Ayrton Gennetten claimed his first Sprint Invaders win in Moberly Sunday night (MF Photography)
(Bill W) Moberly, MO, June 14, 2020 – Ayrton Gennetten took advantage of a restart to nip Austin McCarl in a 25-lap, high speed showdown on the high banks of Randolph County Raceway near Moberly, Missouri. The win was Gennetten’s first with the Sprint Invaders series, and earned him $1,500 aboard the Ozark Barge & Dock Service #3.
Kyle Bellm led early in the feature event ahead of Gennetten and Riley Goodno. McCarl was soon on the prowl, however, using the extreme high side of turn one and shooting low in turn two to jet into third on lap two.
He used the same line to go from third to first on a restart following a stoppage by California’s Kyle Offill. As McCarl stretched his lead, Gennetten and Bellm traded second three times in four laps. Meanwhile, McCarl shot into lapped traffic by the seventh circuit, and disposed of it quickly.
At the same time, Gennetten separated himself in second, while Alumbaugh was left to battle back and forth with Garrett Williamson and Bellm for the show position.
McCarl had opened up a near half lap lead and was approaching the tail of cars in the top ten when the yellow flew for a slowing Mason Campbell.
The restart put Gennetten on McCarl’s tail. A slide job across McCarl’s bow in turn four saw Gennetten take the point. McCarl shot back by on lap 16, only to have Gennetten slide in front for good the next time around.
McCarl dogged the leader the rest of the way, but Gennetten prevailed in an exciting finish. Following Austin across the line were Alumbaugh, Williamson and hard-charger, Chris Martin, who missed his heat race and had to go through the B main after an engine change. Carson McCarl, Bellm, Paul Nienhiser, Campbell and Kaley Gharst rounded out the top ten. Goodno, Alumbaugh and Gennetten won heat races and Williamson won the Dash. Randy Martin won the B main.
A pair of incidents marred the evening. Bailey Goldesberry and Colton Fisher got together in heat three and collected Cam Martin, who was making his first Sprint Invaders start at the age of 15. In the B main, Timothy Smith went for a nasty ride in turn one. He was not injured seriously.
“Austin had me covered the whole race,” said Gennetten. “I found a line passing some lapped cars. I kind of searched. It was so good on the bottom to start the race. I got to third in the first corner, and I knew if I had a yellow I had to try something. That was the only way I was going to get by him. I just drove it in there as hard as I could. Luckily, we got to sliding each other, and we about killed each other one time down the backstretch. I’ve been dying to get my first Sprint Invaders win. We’ve wanted to win at Donnellson (Lee County Speedway) so bad, and then I come here where I got my first ever sprint car start. This was our first time back here since then. That’s pretty special. Austin was way faster than me most of the race. I just threw what I had at him, and it paid off.”
“It was fun for awhile,” said a very disappointed Austin McCarl. “I just got beat. (Gennetten) did a good job. I couldn’t believe the way he was sliding himself was remotely fast, but it was for him. Good for him. It’s disappointing you know, we just want to win these races. That’s why we’re here.”
“We had a really good car,” said Alumbaugh. “We had a much better car than we showed tonight. I had a brake line break on me, and we were without them the last 11 laps. You don’t want to run without brakes, but sitting in that position, it’s hard not to…especially sitting where we were. We used the Dash to experiment a bit and it didn’t work. It was good to know we could go back to our baseline and run well.”
The Sprint Invaders will next hit the track at the Davenport (IA) Speedway on Friday, June 26 and then invade the 34 Raceway in West Burlington, Iowa on Saturday, June 27. For more information on the Sprint Invaders, visit www.SprintInvaders.com or look us up on Facebook.
Sprint Invaders A main (started), 25 laps: 1. 3, Ayrton Gennetten, Gravois Mills, MO (5) 2. 17A, Austin McCarl, Altoona, IA (4) 3. 33, Austin Alumbaugh, Higginsville, MO (6) 4. 24, Garret Williamson, Columbia, MO (3) 5. 44, Chris Martin, Ankeny, IA (16) 6. 27, Carson McCarl, Altoona, IA (11) 7. 14E, Kyle Bellm, Nixa, MO (1) 8. 50, Paul Nienhiser, Chapin, IL (12) 9. 11c, Mason Campbell, New Berlin, IL (19) 10. 78, Kaley Gharst, Decatur, IL (8) 11. 40c, Cody Wehrle, Burlington, IA (15) 12. 7B, Ben Brown, Marshall, MO (10) 13. 22, Riley Goodno, Knoxville, IA (2) 14. 81, Tanner Gebhardt, Burlington, IA (7) 15. 99, John Schulz, West Burlington, IA (9) 16. 35, Josh Higday, Des Moines, IA (13) 17. 14, Randy Martin, California, MO (17) 18. 9m, Glen Saville, Razorback, NSW, Aust. (18) 19. 88, Kyle Offill, Tracy, CA (14) 20. 9, Daniel Bergquist, Burlington, IA (20). Lap Leaders: Bellm 1-2, A. McCarl 3-14, Gennetten 15, A. McCarl 16, Gennetten 17-25. KSE Hard-charger: Chris Martin.
Randall’s Performance Heat one (started), 8 laps: 1. Riley Goodno (2) 2. Kyle Bellm (1) 3. Austin McCarl (6) 4. Carson McCarl (4) 5. Paul Nienhiser (5) 6. Kyle Offill (7) 7. Randy Martin (9) 8. Mason Campbell (3) DNS – Chris Martin
CenPenCo Lubricants Heat two (started), 8 laps: 1. Austin Alumbaugh (7) 2. Tanner Gebhardt (1) 3. Daniel Bergquist (2) 4. Josh Higday (3) 5. Cody Wehrle (4) 6. Kaley Gharst (8) 7. 0, Jake Griffin, Quincy, IL (6) 8. 86, Timothy Smith, Rocheport, MO (5) DNS – 13, Brayden Gaylord, Wever, IA
Paisano’s Ristorante of Preston, Illinois Heat three (started), 8 laps: 1. Ayrton Gennetten (3) 2. Garret Williamson (6) 3. John Schulz (2) 4. Ben Brown (4) 5. Glen Saville (1) 6. 29w, Wyatt Wilkerson, Morning Sun, IA (7) 7. 4, Bailey Goldesberry, Springfield, IL (5) 8. 11, Colton Fisher, Mediapolis, IA (8) 9. 44c, Cam Martin, Ankeny, IA (9)
Budweiser King of Beers – Golden Eagle Distributors Shake-up Dash (started), 6 laps: 1. Garret Williamson (2) 2. Austin McCarl (5) 3. Ayrton Gennetten (3) 4. Austin Alumbaugh (1) 5. Kyle Bellm (6) 6. Riley Goodno (4)
B main (started), 12 laps: 1. Randy Martin (2) 2. Chris Martin (9) 3. Mason Campbell (7) 4. Glen Saville (3) / 5. Jake Griffin (4) 6. Brayden Gaylord (8) 7. Bailey Goldesberry (5) 8. Wyatt Wilkerson (1) 9. Timothy Smith (6) DNS – Colton Fisher, Cam Martin
Contingencies
Pyrotec – John Schulz
Saldana Racing Products – Daniel Bergquist
Kreitz Oval Track Products – Cody Wehrle