Fast Fridays Speedway
Gold Country Fairgrounds
Auburn, California

Bryan Yarrow wins Fast Fridays Golden Speedway Cup!

Fast Fridays, Auburn, California USA - September 8, 2006
By Gary Roberts

Last night Fast Fridays hosted the AMA/USA Speedway Golden Speedway Cup, an evening of all scratch (no handicap) racing, to a championship format. The winner was Citrus Heights rider Bryan Yarrow.

The evening started with San Bernardino’s Charlie Venegas beating the other 2 out of town riders, Bullhead City, AZ rider Nate Perkins and Orange County’s Buck Blair. Mike Faria (Reno, NV) won the second race. The third race brought two favorites out, Bryan Yarrow and Auburn’s Tommy Hedden. Yarrow won, but Foresthill’s Kenny Ingalls got a better gate than Hedden and held him off for 4 laps. Palermo’s TJ Fowler won the last race in the first round.

Mike Faria, Nate Perkins and Bryan Yarrow were the expected winners of the next three races and all succeeded. Heat 8 brought together Tommy Hedden, Charlie Venegas and TJ Fowler. All three have had a good season at Auburn, winning main events. Venegas and Fowler were 1 and 2 in the track championship two weeks ago. Venegas made the gate and Hedden slotted in behind him. Fowler tried, but made no impression on Hedden so that remained the finishing order.

So after two rounds Faria, Yarrow and Venegas were the only ones with a perfect score. Yarrow’s perfect score went away in heat 9, when Fowler out-gated him and held out for the four laps. Mike Faria’s perfect score fell victim to Tommy Hedden in heat 10. Sacramento’s Greg Hooten scored a win in heat 11 and Venegas won heat 12, to be the only one with a perfect 9 points. At this point Yarrow and Faria were one point down, Fowler 2 points down and Perkins and Hedden were 3 points down.

During the intermission that followed was a pre-view of the vintage flat track machines that will race at Fast Fridays on Saturday night, starting at 6.30.

The fourth round opened with Hedden beating Hooten and Blair. Then Yarrow took a further point from Perkins. Heat 15 brought out Fowler and Faria, with Faria taking the win. Venegas again made it look easy to maintain his perfect score with a fourth win. This set up an expectation for yet another Venegas championship. After winning the 2000 SRA National Championship Venegas had a serious injury, ice racing. It really took him 3 years to find his form again, but the past two years he has been back to his former level. Main event wins this year at every track, a successful win at the first round of the AMA National, other championship wins have made 2006 a great year for the 39 year old.

Buck Blair picked up a win in the first heat of the fifth round, with Fowler and Hedden taking the next two races. The meeting of the giants came in heat 20 where Faria, Yarrow and Venegas came together, Venegas, with a perfect score, the other two were only one point down. Faria got the gate, Yarrow tucked in behind, while Venegas got a rare bad gate. At the end of the first lap Venegas was in fourth place, and Yarrow found a way past Faria. Before the end of the race Venegas managed to recover only one place,

and Yarrow held on for the win. This left Yarrow, with 14 points the Golden Speedway Cup winner, and Faria and Venegas tied on 13 points, causing a run-off for the other podium positions. Venegas made no mistake with another of his super-fast gates, to give him the second place.

No more Speedway until Saturday, October 7 when the third round of the AMA National Championship takes place.

Gary Roberts - gary_rob@ix.netcom.com