Former Williams Lake resident Korbin Thomas proved why he is the Wescar Late Model Touring Series defending champion at Thunder Mountain Speedway Sunday when he raced his way to yet another checkered flag.
Korbin, who had been duelling with Quesnel’s Dave Olson for first place, patiently waited to make his move near the 60th lap of the 100-lap main event. Following Korbin’s pass, he wouldn’t look back.
“Korbin just put a little pressure on him and as soon as he wiggled a little bit Korbin got him,” said Thunder Mountain Speedway president Bob Lowen. “He’s always a contender, for sure. He knows how to get it done and he’s got the home track advantage.
“He grew up here as a kid.”
Olson would hang onto second place, while Logan Jewell of Prince George captured third. Williams Lake’s Ryley Seibert finished fourth.
Originally scheduled for Saturday evening, the torrential downpour forced the racing to be moved to Sunday afternoon, where the weather hung on just long enough to squeeze the action in.
“People were doubting me on Sunday morning, but I told them we’d get it in,” Lowen said. “It was sketchy there for a minutes then it was awesome, though.”
Korbin’s brother Kendall, also formerly of Williams Lake and now living in Kelowna, faced some tough luck as he collided with a corner wall early in the race causing him a flat tire and a stop in the pits.
“I brought on my own rough luck,” Kendall said. “I stuck on the high side during the restart and I wanted to try to get a bit more arc on the corner and just got too close to the wall. Popped a tire off and that was that.”
He added the Wescar series is happy to have Williams Lake as one of its stops.
“Little do people realize many of the drivers they saw including my brother, Logan Jewell, are probably some of your best oval track racers in Western Canada so that’s pretty neat,” he said.
Lowen, meanwhile, said he was impressed the 100-lap Wescar main event finished with just one caution flag.
“Rarely do you see that, especially for their first race of the season,” he said. “But all the racing was awesome, really.”
On top of the provincial racing series action, local classes including bone stocks, pro minis and street stocks hit the pavement for their first point-standing outing of the season.
The following are the top three in each class’s dash, heat and main event:
Bone Stock Dash
1.) Brian Bettles
2.) Tim Westwick
3.) Gordon Bettles
Bone Stock Heat
1.) Gordon Bettles
2.) Brian Bettles
3.) Tim Westwick
Bone Stock Main
1.) Tim Westwick
2.) Brian Bettles
Pro Mini Dash
1.) Allen Roberts
2.) George Giesbrecht
3.) Marius Dunford
Pro Mini Heat
1.) Allen Roberts
2.) Tim Roberts
3.) Sage Howlett
Pro Mini Main
1.) Allen Roberts
2.) Tim Roberts
3.) Marius Dunford
Street Stock Dash
1.) Byron Hesselgrave
2.) Arnie Kunka
3.) Tim Graham
Street Stock Heat
1.) Arnie Kunka
2.) Byron Hesselgrave
3.) Bob Lowen
Street Stock Main
1.) Arnie Kunka
2.) Byron Hesselgrave
3.) Corey Price
The next action coming up at TMS will be its Fan Appreciation Night on June 18. Qualifying starts at 4 p.m. with racing kicking off at 5 p.m.
