Published: June 30, 2015
Little brother wins
Older brother Dennis Prunty takes 3rd place, Apel sneaks
into 2nd
By NICHOLAS DETTMANN
Daily News
SLINGER — Dale Prunty figured out how to beat his older
brother, Dennis, and two-time defending super late model track champion Steve
Apel: Borrow one of big brother’s shocks. And borrow is being used loosely.
“I might’ve kind of screwed Dennis tonight,” said Dale
Prunty after winning the Interstate Sawing Independence 75 super late model
feature Sunday at Slinger Superspeedway.
“Today in the shop, I needed some rear shocks and I kind of
took them out of the 42 car. I’m guessing he didn’t check before he came,” he
said.
Now here’s where it gets even more interesting.
Dennis’ regular car, the No. 22, was fourth-fastest in
practice earlier in the evening. Then, toward the end of another practice
session, the engine started to give way. So Dennis hustled home and got the No.
42 car, his backup, and returned to the track.
That No. 42 car is supposed to be the one Ross Kenseth will
use for Slinger Nationals on July 14.
Instead, it wound up being used in Sunday’s feature by
Dennis, who had the sixth-fastest qualifying time without any practice on it.
“We were almost where we needed to be at the end,” Dennis
said.
Apel finished second, edging Dennis by 0.012 seconds.
“The car got really loose at the end and I knew I had a
mirror full of Dennis,” Apel said. “I was just trying to hang on for as much as
I could.”
“Lapped traffic kind of hurt me a little bit,” he added. “We
lost some track time to Dale, but he did a heck of a job holding us off.”
Ryan DeStefano picked up his first career super late model
top-five finish, finishing fourth. Danny Church, who’s in his first season in
the super late division, also had his best finish of the season, rounding out
the top five.
“It’s been tough this year,” DeStefano said. “I know we have
a better car than where we’ve been finishing. We’ve been working hard. It
wasn’t a lack of effort.
“Tonight we definitely showed where we are, which is good
timing with Nationals coming up.”
It was Dale Prunty’s first victory since Aug. 10.
Going into Sunday’s program, Dennis and Apel had combined to
win six of the eight features this season — three each. John DeAngelis Jr. was
the only other driver to win a feature in a super late model this season, doing
so May 17 and May 31.
Dennis also went into the event having won the last two
races.
“It’s always fun watching him,” Dale said. “Obviously I’m a
little bit farther behind so I can see where he’s going in front of me. He
takes some chances that I don’t and sometimes I don’t get the finishes because
of it.”
He added it wasn’t getting old seeing Dennis and Apel win so
often.
“It gives you something to shoot for the next week,” Dale
said.
Now depending on which story you believe, Dennis said he
rented the shocks to his baby brother.
“Do you think I should raise the price for next week?” he
joked.
Dale said he forgot Kenseth is scheduled to race in the car
Dennis used Sunday at Nationals.
“He said I could use them last week,” Dale said. “He didn’t
say I could this week. I just kind of went for it and took them for today. He’s
OK with it. I talked with him after the race. It’s all good.”
It wasn’t like it was a fluke for Dale to win the race. He
has been consistent throughout the season.
After Sunday, he has six top-10 finishes in eight starts,
including four in a row. He missed the season opener April 26.
Dale finished sixth June 21, but fifthplace finisher Jeff
Holtz was disqualified after the race.
Despite missing the opener, Dale is fourth in the points
standings, 33 points behind Rob Braun in third place.
“I’m just trying to get my game here for the Nationals
coming up,” Dale said.
Despite more than 20 track championships in the family,
there is only one Slinger Nationals title (David in 2001). Last year, Dennis
dominated the Nationals before a mechanical failure with less than 25 laps to
go prevented a second family triumph.
Apel and Dennis Prunty will likely go into Nationals as the
favorites.
But Dale Prunty’s consistency the last month has him
thinking: Why not me?
“All year I’ve had car I can race,” Dale said. “The biggest
thing is getting the car to qualify and I’m still struggling with that.”
Lowell Bennett and Dale started on the front row for the
feature. Bennett led the first lap before Dale took over on lap 2. Two cautions
came out in the first 10 laps. The final caution came out on lap 35 when Jamie
Wallace’s car came to a stop near the pit entrance in Turn 2. At that point,
Dale lead Dennis by almost a full straightaway.
“At that point in the race, I knew I had been up front and
they had to race through traffic so I probably still had the better tires,”
Dale said. “They’d been racing a lot of cars at the time.”
On the restart, Dale and Dennis were side-by-side for a
couple laps before Dale cleared his brother on lap 37. From there, Dale
carefully worked through traffic with 15 laps to go and held on for the
victory.
“I thought Dennis was going to have something for me on the
restart, but I got ahead of him and ran away with it,” he said.
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