The "Winfield Warrior" Mike Marlar takes the win on night 5 of The Wild West Shootout in Vado , New Mexico holding off a fast charging Kyle Larson.
Photo Credit - Wild West Shootout Facebook Page (Terry Page)
Garrett Alberson would start the night off taking fast qualifier honors over the 48 car field. He would then go out in the first heat picking up another heat race win sending him to the redraw where familiar faces Marlar Davenport and Pierce would join him.
Davenport would get the lucky pole position draw for the second time this week with Alberson getting the 2. Pierce and Marlar would draw the second row starting spots for the 40 lap feature on a slick racing surface.
Davenport would jump out to an early lead and stretch it out in the clean air. Alberson had a horrible start and quickly fell out of the top 5 but would rally later on in the main event that only 1 caution.
On lap 10 your running order would be the Longhorn parade led by JD with Marlar,Pierce,Johnny Scott, and Brandon Sheppard who would have a faulty spark plug end his top 5 run on lap 17.
On lap 25 Alberson recovered from that bad start of the race was up to 4th while Marlar was starting to pressure on Davenport for the lead. For the first time all week Davenport seemed to be struggling for grip in the desert.
Marlar would take the lead on lap 27 and Pierce was passing Davenport when the yellow came out for Moyer who was slowing off turn 4 with a LR flat. Larson would jump into the top 5 before the caution came out.
When the green replaced the yellow the battle for 2nd quickly got interesting as the trio of Davenport Pierce and Larson with Pierce taking the spot and Larson would overtake Davenport for 3rd. Larson would then overtake Pierce for the runner up spot as the only other winner of the series was starting to fade just as Davenport did.
Larson had 6 laps to close the almost 2 second gap that Marlar was enjoying. Larson would close up on the leader but came up just a little short at the end as Marlar protected himself from any attempt of a slider by the former NASCAR champ.
Behind Larson Ricky Weiss once again had another great run in his Sniper Chassis rounding out the podium finish. He has had a solid run out at the Shootout but hasn't grabbed a lot of attention of how well he has ran out there. He will be one to watch on the final night since its a 50 lap race. Tire management is going to be key as he was gaining ground at the end of the 40 lap event.
Davenport would hold onto 4th and Alberson rounded out the top 5. Marlar picked up his 4th career win at The WWSO and has only had one top 5 finish out in New Mexico this week. Coming in he was one of the favorites to possibly grab the bonus for winning multiple features. Marlar would say in victory lane that he seen on the leaderboard that the 6 was behind him and he knew Larson was probably running the cushion so he made his entries a little wide in hopes of holding him off. Mikey was running lower line as well as Weiss.
A Longhorn Chassis has been the victor each night of the 5 races so far of Shootout. Davenport with 3 wins tops the miniseries points and still has a $25,000 bonus if he can win the final night which also pays $25,000 to the winner. You definitely want to catch the action on FloRacing if you aren't there in person. The track prep guys have produced a different surface each night for the drivers to move around putting on a great show for the fans. They had their best attendance of the week and have already announced that The Wild West Shootout will return to Vado next year with the dates of January 6,7,10,12,13 and the finale being on the 14th. They will have 2 practice sessions the 5th and 9th. Make your plans now and make sure to check out their website www.wildwestshootout.net.
Saturday's Feature Results
1) Marlar
2) Larson
3) Weiss
4) Davenport
5) Alberson
6) Pierce
7) Bagley
8) S. Scott
9) J. Scott
10) Pospisil
11) Dillard
12) Beard
13) Moyer
14) McCowan
15) Winebarger
16) Phillips
17) Sorensen
18) Timm
19) Luckman
20) Whisler
21) Cain
22) Erb
23) Sheppard
24) Sanders
25) Leighton Jr
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