TRENTON, Ont. – May 23, 2017 – Charlie Sandercock could not have had a better Victoria Day weekend. The driver of the Bellevue Fabricating/Deerhaven Farm and Garden No.57 Pro Late Model won at Brighton Speedway on Saturday night before becoming the first Canadian to win a RUSH Late Model Touring Series race at Merrittville Speedway on Monday night.
“It was definitely an awesome feeling,” Sandercock said of both wins. “We’ve had a good car this year, just the cards didn’t fall for us. We’ve definitely been To get a couple wins was definitely awesome. Especially to get the Rush Tour win.”
The weekend began with a weekly Pro Late Model race at Brighton on Saturday night. It began with a second-place finish in the heat. That qualified him for the feature inversion and placed him 10th on the feature starting grid.
“I honestly thought we weren’t going to go anywhere or have a good finish because it seemed to go single-file right off the hop and it was a dusty, one-groove racetrack,” Sandercock explained. “I said ‘I’m not playing this follow the leader game’ and jumped to the outside. I wasn’t making any ground for the first three or four laps as I was just dusting it off making a groove and then it started to come in. We started making headway after that.”
By the time of a mid-race caution, Sandercock had found his way to third and executed a perfect restart to gain the lead.
“I restarted third and I knew I had Caley (Weese) and Austin (King) ahead of me,” Sandercock said. “I knew Caley was going to fire quicker being in the groove on the restart and Austin was probably going to slip back a little bit, so I had a game plan in mind to be right on Caley’s bumper as we took off and then hopefully slip up to the outside to where I wanted to be going into turn one.”
“That’s exactly what cards got dealt to us. We got to the outside and the next corner we got around Caley and didn’t look back.”
After taking the lead, Sandercock had to hold off Phil Potts on a handful of late-race restarts to earn the victory.
“We had a half-dozen late-race restarts which were killing me,” Sandercock said. “I was afraid of how Pottsy was going to fire off the top because he was running up there and I was picking the bottom which was the preferred starting lane. Everything fell right where we wanted it to after that.”
Following Saturday’s win, the team prepared to take on the invading drivers of the RUSH Late Model series at Merrittville Speedway during the track’s annual Victoria Day special. Sandercock was second-fastest in time trials to earn a pole starting position in his heat. He finished second in the heat to qualify for the Dash, where he also finished second. That result placed him second on the starting grid for the 30-lap main event.
“We came into the night and had a good car right out of the box,” Sandercock said. “We started outside pole and got a good jump off the initial start and just kind of put the car on cruise. Bryce (Davis) had a good chance to get underneath me just before a caution came out. I guess the caution helped to our advantage. We got back out front and that’s where we ended up.”
Sandercock was certainly excited to make history as the first Canadian to win a RUSH tour race. However, he refused to take the credit, quickly pointing out the work of his crew.
“I have to give a big thanks to all the crew and sponsors who put this team together and keep it going,” Sandercock said. “If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t be who we are today.”
Sandercock will next be in action on Saturday, May 27 for Brighton Speedway’s Fan Appreciation night.
SEASON STATS
57 Charlie Sandercock – 4 Starts: 2 Wins, 4 Top-5s, 4 Top-10s
FOLLOW CHARLIE SANDERCOCK
Website: www.charliesandercock.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/CharlieSandercockRacing
Twitter: @57Sandercock
Charlie Sandercock is proud to partner with several dedicated marketing partners for the 2017 race season, including Bellevue Fabricating, Deerhaven Farm and Garden, Newham Enterprise, Image Landscape Contracting, Excel Tower Service, Jeff Harrison Farms, Eibach Springs, MCR, Bullet Signs and Graphics, Victory Motorcycles, CCS Industrial Supply, C Smith Automotive Machine Shop, Klotz Sythetic Lubricants Canada, KD Transmission, Stampkrete Contracting, Auto Add-Ons Belleville and Image Factor.ca Motorsports Designs.
Discussion about this post