Beau Ballard entered Super DIRT Week eyeing a DIRTcar Pro Stock Series championship. While he came eight points short of accomplishing that, he still walked away with the biggest win of his career.
In his first Super DIRT Week appearance and first start at Oswego Speedway, Ballard raced his way from fifth to Victory Lane in the DIRTcar Pro Stock 50.
“I’m at a loss for words,” Ballard said while trying to catch his breath.
The stout field of DIRTcar Pro Stock drivers didn’t make the win easy on the Super DIRT Week rookie. He found himself having to battle and grind and fight for every pass against drivers like his championship competitor Pete Stefanski, SRI Performance/Stock Car Steel and Aluminum Pole Award winner Chris Stalker and reigning DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 champion Luke Horning.
The first four laps of the 50-lap Feature ran under caution due to the yellow coming out on the first lap. When the race resumed, Horning stole the lead from Stalker and pulled away with the look of a repeat winner.
However, Stalker entered the fight again after a Lap 11 restart. He pulled side by side with Horning and the two stayed that way for five laps, trading the lead by a nose each lap. And while they dueled, Ballard, up to third, crept closer and closer.
The duel came to a pause on Lap 17 with another caution slowing the field. When the race resumed, Horning launched ahead of the field, leaving Stalker to try and fend off Ballard. But before they could make much of the battle, another caution flew on Lap 23.
That brought the race to halfway under caution with Horning in the lead.
When the green flew, again, Horning continued to charge ahead at the front and Ballard slid into second. Stalker fell, losing third to Stefanski.
Horning had a command out front but another yellow on Lap 32 brought Ballard back to his bumper. And the first-timer took advantage of that on the restart. Throwing his No. 15 car high in the first corner, he pulled even with Horning and the two drivers put on another side-by-side spectacle.
Like the battle with Horning and Stalker, Ballard took Stalker’s place this time as the car swapping the lead with Horning almost every lap. However, a restart on Lap 41, saw Horning slide out of the line of grip in the first corner, allowing Devon Camenga – who had been on the climb from seventh – to dive under him and take second.
The final caution of the night came out on Lap 42, setting up an eight-lap dash for the DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 title, the DIRTcar Pro Stock Series title and the night’s $3,000 check.
When the field saw the green flag for the final time, Ballard pulled ahead by a car length, while Horning and Camenga gave fans a race for second to the end. Using the low line, Horning found enough grip to drive back to second with seven laps to go. But Ballard was now in a league of his own.
In open air, with a clean track in front and behind, Ballard saw the checkered flags for the DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 for the first time in his career.
“Chris and Luke were really battling hard on the bottom, and I tried the top a couple of times up there, and I said, ‘If they keep messing around, I’m going for it,’” Ballard said. “The track came around to my liking and I just kept it straight and… Holy cow, I can’t believe it.
“Luke and I battled there for a few laps. I held these guys off for a couple of restarts. The car was just absolutely on point.”
Horning and Camenga finished on the podium of the DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 for the second straight year. For Camenga, it’s another third-place finish. But for Horning its one spot short of where he finished a year ago.
“I think we were a little bit more prepared for it to be a little bit slicker, I wasn’t prepared for it to be that tacky in the beginning,” Horning said. “We needed it to slicken up a little bit more than it did. The track is absolutely phenomenal… I just wasn’t prepared for it.”
Last year was Camenga’s first Super DIRT Week appearance, giving him two podium finishes in two starts of the Series’ biggest race.
“With this caliber of drivers this year, I’m really happy in third-place,” Camenga said. “I wish we start a little better, but that’s been the story for me this year, starting mid-pack, or out of the top five and top 10 and I kind of have to work my way through.
“I was hoping they were going to bang fenders and I could scoot underneath them or go around them. But this caliber of drivers, they’re just too good. Hopefully it was great racing for the fans. It was great for me to watch, but I was hoping I was going to be one of those lead changes.”
Entering the night with a 16-point lead, Stenfanski knew he had to keep Ballard in sight to score the title. And while Ballard got the advantage with the win, Stefanski still accomplished his goal of keeping his championship competitor within reach, finishing a fourth.
“We wanted to win the race, but sometimes you just get into ride mode, keeping your competitor within enough distance, so you don’t put yourself into trouble and end up taking yourself out,” Stefanski said about his run.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve got to run for a title, because we never had a home track. To come out and do this at my age of 54 and show these guys that we’re still competitive and still can run up front feels good.”
Five-time DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 champion Rob Yetman rounded out the top five, in his first time back at Super DIRT Week since 2022.
Ballard’s win came with another historic stat for the DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 as he became the seventh straight different winner of the event since Yetman last won it in 2017 – C.D. Beauchamp (2018), Josh Coonradt (2019), Chad Jeseo (2021), Nick Stone (2022) and Horning (2023).
UP NEXT: While the DIRTcar Pro Stock Series championship battle is over, the Series will move to its next biggest stage of the 2024 season – the World Short Track Championship at The Dirt Track at Charlotte, Oct. 31-Nov. 2. For tickets, click here.
If you can’t make it to the track, you can watch all the action live on DIRTVision.
VIDEO RECAP:
SUPER DIRT WEEK AWARDS:
SRI Performance/Stock Car Steel and Aluminum Pole Award ($500): Chris Stalker
Fratto Curbing Outside Pole Award ($250): Luke Horning
Bart Contracting Last Car/Finisher Award ($500): Rich Crane
Velocita USA Halfway Feature Leader ($500 Product Certificate): Luke Horning
Integra Racing Shocks Last Car on Lead Lap Award ($200 Product Certificate): Joe Wilson
Fastline Performance Lap 20 Leader Award ($200): Luke Horning
Penske Racing Shocks Hard Charger Award ($500): Kyle Hoard – 25th to 10th
Super DIRT Week Qualifying Heat 1 ($500): Beau Ballard
Super DIRT Week Qualifying Heat 2 ($500): Luke Horning
DIRTCAR PRO STOCK 50 RESULTS:
DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 (50 Laps): 1. 15-Beau Ballard[5]; 2. 2H-Luke Horning[2]; 3. 110-Devon Camenga[7]; 4. 2-Pete Stefanski[8]; 5. 7-Rob Yetman[11]; 6. 711X-Chris Crane Sr[12]; 7. 324-Jason Casey[10]; 8. 81-Bret Belden[9]; 9. 177-Chris Stalker[1]; 10. 76-Kyle Hoard[25]; 11. 12S-Dakota Sharp[14]; 12. 48-Jocelyn Roy[13]; 13. 7C-Caden Dumblewski[6]; 14. 54S-Zachary Sorrentino[15]; 15. 6-Shane Playford[29]; 16. 7D-Chucky Dumblewski[17]; 17. 33-Bruno Cyr[23]; 18. 6C-Brian Carter[21]; 19. 28-Philip DeFiglio[22]; 20. 81A-Michael Achzet[3]; 21. 58-Roxanne Roy[26]; 22. 57W-Joe Wilson[28]; 23. (DNF) 2E-Brandon Emigh[20]; 24. (DNF) 4-Dean Charbonneau[19]; 25. (DNF) 55-David Stickles[16]; 26. (DNF) 04-Jaxson Ryan[18]; 27. (DNF) 25-Chad Jeseo[27]; 28. (DNF) 711-Rich Crane[4]; 29. (DNF) 57-Charles Mcspirit[24]
The post BIG STAGE TRIUMPHS: Ballard wins DIRTcar Pro Stock 50 Thriller, Stefanski Scores Fifth Series Title appeared first on Super DIRT Week.