It looked like the night of the rookie Friday at Williams Grove Speedway, but Doug Esh had other ideas.
Esh won the 25-lap sprint car main event and Robbie Stillwaggon won the URC 360 feature.
Adam Wilt started on the pole and took the lead at the start. The 22-year old body shop worker in his first full year of sprint car racing set a blistering pace in the early going with another rookie, Brent Marks, 18, running second.
Esh, who started tenth, cracked the top five on lap twelve. He took fourth from Pat Cannon on lap 17 and third from Steve Buckwalter on lap 19. On lap 22 Esh drove by Marks just before a caution flag fell.
On the restart Esh tried the outside entering turn one and carried some momentum down the backstretch and into turn three, which he entered on the inside and attempted to slide in front of the leader. There was contact exiting turn four and Wilt flipped over the guard rail bringing out a red flag. Wilt was uninjured and scored with a 15th place finish for which he earned $540.
Esh easily outdistanced the field for the final three laps to score his first victory of the season at Williams Grove and the 17th of his career. He heard some boos from the Williams Grove crowd while celebrating his victory.
He earned a $500 bonus for starting beyond the third row, which pushed his total to $3530.
Marks scored an impressive second place finish. Pat Cannon was third after starting sixth. Mark Smith came from 11th to fourth and Steve Buckwalter completed the top five in his best effort of the year.
Dave Ely, Aaron Ott, Keith Kauffman, Todd Shaffer and Mike Erdley completed the top ten.
At Trail-Way, Mike Bittinger went the distance for his victory in the 358s. Brian Montieth, who won the Battle at the Grove spirnt car feature on Wednesday, won Saturday at Lincoln. Wilt crashed Saturday, as well. Brian Leppo finished second, while Alan Krimes came in third.
Some information used in this story was provided by Williams Grove Speedway. Video is courtesy of Lynn Schaeffer Productions and www.SportsPlusVideo.com.
