pennsylvaniasprintseries Archives

Bloomsburg, Selinsgrove make up weekend racing bill for PASS

By Frank Buhrman BLOOMSBURG, Pa. (May 19, 2022) – The River Valley Builders Pennsylvania Sprint Series gets an early start to the weekend with a rare midweek show at Bloomsburg Fair Speedway, then move to its most-often-visited 2022 track, Selinsgrove Speedway, for more action on Saturday night. Tonight’s (Thursday’s) race will be the second for PASS at the beautiful Bloomsburg track, built last year inside the horse-racing facility that also held auto races through the years. The IMCA RaceSaver cars visited last season for an event co-sanctioned by three regional RaceSaver series and Zack Bealer of the Mid-Atlantic Sprint Series regular Zack Bealer took home the win. PASS is scheduled to appear at Bloomsburg again this year on July 13. Pit gates will open at 4 p.m., with grandstands opening at 5 p.m. and racing scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. Saturday’s race will be the second this year for PASS at Selinsgrove; the last time the series was scheduled to race, rain had other ideas. Hometown driver Ken Duke won the year’s first series [Read More]

PASS in ‘Madness’ at Port Royal this Saturday

By Frank Buhrman PORT ROYAL, Pa. (April 5, 2022) – The River Valley Builders Pennsylvania Sprint Series will be part of an open wheel race fan’s dream show this Saturday, April 9 at Port Royal Speedway for Open Wheel Madness. The IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Cars, which will run a 20-lap feature and qualifying events, are sponsored again this year at Port Royal by Penns Valley Meat Market. This will be the first of nine scheduled PASS appearances at the Port in 2022, including a twin-20s program in June and the annual Keystone RaceSaver Challenge in October. Nine of the top 10 drivers in 2021 PASS points are set to run Saturday, including champion Garrett Bard of Wells Tannery, who is the runaway leader in Port Royal wins among active RaceSaver competitors with seven. Eight of the top 10 in points for the division at Port Royal last year should be on hand, including champion Dave Grube II of York Haven, the season’s only two-time winner at the track. Also planning to run is 2021 IMCA RaceSaver [Read More]

River Valley Builders back PASS

By Frank Buhrman SELINSGROVE, Pa. – River Valley Builders, the Susquehanna Valley’s most trusted homebuilder, will be the series sponsor for the Pennsylvania Sprint Series in 2022. The news was teased at the annual PASS banquet last month, and the contract with PASS and IMCA was finalized last week. Central Pennsylvania’s premier modular home builder’s service area overlaps with the tracks hosting most of PASS’s 2022 IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Car races, making the sponsorship a natural fit. “We’re thankful to Ken Duke Sr. for referring River Valley Builders as our series sponsor,” stated Rod Ort, regional director for PASS. ”It’s great when racers get involved to help bring sponsors over that benefit the series. Our goal will be to spread the word about RVB at the tracks we visit.” “I’m personally excited about this because their area of service is right in our back yard and as an owner of a modular home, I’m a huge advocate of the process,” he continued. “It’s really great to have a company that wants to support our teams, [Read More]

Call him doctor! Hauck puts on Selinsgrove PASS clinic

By Frank Buhrman SELINSGROVE, Pa. (Sept. 25) – Derek Hauck put on a clinic Saturday night to post an emphatic, start-to-finish victory in the Pennsylvania Sprint Series 20-lap feature at Selinsgrove Speedway. Hauck took advantage of a front-row starting position to grab the lead in the second turn of the opening lap and never looked back, negotiating traffic and holding off a late charge by Austin Reed to win by 1.246 seconds in a nonstop IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Car feature. Work responsibilities have limited Hauck’s racing this season to nine PASS starts, plus a few with the Laurel Highlands Sprint Series, but this was his second win and sixth top-five finish in those nine events. While Hauck was roaring through the field in the lead, a battle including as many as four cars was raging behind him, first for the runner-up spot, until Reed laid claim there, then for third, where a late charge by Doug Dodson gave him that spot. Veteran Fred Arnold, who started on the pole and was in the thick of [Read More]

Hendershot repeats at Path Valley, Melair wins PASS make-up feature

By Frank Buhrman SPRING RUN, Pa. (Sept. 18) – Veteran Donnie Hendershot has developed a fondness for Path Valley Speedway . . . and for winning. Over the years, the driver of the family-backed no. 31 had scored the majority of his best finishes at BAPS Motor Speedway, but in May he earned his first career victory at Path Valley. Just four months later, he returned to the Spring Run bullring and earned IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Car win number two. On a track where passing was at a premium, Hendershot slipped by early leader Mike Alleman and held off a charge from Austin Reed to capture the regularly scheduled Pennsylvania Sprint Series feature. After a lap nine caution, Reed got past Alleman and began applying pressure to Hendershot, but the Friday night Williams Grove winner wasn’t able to complete the pass for a weekend double, and Hendershot crossed the finish line .343 seconds ahead. Earlier, Dom Melair took the lead from Jimmy White and scored a win in the conclusion of a feature postponed by [Read More]

Reed is good at The Grove for first PASS win

By Frank Buhrman MECHANICSBURG, Pa. (Sept. 18) – On a bad night for a number of other drivers, Austin Reed tamed a difficult Williams Grove Speedway track surface and collected his first win with Pennsylvania Sprint Series in Friday’s Jack Gunn Memorial program. Reed returned to racing with the IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Cars late last season and has been competitive this season. He drew the pole for Friday’s 20-lap feature following a fourth place heat finish, and after two disastrous attempts to start the race, took the early lead on the third effort and held off a determined Devin Adams to lead all the way for the victory. Adams made several attempts to take the lead and drew even with Reed coming out of turn two on lap 16, but Reed pulled away on the backstretch and held on for the win. Passing was at a premium on a heavy and narrow track but the RaceSaver drivers managed an impressive amount of it in their feature. Unfortunately, it also caused an inordinate amount of carnage [Read More]

By George, Riden ends nine year PASS drought!

By Frank Buhrman YORK HAVEN, Pa. (Aug. 29) – George Riden had been trying to get his IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Car out to the track more often. It paid off Sunday night, when the Elizabethtown veteran won his first Pennsylvania Sprint Series race in nine years, taking the 20-lap feature at BAPS Motor Speedway. Riden drew the outside pole and took the lead from polesitter Drew Young on lap three. He then fought off a ferocious challenge from Dom Melair, whose efforts to go past the leader fell just short. “Work has gotten pretty busy,” Riden said in victory lane. “Racing had to be put on the backburner but these guys over here have been working their butts off and we finally found some speed. It’s been a long time, man, so I’m just happy, just happy.” The win was Riden’s seventh with PASS but his first since Sept. 29, 2112. All six previous wins were at Path Valley Speedway. The veteran racer was a PASS regular from 2005-13 but has run sporadically since then [Read More]

PASS entries total 46, red hot Bard wins at Port Royal

By Frank Buhrman PORT ROYAL, PA. (Aug. 7) – Garrett Bard won his fifth Pennsylvania Sprint Series race in his last sixth starts Saturday night, taking advantage of his second straight front-row starting position draw and fighting off stout challenges from Kenny Heffner and Tyler Snook to top the 20-lap feature at Port Royal Speedway. The defending national champion Bard received his final and most serious challenge on a late restart with six laps to go. Rookie Snook dove to the inside and briefly claimed the lead, but Bard’s outside power was enough to return him to the top spot and the win. Kenny Heffner also challenged earlier in the race and re-took second place from Snook in the waning laps. Ken Duke and Dom Melair rounded out the top five. Forty-six IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Cars contended. Kassidy Kreitz earned the night’s hard charger award, coming from the 21st starting position to 12th after winning her “B” main. This week PASS has two scheduled races. On Friday the Sprinters are part of the Night of Power [Read More]

Rookie schools IMCA RaceSaver foes at Bloomsburg

By Frank Buhrman BLOOMSBURG, Pa. (July 25) – Rookie Zack Bealer found a way around Bloomsburg Fair Raceway that nobody else could match and scored his first win in a full-sized sprint car in Sunday’s IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Car feature co-sanctioned by the Pennsylvania Sprint Series and the Mid-Atlantic Sprint Series. The former micro-sprint driver, running regularly with MASS, already had amassed two top-five finishes and four top-10’s in just six starts, including a seventh at Bridgeport Speedway in his first RaceSaver start, the season-opening co-sanctioned event for both groups. He announced early Sunday he might be ready to do even better at Bloomsburg, coming from ninth starting position to finish fourth in his heat. That was the best charge by any driver in the preliminaries. Then he drew the pole for the 25-lap feature, the first ever for full-size, winged sprints on the Bloomsburg track, built earlier this year inside the horse track that was the site of many classic open-wheel races beginning nearly a century ago and ending in the 1980s. In a [Read More]

Bard bounces back with Path Valley PASS win

By Frank Buhrman SPRING RUN, Pa. (July 24) – Garrett Bard put disappointment behind him and scored a convincing victory Saturday in the Pennsylvania Sprint Series 25-lap feature event at Path Valley Speedway. Bard had endured a rare failure-to-qualify Friday at Big Diamond Speedway, but racing life was clearly back in balance 24 hours later. After a sixth-place start in his heat, Bard finished second, then drew the pole position for the feature and led all the way, taking the IMCA RaceSaver Sprint Car win by 1.391 seconds over Austin Reed. The win was Bard’s fifth of 2021 and 20th in a PASS career that now spans just over two years. It was his third career win at Path Valley. In victory lane, Bard said he welcomed the race’s two late cautions, because the handle on his car was going away and the restarts took him out of heavy traffic. Reed, who had started eighth, hung with Bard on the final restarts but couldn’t get around and fell just short of his first win of [Read More]