TULSA, Okla. — The fastest car doesn’t always win the race and that was the case on the third night of the 24th annual Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals at Tulsa Expo Raceway at the QuikTrip Center.
Darren Hagen, who claimed his first Chili Bowl preliminary feature Thursday night, proved that theory.
Five-time Chili Bowl champion Sammy Swindell put on another dazzling display of speed and skill to win his A Qualifier earlier in the night. Swindell started second in the feature and took the lead from Tracy Hines on lap nine.
From there Swindell drove away from the pack, which included the battle for second between Hines and Hagen.
But with three laps to go, Billy Pauch, Jr. and Jonathan Hendrick tangled at the back of the pack. The melee sent Hendrick flipping into the first turn catch fence and left Swindell, who was running the high side of the track, nowhere to go. Swindell skidded to a stop and the race was suddenly a three-lap shootout with Hagen leading Hines.
“To be honest, I thought I was just going to be blessed to run third,” Hagen said. “When I saw that, he (Swindell) must have had nowhere to go. A guy with that much talent and that good of reaction time, I thought he had it wrapped up tonight.”
Hines tried the high side on the restart, but his machine stumbled on the cushion, allowing Hagen to drive Don Fike’s No. 3 Esslinger-Spike away from the field, while the unheralded pair of Tony Roney and Brad Mosen stormed past Hines and battled for second.
Roney, who has raced at Tulsa Expo Raceway for years, having competed in quads and micro sprints in the Tulsa Shootout before moving up to midgets a few years ago, edged Mosen to finish second.
“I am a little in shock,” Roney said. “I never expected to do this; my goal was to get into a C main (Saturday night), which you had to make the A (main) tonight to do that. At the end, I thought I might get third if I played my cards right. A little luck and it happened, it was awesome.”
Mosen, a New Zealand native, drove Simon Longdill’s V-8-powered midget to a third-place finish, the second top-three finish in three nights for the unique engine after Mosen’s teammate Michael Pickens finished second on Tuesday.
While the top three earned starting spots in Saturday’s finale, Shane Cottle and Kyle Larson rounded out the top five.
Swindell and Hines, both former winners of the Chili Bowl, ran one-two through most of the event, but the turn of events during the closing laps left both with some work to do Saturday afternoon in order to qualify for the feature.
The summary:
First Heat: Shane Cottle, Kyle Larson, Tanner Swanson, P.J. Jones, Glenn Styres, Klint Angelette, Stuart Snyder, Riley Adair, Ted Kirkpatrick.
Second Heat: Brad Mosen, Kasey Kahne, Tony Roney, Henry Clarke, Jimmy Light, Todd McVay, Chad Pitts, Wayne Johnson, Ronnie Gardner.
Third Heat: Michelle Decker, Jesse Hockett, Jason Grady, Caleb Armstrong, Nic Faas, Johnny Murdock, Scotty Weir, Ryan Durst, Austin Brown.
Fourth Heat: Tracy Hines, Cruz Pedregaon, Tanner Berryhill, Billy Lawhead, Ronnie Burke, Eric Todd, Victor Davis, Toni Lutar.
Fifth Heat: Darren Hagen, Kyle Steffens, Billy Pauch, Jr., Chris Coker, Steve Knepper, Cody Darrah, Donnie Ray Crawford, Michael Koontz.
Sixth Heat: Terry McCarl, Shane Hollingsworth, Jay Drake, Sammy Swindell, Jody Rosenboom, Patrick Stasa, Bob Lee, Murray Erickson.
Seventh Heat: David Gough, Damion Gardner, Jonathan Hendrick, Jason Leffler, Aaron Ott, Cap Henry, Tim Pyle, Kurt Blackaby.
Eighth Heat: Garrett Hansen, Thomas Meseraull, Justin Melton, Johnny Rodriguez, Brain Camarillo, Ron Bach, Nathan High, Billy Balog.
First C Main: Darrah, Brown, Weir, Light, McVay, Lutar, Angelette, Pyle, Murdock, Pitts, Adair, Lee, Koontz, Kirkpatrick.
Second C Main: Crawford, High, Snyder, Todd, Stasa, Bach, Henry, Balog, Davis, Blackaby, Gardner, Durst, Erickson.
First A Qualifier: McCarl, D. Gardner, Hines, Hockett, Hollingsworth, Styres, Swanson, Burke, Leffler, Hendrick.
Second A Qualifier: Kahne, Mosen, Johnson, Gough, Larson, Drake, Rosenboom, Knepper, Grady, Pedregon.
Third A Qualifier: Roney, Jones, Cottle, Steffens, Melton, Pauch, Hansen, Faas, Camarillo, Lawhead.
Fourth A Qualifier: Swindell, Meseraull, Hagen, Rodriguez, Clarke, Armstrong, Ott, Decker, Coker, Berryhill.
First B Main: Hollingsworth, Pauch, Light, Hendrick, Styres, Brown, Weir, Burke, Clarke, Pedregon, Rosenboom, Grady, Steffens, Leffler, Darrah, Decker.
Second B Main: Hansen, Drake, Armstrong, Crawford, Snyder, Faas, Swanson, Berryhill, Coker, Camarillo, High, Knepper, Melton, Ott, Lawhead, Falcon.
Feature: Hagen, Roney, Mosen, Cottle, Larson, Kahne, Meseraull, Hines, Hockett, D. Gardner, Hollingsworth, Light, Swindell, Drake, Johnson, Pauch, Gough, Rodriguez, Jones, Hansen, Hendrick, Crawford, McCarl, Armstrong.