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Napa's Richard Bailey charges to first career win in Petaluma Civil War event
Last lap surge puts Bailey Brothers racing back in victory lane once again
by Bill Sullivan

Saturday, July 5, 2008 Results
Qualifying 360 Sprints Contingency Awards

Saturday's event was the second appearance of the season at Petaluma Speedway for the Civil War Sprint Car Series and marked the seventh segment of the 15 race series that visits six different Northern California facilities between March and October. With the victory, Bailey becomes the seventh different winner of the series in as many races.

For Bailey, Saturday's win was no cake walk, in fact it was a bonsai move on the final circuit of the 30-lap feature event that resulted in the $2000 victory over the current series point leader and four of the top five point runners of the series. For Bailey, the biggest win of his career came on the same night of his first career win.

"I have to thank all the guys who put their time into this car every week," said Bailey. "We have had some pretty tough luck so far this season. I knew with time a win would come but to do it in the Civil War is pretty special, this means a lot to the whole team who has been working so hard lately."

Bailey started the 30-lap feature event on inside of row two, behind pole sitter Alissa Geving of Penngrove, the current Petaluma Speedway weekly point leader and Bradley Terrell of Sebastapol, another track regular who started on the outside of the front row. At the waving of the official green flag Geving charged into the lead out of the fourth turn with Terrell in her wake. As the two young rising starts exited the second turn, Terrell pulled aside Geving to steal the lead before completion of a lap while Bailey followed suit, assuming the second position over Geving.

As the three young guns of the Civil War Series battled for the lead on one of the raciest tracks of the year, their efforts were brought to a pause on the third lap when Rohnert Park's Cameron Mendes rolled off the second turn to draw a red flag. Mendes was uninjured in the incident but unable to continue racing due to damage.

On the ensuing restart Terrell maintained the lead while Bailey and Geving produced a nail biting dog fight for the second position. With 15 laps complete Terrel worked his way into lapped traffic with Bailey and Geving I pursuit. It was at the halfway mark of the race when Geving powered beneath Bailey in the first turn in an effort to steal the bridesmaid position within lapped traffic. As the two entered the second turn, a lapped car spun directly in front of Geving who made every effort to avoid a collision, as did Bailey.

Both Geving and Bailey made contact in the collision, that collected a total of three cars. Geving incurred the most damage, a flat tire and damaged top wing among the set backs. Bailey managed to continuing rolling in the incident and he ever slightly made contact, slightly damaging the front suspension of his Bailey Brothers #01 sprint car.

"I just had no place to go when that happened" said Bailey. "She (Geving) did everything she could to avoid the spinning car and me and we all ended up getting together, I was lucky but it did damage my front end a bit making it tough the rest of the race."

While Bailey admitted the damage to the car made it difficult to steer, one would not know it for the remainder of the race as Bailey pursued Terrell for the lead while holding off point leader Sean Becker of Sacramento and Elk Grove's Kyle Larson. In the final laps the race clearly became Terrell's to lose and Bailey's to gain.

With only one lap remaining, Terrell maintained a lead of two to three car lengths over Bailey until Bailey drove to the high of turns three and four and gained momentum to pull aside Terrell on the front stretch, stealing the lead for good as he entered the first and second turns.

"The car was tough to drive after the accident so I did my best with it," said Bailey. "I held back there in second for awhile and used the right energy at the right time to get past him (Terrell). He was driving a good race ad I really didn't think I could catch him until the end. I just gave it everything I had."

As Bailey took the lead the race was far from over. Becker and Larson closed in on Terrell in one of the wildest races for the bridesmaid position on recent years. When the checkered flag flew Becker had robbed Terrell of second place while Larson finished in third followed by Terrell.

In preliminary action Saturday night, heat races were won by Brandon Davis, Arvo Backholm, Art McCarthy and Adam McCarthy. The C-feature was claimed by Klein Simpson followed by Matt Barber and Adrien Betourney. The B-feature was claimed by Herman Klein over Chad Compton, Brett Rollag and Andy Gregg. Qualifying saw Becker steal the show with a lap time of 12:781. Herman Klein was second quick with a 12.847 and David Robinson Jr, with a 12.894.

Robinson's night ended early Saturday night with a damaging roll over in the first turn. Four time series champion Andy Forsberg had his troubles as well, rolling over early the race to end up finishing 15th. For complete results on Saturday's event visit www.johnpadjenmotorsports.com or the Petaluma Speedway section at www.mylaps.com.

The Civil War Series will now head to Silver Dollar Speedway in Chico for the eighth round of action of Friday, July 18th and will return to Petaluma Speedway on Saturday, July 26th.