Williams Grove National Open Preliminary Has Its Place At The History Table

2021 event to be run October 1

Mechanicsburg - As much as the Champion Racing Oil National Open at Williams Grove Speedway deserves its place in sprint car lore as it celebrates its 59th annual running on October 2 with a $75,000 payday, the National Open Preliminary race itself also has a place at the history table.

Although not an annual event, the National Open Preliminary race will hold its head high and celebrate its 34th running coming up on October 1.

The preliminary was first run in 1980 with Keith Kauffman taking the win aboard the Weikert Livestock No. 29.

That preliminary win would be the first of two for Weikert in the race with Doug Wolfgang scoring again a few years later in 1985.

Noted author and television commentator of today, driver Brad Doty of Apple Creek, Ohio was lured East back in 1981 and picked up what would be his first of two career Williams Grove wins in the preliminary before suffering career ending injuries in a racing crash a few years later.

The event has only been lost to weather eight times over the years and on nine occasions the preliminary winner has swept both National Open races, going on to score the coveted big prize a day later.

Sweeps came in 1982, 1985, 1989, 1990, 1995, 1996, 1997, 2011 and in 2017 at the respective hands of Lynn Paxton, Wolfgang, Stevie Smith, Steve Kinser, Mark Kinser, Lance Dewease, Sammy Swindell, Jason Myers and David Gravel.

And that sweep by Paxton in 1982 was surrounded by considerable controversy stemming from the preliminary race.

The Williams Grove record books actually show a tie for the preliminary win between both Paxton and Ohio’s Dave Blaney on September 17.

A young Blaney was leading, headed for his first career Grove win on that night when he ran into mechanical problems as he raced off of the fourth turn toward the checkers.

Veteran Paxton was trailing and gaining fast as Blaney tried to limp home and the scorers documented his No. 10 as crossing the finish line first.

However unrest abounded regarding that decision and a picture of the finish taken at the line produced the next day clearly showed Paxton crossing very close but definitely first.

Thus both drivers were paid for and credited with a victory and Paxton could go on to score the weekend sweep with Grove career wins 38 and 39.

No driver has been able to put up big numbers in the preliminary race over the years unlike within its big brother National Open wherein World of Outlaws driver Donny Schatz will go for his amazing seventh event title in a few weeks.

Rather, in the preliminary no driver holds more than a trio of wins with Kauffman, Steve Kinser and Gravel all holding that distinction.

Before the World of Outlaws began sanctioning the preliminary in 1989, the race was contested once as an All Stars Circuit of Champions contest with Maynard Yingst the winner in 1986.

Today and for many years now the National Open Preliminary at Williams Grove is run as a separate and stand-alone show aside from the Open itself.

However for a number of years as an outlaws race, the top four finishers in the preliminary race were automatically locked into the next night’s National Open.

This was standard procedure under World of Outlaws sanctioning rules for two-day shows for many seasons.

In the 2006 running of the event, Washington state driver Jason Solwold made speedway and outlaws history with a preliminary night win.

Up to that point in outlaws history at the track, every sanctioned race ever run had been scored by either a series regular or a clear member of the home team PA Posse.

Solwold’s drive to victory made him the first true independent driver to ever win a Williams Grove outlaws feature main.

And one last piece of history from the National Open preliminary comes from 2018 when the “Fresno Phenom,” Giovanni Scelzi crossed the country for an upset win on September 28.

Scelzi’s victory etched his name in the record books as the youngest driver ever to win a sprint car race at the historic venue at the ripe old age of 16.

The 34th running of the 25-lap National Open Preliminary gets underway at 7:30 on October 1.

The winner will receive $10,000.

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