ROSSBURG, Ohio — Two-time Kings Royal winner Joey Saldana put himself in prime position to win the prestigious event for a third time, winning the Night Before the Kings Royal Advance Auto Parts World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series feature Friday night at Eldora Speedway.
Saldana used a classic Eldora slide job on former Kings Royal winner Dale Blaney to take the lead on the 14th lap, and held off Jason Meyers to earn the $10,000 victory, which was the 36th of his WoO career.
“We needed this one,” said Saldana. “We have been struggling here lately. It’s nice to win a race at Eldora. They talk about the Knoxville Nationals, but the Kings Royal is just as big. It certainly deserves its mark in sprint-car racing. It’s nice to run good the night before and hopefully, we can run well tomorrow.”
Saldana lined up third in the Budweiser/Open Joist Mopar-powered JEI and moved into second on the opening lap, as he got around polesitter Rob Chaney when Blaney took the lead.
A five-car accident in the third turn on the sixth lap right in front of the leaders led to a very tense moment for Blaney. He found a small opening to dive through after getting on the brakes as hard as he could. Saldana followed him through unscathed. A red flag ensued.
Blaney led Saldana into lapped traffic, which set up Saldana's pass for the lead on lap 14.
“It was tough in traffic,” noted Saldana. “A lot of them want to race you, and they are not even racing the guy ahead of them in the running order. I had to do my job in traffic because I have been beat a lot in traffic this year and I didn’t want to have that happen again. It gets old after a while.”
Saldana began to pull away once he got in traffic, which gave Meyers a chance to close in. Meyers made a final-lap run at Saldana, but came up .267 second short.
The victory was the second of the year for Saldana at Eldora, where he has 16-career victories.
“We have kind of gone back to what everyone else is doing and it’s clearly better for our race car right now,” he explained. “We are rolling around the track a lot better lately.”
Meyers was second in the GLR Investments KPC, with Blaney, point-leader Donny Schatz and Craig Dollansky rounding out the top five.