Randy Turner is the 2008 Wiscasset Raceway Super Late Model champion.
Turner finished fifth in the final 50-lap feature of the season, a race won by Charlie Colby, and claimed his first Wiscasset title by 18 points over Jeff Burgess.
Turner did not win a race this season, but he won the championship worth $10,000 with nine top-5 finishes in 14 starts.
Turner, 27, of Unity, entered the feature with a 10-point cushion over Jeff Burgess. Burgess had closed that gap to just two markers when he was leading with 10 laps remaining, but his car snapped around unexpectedly off of turn four to take him out of championship contention.
"I guess I just got loose," said Burgess, who slipped to ninth in the final rundown. "Trying too hard, I guess... I was protecting the bottom and she came around in a hurry. She didn’t do that all day."
Burgess won three of the last five Super Late Model features to put himself into title contention. But it was Turner’s consistency that was the difference.
"I hate to say it, but it was kind of a sigh of relief," Turner said of seeing Burgess spin only a few cars ahead of him while nursing a tenuous championship lead, especially with Chuck Colby bearing down on him in the closing laps. "I’ve only won a championship once before (at Unity Raceway in 2004), but I didn’t have nearly this much pressure on me. This year, there was just so much competition, and Jeff was so fast that he put so much pressure on me the last few weeks.
"In the feature, I was just riding, really," Turner said. "I wanted to race with those guys, but they kept telling me on the radio to take it (easy)."
Burgess said that while he was disappointed, he still felt good about the season.
"If we could have won, maybe it would have been a little bit different story," Burgess said. "We did everything we thought we needed to do, but it just wasn’t enough. It’s not too disappointing. We really only had a good month and a half, so in a six-month season to only have a (good) month and a half and still end up second in the standings, that’s still pretty good."
PASS North Series driver Gary Smith was second to Colby, and Ryan Deane was third. Chuck Colby finished fourth.
Congratulations to Randy Turner and his team!
Well deserved!...and well earned!
Randy is one of the nicest guys who race... it's always good to see guys like him do well!
Hopefully for Randy, that win he's looking for will come on Sunday?
Posted by: Norm | 16 October 2008 at 12:49 PM