Published: July 8, 2014
Dennis Prunty back in winner’s circle at Superspeedway
Prunty has 16th top-10 finish
By NICHOLAS DETTMANN
Daily News
SLINGER — Dennis Prunty made a statement Sunday night at
Slinger Superspeedway.
The statement? Don’t forget about me.
Prunty won the Miss Slinger Superspeedway 60 super late
model feature, ending Steve Apel’s threerace win streak in the last super late
model race at Slinger until next week’ºs SuperSeal Slinger Nationals presented
by Miller Lite.
“It’s where you want to be,” he said. “You want to be the
guy that won the race before the Nationals so you know what your car’s got. The
car was good.”
And given his history at Nationals, Prunty reminded his
competitors and fans that he shouldn’t be counted out.
Prunty has finished in the top-five at Nationals in three of
the last four years, including runner-up finishes in 2010 and 2013.
In addition, he’s been one of the most consistent drivers at
Slinger since his 2012 track championship.
With his victory, which was his first of the season, Prunty
has 16 top-five finishes in his last 21 starts. He also has two top-10 finishes
mixed in there.
“We’ve been good all year,” Prunty said.
Austin Luedtke tied his career-best finish for the second
time with a second-place showing after setting fast time in qualifying for the
first time in his career.
Apel, who had won the previous three races and four of the
last five going into Sunday night, was third, rallying from a 10thplace
starting position.
Conrad Morgan was fourth and Dale Prunty rounded out the top
five. Other notable finishers were rookie Braison Bennett, finishing a
career-best sixth in just his ninth super late model feature start. Tim Lampman
had another strong showing, finishing seventh a week after posting a
career-best sixth-place finish.
“The guys gave me an awesome race car,” Luedtke said.
Also picking up feature victories Sunday were Danny Church
(limited late model), Nick Schmidt (Slinger Bees), Erle Hoth (American Super
Cup Series), Kyle Chwala (area sportsman) and Shane Becker (Figure 8).
It was an eventful weekend for the Prunty family.
On Friday, the youngest of the Prunty brothers, Dale, got
married. Dennis Prunty was the best man.
“The last few weeks have been stressful with getting ready
for a wedding, trying to get the race car ready, qualifying crappy, running
heat races and semi-features,” Dale Prunty said. “Tonight, to finally settle in
right off the bat, qualify fifth, finish fifth is just finally a night where we
didn’t have a lot of stress.”
On Sunday, the best man was the top driver.
Dennis Prunty has found a rhythm in the last
year-and-a-half. Last year, he missed four races as he also competed in the
ARCA Midwest Tour Series, narrowly missing the Rookie of the Year honor, which
went to James Swan.
He finished the 2013 season fifth in points. And given how
consistent he was in 2013 at Slinger, there was reason to wonder “what if.”
What if Prunty had run a full 2013 season at Slinger? Could
he have won his second-straight championship? We’ll never know.
However, a victory in the last race before Nationals was
certainly a confidence boost, if he didn’t already need one.
“I think we’ll be really good for Nationals,” he said.
Prunty has the results to back it up.
Prunty finished second at Nationals in 2010 to Lowell
Bennett. He was 10th in 2011, the year Kyle Busch won it. He was then fifth in
2012 when Matt Kenseth won, and was second last year to Rich Bickle Jr.
The Prunty family has enjoyed a great deal of success in
short-track racing, specifically at Slinger. Overall, the family has celebrated
more than 20 track championships.
However, only David Prunty has won Slinger Nationals, doing
so in 2001.
“I think we have a really good shot at it; I really do,”
Dennis Prunty said.
“That’s what we’re shooting for, to win the Nationals,” he
added.
Morgan led the first two laps of the 60-lap feature. Lowell
Bennett then surged to the lead without much of a challenge and stayed there
for the next nine laps. A caution then came out for a crash between Curt
Tillman and Paige Decker. On the restart, Bennett fell off line, which opened
up the line for Prunty and he was in control the rest of the race.
Bennett went on to finish 16th after it was discovered a
radiator cap popped off.
In a way, however, Prunty had a feeling this sort of thing
was coming his way.
“I wrote on Facebook this morning that I could feel a win
coming tonight,” he said. “But it didn’t upload for some reason so I deleted
it.”
While Prunty’s confident, history hasn’t favored the winner
of the last super late model race before Nationals. Not since 2000 had the
winner of the last late model race at Slinger before Nationals had gone on to
win the race. Bennett was the one who accomplished the feat.
Apel won the feature before last year’s Nationals and won at
Nationals, but was disqualified for failing post-race inspection.
Still, Prunty is ready to break through in the biggest race
of the year July 15.
“I think we’re really close,” he said. “On Monday I think
we’ll come in here and work on some qualifying line, but I think our race setup
is pretty darn good.”
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