then we got up to Peck a couple of times and just lapped traffic was really, really treacherous for us. It being in dirty air was really bad. We tightened the car up too much. Didn’t really anticipate the track doing what it did.”
Austin McCarl rebounded from his early spin to finish fourth. Danny Dietrich drove from 14th to fifth to earn the Hard Charger.
Heat Races were claimed by Austin McCarl, Justin Peck, Cameron Martin, and Sam Hafertepe Jr.
UP NEXT: Volusia Speedway Park comes back to life when the Federated Auto Parts DIRTcar Nationals (Feb. 5-17) begin. For tickets, CLICK HERE.
If you can’t make it to the track, catch all of the action live on DIRTVision.
RESULTS:
Germfree Southern Sprint Car Shootout (30 Laps): 1. 5T-Ryan Timms[5]; 2. 20-Justin Peck[4]; 3. 15H-Sam Hafertepe Jr[8]; 4. 88-Austin McCarl[1]; 5. 48-Danny Dietrich[14]; 6. 4-Cameron Martin[3]; 7. 28F-Davie Franek[10]; 8. 24-Danny Martin Jr[12]; 9. 6-Tyler Clem[7]; 10. 47-Eric Riggins Jr[9]; 11. 44-Chris Martin[13]; 12. 15-Ryan Turner[2]; 13. 7S-Landon Crawley[6]; 14. 17JR-Ricky Stenhouse Jr[20]; 15. 9-Liam Martin[17]; 16. 97-Ryan Harrison[18]; 17. 0-Glenn Styres[15]; 18. 13-Elijah Gile[26]; 19. 23-Lance Moss[24]; 20. 3-Dennis Misuraca[25]; 21. 23R-Ryan Roberts[16]; 22. 24D-Danny Sams III[19]; 23. 2C-Wayne Johnson[21]; 24. G6-Brandon Grubaugh[22]; 25. 24T-Christopher Thram[11]; 26. 10-Terry Gray[23]