ROSSBURG, Ohio — Robert Ballou employed a firm right foot and a spot-on race car to dominate Saturday’s USAC National Sprint Car Series feature during the 4-Crown Nationals at Eldora Speedway. 
On a night when the fast lane followed a narrow strip along the cushion, Ballou repeated what he had accomplished nearly five months earlier, making winning at Eldora’s half-mile oval look easy. 
Darren Hagen trailed by nearly half a lap at the finish, with Jesse Hockett, Brad Sweet and Dave Darland filling the top five.
Ballou started ninth, but moved up quickly with a series of spectacular moves. On the seventh circuit, Darland took third from Brady Short with a slide job in turn two, but then Ballou ripped past both of them in the fourth turn. 
Following a lap-eight restart, Gardner dove under Hagen in turn one and Hagen repassed in two. But when they got to turn three, Ballou drove the MPHG Promotions Maxim past both for the lead. 
“I was going to go where he didn’t go,” Ballou recalled. “I went to the top and lifted enough where I didn’t run into either of them and I just had the wheels underneath me and the car pointed in the right direction and as soon as I rolled back into it, the car was tight as a rock underneath me and good enough where I could just drive. At the last second, I got a hole opened enough that I didn’t crash anybody and drove by both of them.”
Stenhouse mounted a challenge near the midpoint in the race, closing in on Gardner, but misjudging and ending up in the wall.
“I got a run on Damion and I knew I had to take it because I was so close to him,” he said.  “I probably should have eased up getting in, but I’ll learn from my mistakes.”
Ballou built a half-lap lead in the closing stages, but walloped the wall while passing a lapped car with three laps remaining.  With the right rear wheel obviously wobbling, he made it to the checkered flag. 
Point-leader Levi Jones flipped in hot laps, but drove a backup car to a 14th-place finish.
The summary:
Qualifications: 1. Jerry Coons, Jr., Dynamics 69, 16.628; 2. Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., Stewart 21, 17.173; 3. Brad Sweet, Kunz 67k, 17.188; 4. Brady Short, 2B Racing 2b, 17.273; 5. Damion Gardner, Leffler 71, 17.345; 6. Cole Whitt, CW 29w, 17.382; 7. Darren Hagen, Kunz 67, 17.391; 8. Dave Darland, Pace 44, 17.410; 9. Rob Chaney, Hammer 24h, 17.429; 10. Robert Ballou, MPHG 81, 17.442; 11. Levi Jones, Stewart 20s, 17.444; 12. Kevin Swindell, Kahne 9, 17.476; 13. Bud Kaeding, BK 29, 17.520; 14. Jesse Hockett, VKCC 75, 17.568; 15. Bill Rose, Rose 6, 17.574; 16. Gary Taylor, Tel-Star 25, 17.578; 17. Brady Bacon, Kahne 99, 17.596; 18. Matt Westfall, Westfall 54, 17.645; 19. Chris Windom, Windom 17, 17.680; 20. Kevin Huntley, SC 9x, 17.682; 21. Mike Brecht, Seeling 97s, 17.838; 22. Jon Stanbrough, Shepherd 5x, 17.883; 23. John Heydenreich, Burkey 57b, 18.030; 24. Hunter Schuerenberg, R & B 10t, 18.071; 25. Shane Cottle, Edison 10e, 18.104; 26. Daron Clayton, R & B 10, 18.126; 27. Dustin Morgan, Walker/Guiducci 11d, 18.127; 28. Matt Mitchell, BK 29k, 18.262; 29. Dickie Gaines, Pottorff 11p, 18.317; 30. Mat Neely, Walker/Guiducci 11, 18.323; 31. Davey Ray, Bland 21x, 18.394; 32. Marc Arnold, Hoyer 24, 18.513; 33. Russ Gamester, Gamester 46, 18.545; 34. Steve Ott, Ott 0t, 18.741; 35. Brian Tyler, McClure 9m, 18.886; 36. Don Droud, Jr., Yeley 1j, 18.974; 37. Mike Miller, Kissel 320, 19.042; 38. Jeff Bland, Bland 21t, 19.203; 39. Neil Shepherd, Shepherd 4n, 19.233; 40. Mike Murgoitio, Melchi 6m, 19.311; 41. Chappy Knaack, Miller 51x, 19.383; 42. Lee Stark, Stark 16, 19.507; 43. Craig Dori, Dori 38, 19.716; 44. Kyle Conaway, Conaway 37k, 20.641; 45. Aron McFadden, MAC 23m, 20.886; 46. Levi Jones, Stewart 20, no time; 47. Aaron Mosley, AM 27, no time; 48. Critter Malone, Seeling 97m, no time.
Non-Qualifiers Race (8 laps): Gamester, Ott, Bland, Murgoitio, Stark, Tyler, Shepherd, Miller, McFadden, Knaack, Dori, Conaway.
First Heat (8 laps): Coons, Chaney, Cottle, Gardner, Bacon, Gaines, Brecht, Kaeding, Gamester.
Second Heat (8 laps): Clayton, Ballou, Westfall, Hockett, Neely, Ott, Stanbrough, Whitt, Stenhouse.
Third Heat (8 laps): Morgan, Windom, Ray, Rose, Sweet, Hagen, Bland, Heydenreich, Jones.
Fourth Heat (8 laps): Mitchell, Taylor, Schuerenberg, Darland, Arnold, Swindell, Huntley, Short, Murgoitio.
Semi (12 laps): Stenhouse, Sweet, Hagen, Jones, Swindell, Short, Kaeding, Bacon, Huntley, Brecht, Stanbrough, Whitt, Heydenreich, Neely, Gaines, Murgoitio, Bland, Arnold.
Feature (30 laps): Ballou, Hagen, Hockett, Sweet, Darland, Gardner, Short, Coons, Chaney, Ray, Windom, Swindell, Taylor, Jones, Bacon, Neely, Rose, Westfall, Stenhouse, Mitchell, Cottle, Schuerenberg, Morgan, Clayton.