Bloomington, Ind.—April 21, 2013— The more Kraig Kinser gets to race this year, the more comfortable he continues to become with the new tires and some of the other changes that have been instituted this season. After wrapping up the World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series West Coast Swing last weekend in California, the third-generation driver began the trek back to the Midwest, first with a stop for a race at El Paso Speedway Park Texas and then with a return to Tri-State Speedway his home state of Indiana. Kinser would finish fifth at El Paso and was eighth at Tri-State to wrap up a consistent week in the Casey's General Stores/Mesilla Valley Transportation Maxim.
Kinser made his second-career start at El Paso Speedway Park on Tuesday, April 16 and first in a 410-sprint car at the sprawling three-eighths-mile in West Texas. He would finish fifth in the 30-lap main event, after lining up seventh on the grid. He ran among the top-eight for the duration of the contest and moved into the top-five on the 20th circuit. The race was slowed by just a single red flag on lap-23.
“Having some laps at El Paso last year definitely helped,” said Kinser. “We had a good baseline and had an idea of how the surface would change throughout the night. Getting in the dash was pretty important as well. We haven’t made it into the dash as many times as we would have liked this year and we’ll continue to focus on our qualifying package going forward, so we can put ourselves in a position to have a chance to make the dash.”
In time trials at El Paso, Kinser stopped the clocks 11th-fastest, which put him on the pole of the second eight-lap heat race. He would take the lead at the start of the heat and paced all eight circuits to earn a spot in the dash. The third-generation driver started the dash in ninth and gained two positions, which put him on the inside of the fourth row at the drop of the green flag in the A-Feature.
At Tri-State Speedway in Southern Indiana on Saturday, April 20, Kinser finished a solid eighth, with one of the strongest field of the year assembled, as 39-cars checked into the always racy quarter-mile bullring. He lined up 17th in the 40-lap A-Feature after racing his way through the B-main into the main event and steadily worked his way forward. Kinser was up to 13th by just the sixth lap and then set his sights on the top-10. He made his way into the top-10 on lap-24 and gained a couple of more positions in the late going to earn his eighth top-10 finish of the season.
“We made some changes for the feature and the car responded very well,” he noted. “To come up through the field in the feature like we did was great. There were a lot of strong cars at Haubstadt and some good ones missed the feature. It’s always important at Haubstadt to keep your nose clean and we were able to do that as well and bring the car home in one piece.”
Kinser opened the night with the 17th-fastest lap in time trials, which was just one spot short of making the heat race inversion. He thus lined up fifth in the first 10-lap heat race and finished sixth, one position away from a transfer spot to the main event. He would finish second in the B-main to earn a berth in the A-Feature. Kinser has finished among the top-10 in each of his last four starts at Tri-State Speedway with the World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series.
The event originally schedule for Friday, April 19 at Paducah International Raceway in Kentucky was postponed due to flooding in the area. Track and series officials are currently working on a date to reschedule that race. Also, next weekend’s race at Federated Auto Parts Raceway at I-55 in Pevely, Mo., has been cancelled due to rising flood waters in the St. Louis area.
“It’s always tough weather-wise in the Midwest this time of the year,” said Kinser. “We’ll spend time in the shop this week getting ready for next weekend’s event. After all the miles we put in last week, it will be nice this week to have a few days to regroup and get caught up on things, before heading to Oklahoma.”
Kinser, who is currently ninth in the World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series championship standings, will return to action on Friday, April 26 at Salina High Banks Speedway in Oklahoma. The 2005 winner of the Knoxville National has eight top-10 finishes this season, with three of those being top-five performances.
Kraig Kinser Racing would like to thank Casey’s General Stores, Mesilla Valley Transportation, Maxim, Aerodine Composites, Sander Engineering, Integra Shocks, All Star Performance, FK Rod Ends, Brown & Miller Racing Solutions, Bell, KSE Racing Products, ButlerBuilt, Schoenfeld Headers, Donovan Engineering, Fel-Pro, Brodix, Wilwood, Dyer’s, Barnes Systems, Ringer Gloves, Jakes Custom Golf Carts, and Ben Cook Racing Limited for their continued support.
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- Admin Account on Apr 22, 2013
- Article Date: 4/21/2013 by Kraig Kinser Racing PR