Rico at the Bowl on Night Two
Lonnie Wheatley, TULSA, Okla. (January 14, 2015) – There was no stopping Rico Abreu on Wednesday night as he raced to victory lane in the 25-lap River Spirt Casino Qualifying feature event at Tulsa Expo Raceway’s 29th Annual Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals.
After starting sixth, the Rutherford, CA, racer battled past Chris Windom for the point on the 15th lap and paced the final 11 circuits aboard the Toyota-powered Abreu Vineyards No. 97 Bullett to give Keith Kunz Motorsports a second win in as many nights after Kyle Larson raced from “C” Main to victory lane on Tuesday night.
“You only get one shot at taking the lead sometimes so you have to make sure you time it right,” Abreu said after the popular victory in front of a packed house.
Abreu timed it right indeed, rolling around the outside of Windom in turns three and four on the 15th lap and then checking out over the final circuits to take the win with a comfortable 2.875-second margin.
“Smoke has given us a perfect racetrack the last two nights so there’s no reason to believe it won’t be like that the rest of the week,” Abreu commented of Tony Stewart’s track prep skills.
Among the frontrunners throughout, Blake Hahn followed Abreu around Windom on the high side to move into second only to nearly wipe out on the turn two cushion on the 19th lap. While Hahn saved it, he fell to fourth behind Windom and J.J. Yeley before he returned to full song.
Windom held second to the line with Yeley fending off some Hahn sliders in the closing laps to lock into Saturday’s 55-lap championship finale along with Abreu and Windom.
Hahn was fourth while Sammy Swindell’s charge from “D” Main action after losing a muffler in his heat race culminated with a charge from 18th to fifth in the feature event. Swindell advanced a total of 45 positions in his climb from D to C to B to A.
Colby Copeland actually outcharged Sammy in the main event by rallying from 23rd to eighth for a gain of 15 positions.
For complete results from Chili Bowl Night Two, go to http://www.chilibowl.com/news/?i=26789&clk=featureNews.
(Photo courtesy of Dylan Duvall)
