O'Reilly MLRA Closer to Terry Phillips
by: Clint Brown

BOLIVAR, MO. (Oct. 7, 2006) - Terry Phillips picked up his eleventh win of the 2006 Thunder Tour as the O'Reilly MLRA closed out the season at Bolivar Speedway USA. The win was also the 82nd career O'Reilly MLRA victory for the driver out of Springfield, MO.

Jason Bodenhamer brought the field down to the green flag, but it was outside pole sitter Steve Kosiski who used the high side to grab the lead going into turn one. Kosiski and Bodenhamer quickly opened up a small lead over the rest of the field that saw cars running high and low all over the track. Jeremy Payne moved his way into the fourth spot on lap three with Alan Vaughn following him through for the fifth spot. Further back in the pack Bill Frye was on the move coming to thirteenth on lap five only to pull into the infield two laps later with motor problems.

Kosiski and Bodenhamer continued to set a blistering pace through the first ten laps when Terry Phillips began using the low side of the track to move into the fifth position on lap 11. Phillips began to work on Payne for the fourth spot and the pair raced three wide with Dewaine Hottinger where Payne came away with the third position only to have Phillips shoot past both he and Bodenhamer to take over second. Phillips began to pressure Kosiski for the top spot and pulled alongside coming off turn 2 where the pair made contact that saw Kosiski bounce off of the back stretch wall collecting Will Vaught on lap 18 bringing out the caution.

On the restart Phillips continued out front with Payne moving into second and a quick running Steve Rushin making the move to take over the third spot. Rushin quickly began to try and make the low side of the track work as he pulled alongside Payne as the field reached the 1/2 way point of the 40 lap event as Phillips stretched his lead to a half straight away.

Phillips began to work lapped traffic taking his machine to both the high and low sides to make passes - even going three wide on occasion and extended his lead even more.

The yellow flag flew on lap 31 for the spun machine of David Conkwright who went around just ahead of second running Payne. With the field rolling around under yellow a problem had developed for Payne who had right front suspension damage. After checking the damage out Payne lined up to fight it out to the finish.

On the restart Steve Rushin shot around Phillips as the green flag waved only to give the spot back as he couldn't keep the momentum up. Behind those two Bodenhamer worked back into third around the wounded machine of Payne while Jeff Taylor moved into the top five. The remaining laps clicked off and as the checkered flag waved Phillips built up a full straight advantage to take the win. Rushin held on for second with Bodenhamer, Payne, and 15th starting Jeff Taylor completing the top five.

Four heat races were contested on the night with Steve Kosiski, Reid Millard, Jeremy Payne and Dewaine Hottinger coming out on top. Kelly Boen and Billy James fought for the wins in the two B Features that were contested prior to the feature event.

The night also capped off the O'Reilly MLRA 2006 Thunder Tour title fight which saw Al Purkey bring home his fifth title with the series. Needing to merely start the event, the Coffeyville, KS racer encountered problems early in the night, but fought back to a thirteenth place finish to claim the title over Alan Vaughn.

For all the latest news and information on the O'Reilly MLRA visit us on the web at www.mlraracing.com or by calling (816) 650-5063 or (816) 305-6572.

2006 Thunder Tour Sponsors: O'Reilly Auto Parts, Hoosier Race Tire, Hatfield Racing Engines, Larry Shaw Race Cars, Afco, GRT Race Cars, The Driveline Shop, Sunoco Race Fuels, Weld Wheels, Chase Race Decals, Gameday Trophy, Bodee's Race Bodies, Smitty's Racing Engines, Duralite, Holley, Lunati, Rod End Supply, Schoenfeld Headers, Kluhsman Racing Components, Performance Race Bodies, ATL Fuel Cells, Sports Nutz, Sports Radio 610, Shepherd of the Hills Entertainment

Full Results
Bolivar Speedway USA
October 7, 2006

Heat 1
1) Steve Kosiski, 2) Will Vaught, 3) Larry McDaniels, 4) Delbert Smith, 5) Kelly Boen, 6) Billy James, 7) Jesse Stovall, 8) Bill Frye, 9) CJ Lyle, 10) Ricky Vandergriff, 11) PJ Haskins

Heat 2
1) Reid Millard, 2) Steve Rushin, 3) Badder, 4) Vaughn, 5) Rayburn, 6) Smyser, 7) Essary, 8) LaFollette, 9) David Conkwright, 10) Jack Sullivan,
11) John Hampel

Heat 3
1) Jeremy Payne, 2) Terry Phillips, 3) Jason Bodenhamer, 4) Larry Jones, 5) Steve Kempt, 6) Steve Grotz, 7) Larry Clawson, 8) Leroy Johnson, 9) Al Purkey ,10) Scott Drake

Heat 4
1) Dewaine Hottinger, 2) Justin Wells, 3) Dane Daucus, 4) Jeff Taylor, 5) David Barker, 6) Billy Murphy, 7) Brandon McCormick, 8) Joey Mack, 9) David Turner, 10) Jeff Floyd

B Feature #1
1) Kelly Boen, 2) Christian Rayburn, 3) Joey Mack, 4) David Barker, 5) Shane Essary, 6) Jesse Stovall, 7) Steve Grotz, 8) Brandon McCormick, 9) CJ Lyle,
10) PJ Haskins, 11) Ricky Vandergriff, 12) Al Purkey, DNS - Scott Drake

B Feature #2
1) Billy James, 2) Steve Kempt, 3) Larry Clawson, 4) Billy Murphy, 5) Chris Smyser, 6) David Turner, 7) David Conkwright, 8) Brett LaFollette, 9) Leroy Johnson, 10) Jeff Floyd, DNS - John Hampel, Bill Frye, Jack Sullivan

A Feature
1) Phillips, 2) Rushin, 3) Bodenhamer, 4) Payne, 5) Taylor, 6) Smith, 7) Hottinger, 8) Vaughn, 9) Wells, 10) James, 11) McDaniels, 12) Boen, 13) Badder, 14) Daucus, 15) Purkey, 16) Floyd, 17) Murphy, 18) Turner, 19) LaFollette, 20) Jones, 21) Millard, 22) Rayburn, 23) Conkwright, 24) Kempt,
25) Vaught, 26) Kosiski, 27) Frye