O'Reilly MLRA win to Terry Phillips at LA Raceway
Clint Brown
April 7, 2006

LaMonte, Mo (April 7, 2006) - Terry Phillips notched his second win of the O'Reilly MLRA 2006 Thunder Tour as LA Raceway played host on Friday night. The win was the 72nd for the Springfield, MO native with the O'Reilly MLRA.

The drop of the green flag saw outside front row starter Al Purkey roar to the lead as the field raced off into turn 1 of the 40 lap affair. While Purkey set sail at the front Phillips moved from his sixth starting spot to the runner up position within five laps and began to pressure Purkey for the top spot. Phillips attempted to make the move on the low side for the lead several times, but just couldn't make it stick and Purkey was able to continue to set the pace at the front of the pack. While Purkey and Phillips continued to battle three cars sliced through from the back of the pack as Jason Bodenhamer, David Turner, and Alan Vaughn all worked their way into the top 15 by the time that the sixth lap was completed.

Out front Purkey and Phillips continued to run wheel to wheel while building up a 12 car length advantage over Charlie Randolph, John Hampel, and Joe Kosiski who were fighting it out for the third position. Phillips was finally able to make the low side work to his advantage on lap 13 only to have the caution flag wave for Shane Essary's spin in turn 4.

On the restart Phillips was shuffled back to the fifth spot as both Randolph and Hampel slipped past with 14 laps in the books. Purkey stretched his lead out to nearly eight car lengths just as Phillips moved back into the runner up spot going down the back stretch on the 18th lap. Another slow down at the halfway mark bunched the field up and once again Purkey and Phillips battled side by side for the top spot with Phillips finally gaining the advantage on lap 23.

Once out front Phillips began to open up the lead to nearly 10 car lengths by lap 27 as Purkey found himself in a fight for the second spot with Randolph and Hampel. With 10 laps to go Phillips began to work through lapped traffic just as Charlie Randolph found a line to his liking and shot past Purkey into the second position. Phillips began to encounter heavy traffic with only five laps left which allowed Randolph to close on the leader, but it wasn't enough as Phillips held on for the win with Randolph, Hampel, Purkey, and Joe Kosiski rounding out the top five positions.

Joe Kosiski, Scott Drake, Charlie Randolph, and Craig Preble took home the heat race wins while Jason Bodenhamer and Mike Brown came home with top honors in the B features. A total of 38 driver's signed in for the nights racing action.

The O'Reilly MLRA springs back into action on Saturday, April 8, traveling to Winston, MO for the 2006 season opener at Winston Speedway.

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.

Please support these sponsors who support O'Reilly MLRA Racing O'Reilly Auto Parts/Hoosier Race Tires/Hatfield Racing Engines/Larry Shaw Race Cars/GRT Race Cars/AFCO/Driveline Shop/ATL Fuel Cells/Sunoco/Simons Petroleum/Weld Wheels/Chase Race Decals/Gameday Trophy/Bodee's Race Bodies/Smitty's Racing Engines/Duralite Wheels/Holley/Lunati/Rod End Supply/Schoenfeld Headers/Kluhsman Racing Components/Performance Bodies/SportsNutz

Full Results
LA Raceway
April 7, 2006

Heat 1
1) Joe Kosiski, 2) Chad Frewaldt, 3) Gary Billings, 4) Brandon McCormick, 5) TJ Kuykendall, 6) David Turner, 7) Mark Evinger, 8) Justin Wells, 9) Reid Millard, 10) Bob Hiller

Heat 2
1) Scott Drake, 2) John Hampel, 3) Terry Phillips, 4) Brett LaFollette, 5) Jason Bodenhamer, 6) Alan Vaughn, 7) Johnny Bone Jr., 8) CJ Lyle, 9) Aaron Seabaugh, 10) Barney Bauernfeind

Heat 3
1) Charlie Randolph, 2) Larry Clawson, 3) Chad Clark, 4) Bryon Allison, 5) Chris Smyser, 6) Corey Zeitner, 7) Shad Badder, 8) PJ Haskins, 9) John Farmer

Heat 4
1) Craig Preble, 2) Al Purkey, 3) Shane Essary, 4) David Barker, 5) Jim Morris, 6) Mike Brown, 7) Jeff Schlup, 8) James Rutledge, 9) Keith Lewandowski

B Feature 1
1) Jason Bodenhamer, 2) David Turner, 3) Justin Wells, 4) Brett LaFollette,
5) Jeff Schlup, 6) Aaron Seabaugh, 7) Corey Zeitner, 8) Mark Evinger, 9) PJ Haskins, 10) Bob Hiller, 11) John Farmer

B Feature 2
1) Mike Brown, 2) David Barker, 3) Alan Vaughn, 4) Johnny Bone Jr., 5) Jim Morris, 6) CJ Lyle, 7) Shad Badder, 8) Barney Bauernfeind, 9) James Rutledge, 10) Keith Lewandowski, 11) Reid Millard

A Feature
1) Terry Phillips, 2) Charlie Randolph, 3) John Hampel, 4) Al Purkey, 5) Joe Kosiski, 6) Scott Drake, 7) David Barker, 8) Alan Vaughn, 9) David Turner,
10) Jason Bodenhamer, 11) Chad Clark, 12) Mike Brown, 13) TJ Kuykendall, 14) Craig Preble, 15) Brett LaFollette, 16) Brandon McCormick, 17) Gary Billings, 18) Chris Smyser, 19) Larry Clawson, 20) Bryon Allison, 21) Shane Essary, 22) Chad Frewaldt

Performance Bodies Nose Piece: Joe Kosiski