7/28/2018
Cam Schafer Makes It Seven Wins With Cedar Lake Victory
The incredible season continues for Minneapolis driver Cam Schafer, as the 2014 Traditional Sprint Car Series Champion earned his seventh win of the season in the POWRi UMSS Lucas Oil Traditional Sprint Car Series A Main on Saturday July 28 at the Cedar Lake Speedway. Schafer led all the way on his way to Rock Auto Victory lane for his nineteenth career TSCS win, moving him into second on the all-time win list in the popular non-winged division. It was also Schafer's third win of the season at Cedar Lake.
A solid field of (22) Traditional sprint cars signed into the pits on a beautiful summer evening for the final CLS Shootout event of the season. The field was pared down by one in hot laps, as rookie John Lowe rolled his car in turn one and was done for the night. Three caution-free 10-lap heat races were run and won by Schafer, Brad Peterson and Johnny Parsons III. Following his apparent win, Parsons failed to report to the scale and was disqualified. This handed the third heat race win to Anna Hippe, who had pressured Parsons the entire way but came up just short at the finish.
Schafer drew the pole position for the feature, leaving little doubt in anyone's mind that he would be a strong candidate for the win. Schafer jumped up top in his familiar "Cam Country" and led the first 15 laps before the yellow light blinked on for debris (start cone) on the front stretch. Five laps later the second yellow waved again when Allen Stettner stalled on the back stretch. The third caution flew one lap later when Neal Matuska made hard contact with the concrete wall exiting turn two after clipping the spinning Brad Peterson car. Matuska's car sustained heavy front-end damage and was towed to the pits. Peterson restarted at the tail of the field. Two laps after the race returned to green, the red flag was out for Anna Hippe. Anna crashed hard into the turn three wall and flipped over. Both Neal and Anna were okay following their crashes.
Schafer continued to lead throughout the cautions and red flag, as he held off a charging Blake Anderson during the final two lap dash to the checkers. Anderson turned in his best finish of the season with a solid second place ahead of defending series champion Mike Mueller. Bryan Roach and three-time TSCS champion Rob Caho, Jr. rounded out the top five. Caho, who blew a rear seal in his car in hot laps, started 20th on the grid and advanced fifteen positions to earn the $100 GRP Motorsports Hard Charger Award. Also advancing an identical number of positions in the feature race was 21st starter Johnny Parsons. At one point late in the race, Parsons was actually ahead of Caho but Caho regained the fifth spot on the final lap to edge Parsons out for the extra cash. Completing the top ten finishers behind Parsons was Denny Stordahl, Peterson, Scott Brandt and Ty Sampair. Fifteen of the twenty one starters were still running at the finish.
The POWRi Lucas Oil Traditional sprints will have a couple of weekends off before returning to action on Saturday night August 18 for the Davey Tabor Memorial at the Ogilvie Raceway. The UMSS 360 winged sprints will join with the Traditional sprints that night in what will also be a Midwest Power Series race for the winged division. Keep tabs on all of the POWRi UMSS Lucas Oil Traditional sprint car action by visiting our website at www.umsprints.com or by following the series on Facebook and My Race Pass.
TSCS Race Results - Cedar Lake Speedway July 28, 2018 (Race #13)
POWRi Lucas Oil A Feature 1 (25 Laps): 1. 14-Cam Schafer, [1]; 2. 12X-Blake Anderson, [5]; 3. 87-Mike Mueller, [3]; 4. 99-Bryan Roach, [7]; 5. 78-Rob Caho Jr, [20]; 6. 12-Johnny Parsons III, [21]; 7. 34-Denny Stordahl, [10]; 8. 93-Brad Peterson, [6]; 9. 7-Scott Brandt, [4]; 10. N1-Ty Sampair, [11]; 11. K1-Kevin Lear, [13]; 12. 23-Jake Hendrickson, [14]; 13. 33C-Cody Emmans, [16]; 14. 5-Troy Gessner, [15]; 15. 00-Ryan Buck, [19]; 16. (DNF) 16-Anna Hippe, [2]; 17. (DNF) 19B-Jack Berger, [9]; 18. (DNF) 48-Neal Matuska, [8]; 19. (DNF) 55-Joseph Kouba, [12]; 20. (DNF) 38S-Allen Stettner, [17]; 21. (DNF) 56-Josh Braford, [18]; (DNS) 2J-John Lowe,
Lap Leader: Schafer 1-25. (3) Yellows for cone on front stretch with 15 laps in, 38S stalled on back stretch with 20 laps scored and 48 into wall exiting turn 2 with 21 laps scored (also involving 93 & 33C). (1) Red for 16 hard into turn 3 wall and flipped over with 23 laps scored.
PIRTEK Fluid Transfer Solutions Heat 1 (10 Laps): 1. 14-Cam Schafer, [1]; 2. 87-Mike Mueller, [2]; 3. 34-Denny Stordahl, [3]; 4. N1-Ty Sampair, [5]; 5. 55-Joseph Kouba, [6]; 6. 5-Troy Gessner, [7]; 7. 00-Ryan Buck, [4]; 8. 78-Rob Caho Jr, [8]
Lap Leader: Schafer 1-10. No cautions.
Rock Auto Heat 2 (10 Laps): 1. 93-Brad Peterson, [2]; 2. 12X-Blake Anderson, [5]; 3. 99-Bryan Roach, [4]; 4. K1-Kevin Lear, [1]; 5. 33C-Cody Emmans, [3]; 6. 38S-Allen Stettner, [6]; 7. 56-Josh Braford, [7]
Lap Leader: Peterson 1-10. No cautions.
GRP Motorsports Heat 3 (10 Laps): 1. 16-Anna Hippe, [3]; 2. 7-Scott Brandt, [2]; 3. 48-Neal Matuska, [4]; 4. 19B-Jack Berger, [6]; 5. 23-Jake Hendrickson, [5]; (DNS) 2J-John Lowe, ; (DQ) 12-Johnny Parsons III, [1]
Lap Leader: Parson 1-10. But Parsons failed to scale and was DQed handing the win to Anna Hippe. No cautions.
Rock Auto Victory Lane photo courtesy of Vince Peterson at Track Rat Photos.
Article Credit: Greg Parent, UMSS Media Director
