KNOXVILLE, Iowa — Donny Schatz knows the history of Knoxville Raceway very well and he added his name to that history Saturday night.
He put himself in the elite company of drivers that have won on opening night at the famed half-mile oval.
On top of that, the two-time defending Advance Auto Parts World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series champion and two-time defending Knoxville Nationals winner, picked up his first series victory since joining team owner Tony Stewart.
Schatz took the lead on the 18th lap, powering past Steve Kinser on the high side of the track exiting the fourth turn. He quickly opened an advantage aboard the Armor All J&J en route to his 71st career Advance Auto Parts World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series A-triumph, which moved him into the fifth spot on the all-time win list ahead of 1995 series champion Dave Blaney.
He pocketed $10,000 for the win, which was the eighth of his career at Knoxville Raceway.
“It feels good to get that out of the way,” said Schatz. “We knew it was coming. It feels good to do it passing The King. That’s awesome. It was a great night. We had quick time and were able to win the heat, and just had an awesome race car. The guys have worked so hard, and they needed this and I needed this. Everybody needed it. We can now breath a sigh of relief and go on to next weekend and try to win races again.”
Schatz lined up third for the 25-lap event, which took three full starts to get going due to a yellow flag and a red flag for a Tim Shaffer flip. On the third start, Schatz quickly challenged Jac Haudenschild for the runner-up spot, passing him a couple of times coming off the fourth corner, only to have Haudenschild win a drag race down the frontstretch. This allowed Kinser to open a sizeable lead. Schatz ran third for the first five laps, before getting around Haudenschild and setting his sights on Kinser. He used lapped traffic to his advantage as he chased down the 20-time series champion as the laps wound down.
“You always have to be patient, but tonight I was not,” Schatz said. “I kept pushing and pushing and pushing. When you are as hungry to win a race as we have been, you just have to go and I went. It could have cost, but that’s all part of it. If you sit back and slack, you start to do that on a regular basis and I don’t want to do that. I want to get myself back on top of the ladder and start winning races. Next week we start racing hard and when the going gets tough, the tough get going and we are ready.”
Joey Saldana won a late battle with Kinser to finish second.
“We had a good car and came home second,” said Saldana. “We tried to tighten the car up for the dash and cost ourselves a front-row starting spot. We were good halfway through the feature.”
Haudenschild finished third, with Kinser and Jason Meyers rounding out the top five. Point-leader Craig Dollansky was sixth.