Tuesday Night Thunder - Delaware's Top Ten Performers of the Week. July 9

Howdy all! Well the big move is behind me now and I'm ready to get back in the saddle in a big way for the 2nd half of the season. This has actually been in the works for a while, but so far has only seen light in one issue of Delaware's handout program earlier this season.

I've decided Spencer Lewis can't have all the fun, so I've come up with an appendix to the regular Friday night report, namely a "power ranking" system of my own. In it, all drivers competing on a given Friday night are ranked against all others, regardless of what division they're in. The rankings are based on total performance: heat wins, feature wins, positions gained/lost and lap times....so you can still have a feature winner technically finishing out of the top 10.

Aside from that, the rankings ARE stat based, but are still to be taken as an opinion piece, and have NO bearing on Delaware points or performance totals. All opinions are expressly my own and have no official sanction from Delaware management or officials.

But this is a discussion piece....so feel free to discuss or add some kudos of your own!

Trev

And our Top 10 Delaware performers for the week of July 9...drum roll please...

10
Darrell "Hollywood" Lake - London - Super Stock 77
Coming off a major mishap a few weeks ago in which the 77 car found itself crunched nose first hard into the inner pit wall, the Lake team is quickly getting the program back on track. After one week in a borrowed car, and another week where they managed to pull off a feature win in an ill handling race car, they came back with a solid 4th place in the feature this week.

9
Michelle Koricina - Ailsa Craig - Demar Aggregates Truck 99
She's been dubbed the "Sophomore Sensation" by the announcers, and is currently the only female driver in any of our regular race divisions. Not afraid to mix it up with the rest of the guys, she's always exciting to watch, and never more so than in last week's wild three- wide feature finish between her, 75-Depuis and 31-Powell.

8
Paul Fothergill - London - Demar Aggregates Truck 33
Fothergill is no stranger to the upper ranks here, and even after a rough outing still made the top 10. Fothergill and Showler were poised to be to the front soon when the two of them got together, sending both trucks to the back of the feild just after the crossed flags. Fothergill fought back to net himself a 6th place finish.

7
Justin Demelo - London - MRA / Powerade Modified 82
Justin is in his rookie year this year and has been most impressively consistent. He's just a hair's breadth from being able to mix it up with the Mod Division's usual heavy hitters, and I'm certain he'll be up there before the season in over. This week he took 1st in his heat and a solid 4th in the feature.

6
Jordan Dupuis - LaSalle - Demar Aggregates Truck 75
Depuis was another of the three trucks involved in that 3 wide, tooth and nail battle for the checkers last week. Dupuis is quietly consistent on the track and found himself in 3rd and in a position to pounce when 31-Powell got both himself and Michelle Koricina out of shape off the last turn. Dupuis ended up beating Powell for 2nd by the thickness of a coat of paint!

5
Kris Lawrence - London - Super Stock 28
Kris is in his 3rd year in Super Stock action, and in the 2010 season Kris has kept has kept the BTRacing number 28 pretty regularly in the top 5. This week he was 5th in his heat race and 3rd in the feature, but bested the SS field in overall positions gained.

4
Paul Shipway - Ailsa Craig - MRA / Powerade Modified 88
The second Ailsa Craig native in the top 10 rankings this week, Paul, affectionately known as "Shippy" comes off a stellar performance at Sauble Speedway last weekend, besting 21 other competitors in the Modified Racing Association's maiden voyage as a travelling group. (the MRA's just picking up steam folks and the T-shirts are gonna be a collector item...get em' while they still got em'!) This Friday, Paul stayed on a roll, putting together a heat win, a 3rd in the feature, and was only second to Cox in pos. gained.

3
Jamie Cox - Dorchester - MRA / Powerade Modified 3
Jamie is the perrenial top dog here in the Modified division, and his inclusion here comes as no surprise. His gift is that he seems to be one of the very few drivers here that really has the outside lane working for him, and his power moves getting from the back to the front in last week's feature proved it.

1st Place TIED - Jeremy Ried and Jake Ott

Jeremy Ried - Kerwood - Super Stock 76
When Jeremy's there, he's there to win, and he usually has that red Camaro hooked up and ready to go. However Jeremy is not an every-week competitor, so the points don't reflect his often-stellar performances.
This week Jeremy had the Super Stock feature won, lost it, then won it again. After dominating the last 2/3rds of the feature, he was bumped out of the way in turn 2 on the last lap. He went wide but managed to hang onto the car and take second spot. Then at the finish line, he was ruled the winner due to a rough driving call on the other car. Chalk one more up for the boys from Kerwood. These guys would be a legitimate threat for the title if they were there every week!

Jake Ott - Ayr - in the "It Aint Easy being Green" Super Stock 60
This is the JWO Racing team's second year at the big half mile. Driver Jake, affectionately known as "Juice Box", cut his racing teeth racing at smaller venues like Flamboro and Varney. He came out of the box fairly slow last year, but has been exemplary this year. He's in the hunt every week, but has thus far been unable to bag a feature win. Great night this past week, netting 2 second place finishes and an excellent +/-. He's been so close it hurts, and a feature win has to be coming shortly.