In the other semifinal Young put a holeshot on Stewart with a .140 RT to Stewart’s .183 effort. Young drifted towards the concrete guardwall eventually being forced to lift and slowing to a 3.942/178.31 that was still good enough to trailer Stewart’s 3.953/187.18.

In the shutdown Stewart was following Young and got too close, hitting Young’s left rear slick with the right front of his Mustang. Amazingly Young’s Goodyear tire didn’t get cut down and Stewart only did cosmetic damage to his ‘Stang, but it could have been a lot worse for both drivers.

With just an hour and ten minutes before the curfew the Hale and Young camps thrashed to turn their racecars around and get ready for the final. Young had to take the heads off of his motor but amazingly Hale’s crew didn’t. They put in a new clutch, filled the tank with 95% and pulled to the line followed by Johnson. At exactly 11:40 p.m. both cars fired and pulled to the line.

Hale was ready. He had his best RT of the event (a 0.66) and then ran the 5.746/200.50 to crush Young, who had a .123 RT and ran a 3.940/191.10 losing effort.

After the race Young told DRO that he -- like everyone else but Guy Tipton -- thought the track would be cold and slick and he de-tuned his car to compensate. He was obviously wrong about the track. His arch rival, John Hale, proved that he will be favored for a DRO Series “three-peat” by winning the race and setting both ends of the DRO eighth-mile records. Hale’s 3.818/196.07 lap in the semi-finals stood up as both ends of the record and gained him 60 additional Championship points.

The next race on the Series schedule is at Cedar Falls, Iowa, July 19-20. That is a quarter-mile track and a dozen cars are anticipated to attend the event.

Mickey Thompson Tire DRO AA/FC Challenge Championship Points after one race   

1. John Hale -168
2. Ronny Young - 99
3. Brian Stewart - 90
4. Tommy Johnson Jr. - 87
5. Kebin Kinsley - 76