White holds off Hoffman to win at Illiana
By Tony Baranek Post-Tribune correspondent July 1, 2012 11:26PM
Updated: August 3, 2012 6:25AM
SCHERERVILLE — In 2011, Mike White had a 28-year streak of winning at least one racing feature come to an end.
A new streak started Saturday night in the 30-lap late-model at the ASA-sanctioned Illiana Speedway.
White, a five-time champion at the half-mile oval, waited out a seven-lap side-by-side battle between John Nutley and Jack Kalwasinski, before leapfrogging past both. He paced the field the rest of the way, holding off steadily-closing Eddie Hoffman.
“Tonight was more or less a testing thing with this car, and guess what? My nephew Mark (Fredette), Ray (Wroblewski), my son Eric, we finally got it to stay on a race track,” White said. “Of course, Ray spent the last two weeks working on this thing by himself.
“When we went down there today, he had done a great job. It’s been a long time coming. We’ve been there this year. I think we should have won one or two, but when you can’t get ‘em, you can’t get ‘em. Tonight, we were able to get it, and it worked out.”
Hoffman battled from as far back as seventh place to take second away from D.J. Weltmeyer on lap 16. He made up several car-lengths on White during the stretch run, but was unable to get into position to take a shot at a pass.
“We weren’t getting any faster, it was just a matter of who slows down the least is how these things seem to go,” White said. “I think we were slowing down a little bit less than he was. But it wasn’t by much, and it certainly wasn’t enough.”
Weltmeyer held off Paul Shafer Jr., to claim third place. Danny Darnell and Mark Sontag Jr., completed the top six.
Bill Serviss won his second consecutive turbo stox main event, holding off the battling duo of Shawn Wiltjer and points leader Jacob McKown. McKown made a last-lap pass of Wiltjer to finish in the runnerup spot. Fourth went to Ed Ligue, followed by Matt Baikie and Bobbie Jean Wall.
Chris King won his second feature in as many weeks, taking the lead from Alex Arelano just four laps from the finish and prevailing by a short margin over Matt O’Leary. Arelano held on for third, followed by Ben Fidone, Jacob Melvin and Paul Shafer Sr.
The pure stocks main went to Adam Batliner, the first of his career, over Mark Ross and Craig Urban. Stan Zolodz continued his domination in the bandolero class, beating Ashley Ligue and Kenny Myer.
