Last night Joel Ettridge won his second feature race for the season by taking out the Carby Nationals at Bunbury Speedway in front of Michael Keen and Tim King.
The evening started with four heat races that dished up four different winners in Ettridge, Gavin Davis, Keen and Clayton Dickinson.
Jarrin Bielby withdrew from the race meeting at this point of the evening having suffered a DNF and a DNS in his two heats as his team chased motor problems in the Jetari Farms #39.
After the second round of heats, Glenn Dickinson had a collapsed sideboard on his top wing. Having qualified for the Bronze Shootout his team quickly went about making the switch to a spare as there was only a couple of races to make the change.
The Gold/Silver/Bronze Shootout was next up and in the Bronze Shootout it was the Dickinson Motorsport father and son duo of Glenn and Clayton that were clearly the fastest 2 cars on track as they both caught another car in front of them. This meant Aaron Chircop and Anthony Gaudio would start the feature race in 7th and 8th respectively.
In the Silver Shootout the Dickinson’s were joined on track by Gavin Davis and Tim King. King laid down a time of 14.829 on his opening lap and Glenn Dickinson would set a time of 15.406 on the same lap to be in second. That was until Davis timed in at 15.307 on his 3rd and final lap to send himself and King into the battle for pole position.
The Gold Shootout had King, Davis, Keen and Ettridge on track. Ettridge’s fast lap was his first one as he recorded a 15.062. Keen went quicker on his 2nd lap banking a 14.949 and King waited until his 3rd and final lap to time in at 15.177. Davis would record his best time on lap 2 with a 15.589, but would have to settle for starting from P4 in the feature race.
With 20 laps set to decide the Carby Nationals Champion, the field was set at 13 cars due to the loss of Bielby. Keen would elect to start from the outside of the front row and when the green flag dropped he led the field away from Ettridge, King, Davis, Glenn Dickinson, Chircop, Gaudio, Nash Waldron, Craig Bottrell, Brooke Newson, Peter Shepherdson and Tony Pracilio – this is with the exclusion of Clayton Dickinson who came to a stop in turn 4 on the opening lap with a right front tyre coming off the bead.
As the race restarted with 19 laps to run, it would only last until turn 2 where Peter Shepherdson got loose behind the wheel of the Lynx Bobcats #44 and came to a stop.
Keen got the race underway for a third time and on this occasion we stayed green. Glenn Dickinson made the first move after the restart, passing Gavin Davis for fourth. On lap 3 Davis would get out of shape losing a heap of positions to fall back to 9th as he regathered the Martin Engineering #8.
Craig Bottrell meanwhile had commenced his move forward in the field, first making an outside pass on Waldron. Bottrell then lined up Gaudio in turn 4 and Chircop down the main straight, Chircop fought back in turn 1, but Bottrell made the outside grove work to make the pass stick. Bottrell was now in 5th, but well behind the top 4.
Waldron and Gaudio, much like the heat races seemed to be stuck together as they traded positions a couple of times as Davis also started his recovery, taking a position back off Gaudio.
Keen and Ettridge were clear of King at the front of the field as they started their battle through lapped traffic. At half race distance the race had a new leader as Ettridge was now in front of Keen.
A lap later and Waldron would retire the Brooks Hire #97. Ettridge started to use the lapped traffic as a buffer between himself and Keen, but Keen wasn’t ever far away from making a lunge to take back the lead.
With 6 laps remaining Tony Pracilio exited the race – heading infield also. As the end of the race drew closer would Keen be able to make a challenge for the lead?
Bottrell was closing in on the back of Glenn Dickinson and after 2 laps of trying to make a pass, the Empire Graphics #4 went underneath the #26 for fourth.
When the white flag came out signalling 1 lap to go, Ettridge had enough of a buffer to complete the final lap without any trouble and claim his second win of the season and his first Carby Nationals belt reign.
Keen would cross the line 2.934 seconds later in 2nd, King would take 3rd, then Bottrell, Dickinson, Davis who passed Chircop on the last lap, Newson was behind both of them, then back to Gaudio and Shepherdson.
We now take a break from the Club Championship as we head to the Perth Motorplex in two weeks time for the 2023 State Title on 17th and 18th February 2023.
