Gravel Ends Meyers WoO Dominance with Win at Talladega Short Track

Eastaboga, Alabama | Oct. 22, 2011 — David Gravel was able to do something in the Sage Fruit Showdown at the Talladega Short Track that no one else has been able to do in the last five World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series. Gravel ended Jason Meyers winning streak at five as the Watertown, Conn. grabbed his first career victory at the 1/3rd mile, high banked oval...

“This is just unbelievable,” said Gravel. “I just needed to be patient when it came to passing Jason. We had a really good car all night long and the bottom seemed to work really well for us. I knew I wanted to get clear of him before I got into lap traffic. We passed a lot of big names tonight. It’s still just so surreal. We are just winding down our season and this is our first 410 win of the season. We’ve got the World Finals coming up which is a huge event so we’re certainly looking forward to that.”

Meyers started the night’s 35 lap event from the pole position and led early. As the race neared it’s halfway point, Gravel’s patience proved to be key. Using the low groove, Gravel slid by Meyers on lap 14 and never looked back.

“We just missed a bit on our setup tonight,” said Meyers, who will be on SPEED TV’s “Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain,” this Sunday evening at 8 P.M. EST. ”Five out of six races won isn’t bad but seven of eight sounds even better. We’re really looking forward to the World Finals.”

NASCAR star Tony Stewart had his hands full battling the two machines he owns, the #15 STP/Armor All/Chevrolet of Donny Schatz and the #11 Bass Pro Shops/J.D. Byrider/Chevrolet of Steve Kinser. The three Tony Stewart Racing cars duked it inside the top-5 for most of the race with Schatz eventually emerging as the top finishing TSR car.

“We had a decent car here tonight,” said Schatz, who finished second. ”We would have liked to gotten a win here but we have a few more races left before this season is all over.”

Kraig Kinser emerged from two and three wide racing to secure the third position, his best finish since winning at Cottage Grove (Ore.) Speedway in early September.

“We had an awesome car tonight and I was able to pass quite a few cars,” said Kinser, driver of the #6 Casey’s General Stores Maxim.

Meyers would settle for fourth with Steve Kinser finishing fifth. NASCAR standouts Kasey Kahne and Stewart finished eighth and eleventh respectively.

The stage is now set for the final World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series event of the season as the tour takes on the Lowes Foods World Finals presented by Tom’s Snacks, Coca-Cola and Natures Own at the Dirt Track at Charlotte on November 3, 4 and 5.  FULL RESULTS & POINTS

A-Main RESULTS (35 Laps):
1. 89G-David Gravel[6][$10,000]; 2. 15-Donny Schatz[2][$5,500]; 3. 6-Kraig Kinser[9][$3,200]; 4. 14-Jason Meyers[1][$2,800]; 5. 11-Steve Kinser[4][$2,500]; 6. 5W-Lucas Wolfe[3][$2,300]; 7. 7S-Jason Sides[16][$2,200]; 8. 49-Kasey Kahne[12][$2,100]; 9. 4-Danny Smith[14][$2,050]; 10. 1-Sammy Swindell[7][$2,000]; 11. 14S-Tony Stewart[5][$1,500]; 12. 63-Chad Kemenah[15][$1,200]; 13. 83-Paul McMahan[8][$1,100]; 14. 7-Craig Dollansky[17][$1,050]; 15. 9-Joey Saldana[11][$1,000]; 16. 25-Chris Myers[23][$900]; 17. 56R-Ryan Myers[19][$800]; 18. 10-Terry Gray[20][$800]; 19. 47-Eric Riggins Jr[24][$800]; 20. 91-Cody Darrah[13][$800]; 21. 1X-Matt Linder[22][$800]; 22. 80-Morgan Turpen[21][$800]; 23. 6R-Ian Madsen[10][$800]; 24. 66-Tommy Worley[18][$800]

Lap Leaders: Jason Meyers 1-14, David Gravel 15-35
KSE Hard Charger Award: 7S-Jason Sides[+9]