SARVER, Pa., Sept. 21 — Logan Schuchart of Hanover, Pa. started 14th and finished ninth in the Commonwealth Clash presented by GottaRace.com, a World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series race held at Lernerville Speedway Saturday night.
The Shark Racing driver now has five top-five finishes and 15 top-10 finishes in WoO action so far in 2014, his rookie season as a WoO driver. He is currently 12th out of 380 drivers in the national point standings, while his Shark Racing teammate and fellow rookie, Jacob Allen, is 13th.
Schuchart passed Kerry Madsen and Cole Duncan at the initial start of the 35-lap A-main to vault into 12th place in the 24-car field. He got 11th on lap three by passing Tim Shaffer, and he remained in 11th place until he passed Kraig Kinser working lap nine to move into tenth place. The following lap Schuchart set his fastest lap of the race when his car tripped the electronic timers in 14.335 seconds.
Polesitter Logan Wagner got into the wall on the frontstretch of the four-tenths-mile clay oval with 11 laps down after contact with David Gravel as they were dicing for second place. That brought out the race’s only caution flag and vaulted Schuchart into ninth place, but his fight for that position was just beginning.
Ed Lynch Jr. had problems on the restart, which gave Schuchart eighth place for about 15 seconds, but he dropped back to tenth on lap 13 when Shaffer and Madsen passed him. Kinser did the same on the following lap to put Schuchart back in 11th place. He regained tenth on lap 31 when he got by Kinser once again, and he charged into ninth on lap 32 by repassing Shaffer.
Schuchart took the checkered flag 1.937 seconds after the eighth-place driver, Madsen, did. Schuchart was 1.234 seconds ahead of the tenth-place finisher, Shaffer, who is a former Lernerville Speedway track champion.
Joey Saldana led every lap of Saturday’s A-main, which paid $10,000 to win. Gravel, Paul McMahan, Shane Stewart and Danny Holtgraver rounded out the top five.
In preliminary action Schuchart started second and finished second in Heat 4, an eight-lap race. He was 0.855 of a second behind that race’s polesitter and winner, Wagner, at the line.
Schuchart was 12th in time trials with a qualifying time of 13.049 seconds. Lynch was the fastest qualifier with a lap in 12.687, which wasn’t too far off Saldana’s track record of 12.334 established in May 2002.
Schuchart’s teammate, Jacob Allen of Hanover, Pa. (and formerly of Brownsburg, Ind.), qualified 31st out of the 40 drivers who posted qualifying times. He started eighth in the third heat and finished in that same position. He started 11th in the 19-car B-main but retired after seven laps for a 15th-place finish.
Schuchart finished 13th and fifth at Lernerville July 15 in twin 30-lap races for the Don Martin Memorial Silver Cup.
Next week the WoO series appears at Bloomington Speedway in Bloomington, Ind., on Friday night, Sept. 26 and Berlin Raceway in Marne, Mich., on Saturday night, Sept. 27.
National Sprint Car Hall of Fame driver Bobby Allen owns Shark Racing. Schuchart drives a Triple X sprint car chassis powered by a Don Ott-prepared engine.
Shark Racing is sponsored in part by the following companies and individuals: Your Auto Source NAPA Autocare Center, Pell’s Tire Service, Marty Thompson, Don Ott Engines, Triple X Race Components, Rich Fogle Custom Pole Buildings, Newman’s Towing & Recovery, CnB Mushroom Farms, Brenneman Painting, Speedway 94, Dirt: The Game, Silpada Jewelry, Lebo Skin Care, DMI, Penske Shocks, ButlerBuilt Seats, Tony Stewart Racing, SR Lubricant Solutions and Mycroleum.
Race updates are posted on Shark Racing’s Facebook page, while additional information is available on Schuchart and Allen’s Facebook pages and Twitter accounts. Team apparel may be purchased through Schuchart’s Web site at Shark1s.com.
Free audio coverage of all WoO races is available on Dirtvision.com. Additional information is available on the series’ Web site at woosprint.com.
