Jason Trammell drove a brand new Rocket Chassis to victory lane at Volunteer Speedway
Volunteer Speedway hosted its regular classes for a full night of racing on Saturday night. The Limited(Steelhead) Late Models class served as the headline attraction with several other divisions also in action. And for that division, the night proved to be a survival of the fittest contest as the attrition rate was high for multiple reasons. When the checkered flag waved, it was east Tennessee veteran driver Jason Trammell, driving a brand new race car, who survived and came away with the victory at the Bulls Gap, Tenn. facility.
Jason Cardwell set the pace early when he posted a lap of 12.950 seconds around the 4/10 mile clay oval to best the 21 cars entered in the Limited Late Model class. Austin Neely, Layne Clifton, Bobby Mays, Trevor Sise, Greg Estes, John Llewellyn, Bobby Giffin, Michael Courtney and Trammell followed the fast qualifier in time-trials and rounded out the top-10 on the starting grid.
There were no heat races as the starting lineup for the main event were set entirely via time-trial results.
Cardwell took the lead when the green flag waved over the field at the start of the 30-lap feature and appeared poised to drive away with the race as he quickly jumped out to a lead of several car lengths as Neely, Clifton, Mays, Estes and Sise battled for position behind him.
A lap 7 caution for a spin by Chris Chandler slowed the pace and allowed the field to bunch back up. On the ensuing restart, Mays went after Clifton for the third position but the big mover proved to be Trammell as he found himself just outside the top-5 after only seven circuits.
Cardwell again looked separate himself from the pack until a lap 11 yellow flag waved for the slowing machine of Clifton, who surrendered the fourth position when he pull his car into the pit area.
The restart following the Clifton caution would prove to be a costly one for several contenders when contact from another car sent the Mays machine for a spin at the exit of turn two in front of oncoming traffic. Neely, Sise, John Tweed and Josh Henry were collected in the melee with significant damage done to all of those cars.
Trammell bolted to the runner-up spot just behind Cardwell on the lap 11 restart and looked to apply pressure on the leader until another caution flag flew on lap 13 for another multi-car incident in turn two.
Cardwell looked to be pulling away again once the race returned to green flag action until Trammell gained quickly on lap 18 and then shot to the low side of the high-baked track to take the lead. Shortly after, Cardwell slowed a stop with a flat tire.
From that point, the race was all Trammell’s as he cruised to the finish line for the win ahead of Greg Estes, John Llewellyn, Michael Courtney, John Tweed, Chase King, Ellery Leake, Trevor Sise, Michael Smith and Jason Cardwell.
