4/18/2019
RPM Speedway
Black gets IMCA Victory, Grabouski wins twice at Sunflower Classic
Tanner Black atoned for a misadventure on opening night of last season’s Mike Hughes Memorial Sunflower Classic while Jordan Grabouski was a double winner at RPM Speedway’s 2019 season-opening special, March 28th-30th.
Both took home $1,000 for their respective IMCA Modified victories on Saturday, after inclement weather brought an early end to Friday’s scheduled show. Black was added to the Fast Shafts All-Star Invitational ballot while defending national champion Grabouski was already on the candidate list.
A late caution in the first feature worked to Black’s advantage, taking out traffic ahead of him and clearing out his preferred higher line for the last five laps.
“I messed up last year. Jason Wolla got by me and I didn’t want that to happen again,” Black said following his first feature win of the season. “This year we were able to finish.” He’d taken the lead at the drop of the initial green from his outside front row starting spot and led by three seconds and more at several points, ultimately beating Grabouski to the checkers by five car lengths. David Murray Jr. was third. “There were some really good cars here,” Black said. “We felt really good about being able to come here and get a win.”
Grabouski had swept Sunflower Classic wins at Hayes in 2016 and topped Fall Nationals there last October. He motored from ninth starting to winning Saturday’s first IMCA Sunoco Stock Car feature, then passed Steve Bowers Jr. for the lead and checked out on everybody in topping the Modified main. Career win number 204 in the division came aboard a new GRT ride and in front of Daniel Gottschalk and Bowers.
“It was a big weekend for us. The car was pretty good right out of the box,” Grabouski said. “The track was really racy for the second (Modified) feature. You could run all over.”
Two other defending national champions parked in victory lane Saturday at Hays, Mike Nichols following the second Stock Car feature and Ramsey Meyer in the Mach-1 Sport Compact main.
Nichols’ victory was his career 504th in a Stock Car. Jason Rogers and Kyle Pfeifer rounded out the top three. Grabouski had been chased across the stripe by Tyler Tipton and hard-charging Nick Tubbs, who’d started 21st. Meyer started eighth and scored career win number 169 with Shawn Hein and Terry Tritt in tow.
Tathan Burkhart won the first IMCA Sunoco Hobby Stock feature, with Zach Olmstead second and Garrett Hager third. Hager, the 14th starting Olmstead and Kent Husted ran 1-2-3 in the nightcap.
Karl Customs Northern SportMod winners were Dakota Sproul and Cody Thompson. Runner-up in both shows was Lance Borgman.
Thompson ran third in the first SportMod feature and started 11th in the second, when Blaine Walt completed the top three
Article Credit: IMCA