June 28th, 1997

BELLINGER AND DIDERO EVEN AT THE LINE AT OSWEGO TYING FOR FEATURE WIN

Oswego, NY - In one of the most exciting finishes at Oswego Speedway ever, Eddie Bellinger's 02 and Doug Didero's 3 came off the fourth turn full bore and at 120+mph, touched the finish line at the same time. It was the first feature tie at Oswego Speedway in recent memory. Looking back in the record books finds the last exciting dead heat occurring in 1969 between the late Jim Shampine and the late Jack Greedy. Saturday night, Bellinger grabbed the lead on lap 27 and looked to be the winner as he approached the lap 45 mark, but a lap car sat in Bellinger's sites, slowing him and giving the charging Didero one last shot. He took it, powering the 3 down the front straight to match Bellinger's efforts. After review of information from the videotapes, scorers and flagmen, the race was declared a tie, giving Eddie his first win since May 27, 1995 and Didero his third of the season. The pair will share the points and money for first and second place. Bellinger also picks up an extra $500 for the Brodix heads bonus. Bobby Bond took over the lead in the limited go on a lap 21 and survived one caution to go on to his first-ever Oswego victory. Tim Devendorf was also a first-timer after winning the June 7 makeup limited feature which began the race night.

"I'm satisfied," said Bellinger after the race, "It's better than wrecking. The car was running pretty good. Coming into four at the end a lap car came out on me and I had to slam on the brakes. I was right on them hard, but I had no choice."

Didero, too, had a favorable comment with the outcome. "It was just good to get back to some good racing tonight. There was only one car who seemed to be driving way over his head, but the rest of the guys really ran good tonight. It's good to get back into a good race tonight. You could race side by side and clean. This was the most enjoyable part about it."

The Wendy's supermodified main was led to the line by Jamie Letcher and Bob Goutermout and it was Letcher in the lead on the first lap. Goutermout ran a strong second until Danny Soule got by on lap 12.

The first of only three yellows flew on lap 19 for the 89 of Todd Stowell who was in the wall off turn three. Stowell rolled into the pits, while also making pitstops were Muldoon and Abold. All were able to restart.

On the green, with Letcher still in control, Kenny Bell used the opportunity to take third from Goutermout, then battling by his own teammate Soule for second.

At lap 23, Bell became the leader for the first time in a long time, with Eddie Bellinger tucking right in behind. Soule, Letcher, Goutermout, Steve Gioia, Tim Gareau, Doug Didero and Dave Heitzhaus were among the top ten at this point.

Bellinger haunted Bell while Soule watched his second car out front. "He got me all excited watching him(Bell) up there," said Soule later, "I wasn't paying attention to where I was going."

Lap 27 saw the last of the slowdowns as first a three-car pileup off four occurred affecting Stowell, Shannon Groves and Pat Abold. Abold's car took the hardest hit and was done for the night. Into the pits were Furlong, Hawksby and Gioia, who had been running fifth.

A second yellow on the restart of this lap found Tim Gareau on the hook and out of the action.

It was all racing from here on in as Bellinger stormed by Bell on the restart, looking for a win. Bell, Soule and Didero were the top four as moving up quickly through traffic was Mike Muldoon, gaining a fifth at this juncture. Back in the pack Goutermout fought off Tim Snyder and Dave Heitzhaus.

Didero was picking his way through the pack and was second by ten to go. Soule was back in third, Goutermout fourth and Muldoon fifth as Bell had dropped back with a too-loose 31.

Bellinger and Didero were the men to watch with five laps to go, as the approached slower cars, as Muldoon, Soule and Snyder continued in the top five.

Bellinger actually powered away from Didero by a couple car lengths as the laps wore down, but as the clock ticked to 44, a mass of lapped traffic lay ahead. Coming into four, the 12 of Andy Powell was high in the groove where Bellinger was about to run and Eddie laid on the binders, allowing Didero to make up the distance between the two.

Coming across the line, it was deemed the two front ends hit at the same time. Bellinger and Didero shared the honors in victory lane as the crowd cheered loudly. Point leader Mike Muldoon settled for third after his pitstop. "We missed the stagger on the car," said Muldoon, "So we changed it and I didn't have a long time to get back up. I've got to congratulate Eddie Bellinger. It's been a long couple years for him. I'm glad to see him on a winning track."

Soule continued his consistent finishes. "We're real pleased. We're going to keep working on the car. I think we found the direction we need to go in and hopefully next week we can run even better."

Probably one of the happiest top five finishes was Tim Snyder, who had to run the consi earlier because his crew had spent most of early evening fixing the car. "We had a bad fuel pump. We thought it was the magneto. We thought it was injection. Finally we decided to take a look at the fuel pump. We had to borrow a fuel pump and the guys got it in on time to run the consi," said Tim, "We didn't have time to do anything to the car. We ran on last week's tires, stayed out of trouble and moved up one spot at a time. The crew did all the work. I just sat in the car and went around the track."

Rounding out the top ten were Bob Goutermout, Ken Bell, Howard Page, Dave Heitzhaus and Dave Trytek.

Snyder picked up the Universal Joint Sales Up and Comer award and unofficially was the SCS Installations Hard Charger, moving from nineteenth to fifth.

Heat 1: Steve Gioia Jr., Dave Heitzhaus, Howard Page, Bob Goutermout, Todd Stowell, Ken Bell, Dave Mazzoni, Joe Hawksby Jr.

Heat 2: Doug Didero, Jeff West, Jamie Letcher, Greg Furlong, Jamie Moore, Dan Soule, Gary Syrell, Roger Clark, Tim Snyder(dns)

Heat 3: Mike Muldoon, Eddie Bellinger, Pat Abold, Dave Trytek, Shannon Groves, Tim Gareau, Andy Powell, Bill Sharkey

Consi: Gary Syrell, Tim Snyder, Dave Mazzoni, Andy Powell, Joey Hawksby Jr., Roger Clark, Bill Sharkey(blew an oil line on last lap)