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ACRL: Portland Race Report

Kreger Scores First ACRL Win Portland, OR, July 5 -- Tom Kreger of Team Vancouver became the fourth different winner in five races of the American City Racing League's eleventh season. The series for Cosworth-powered Super Sports 2000 ...

Edited: Dec 24, 2003, 6:55 PM

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Kreger Scores First ACRL Win

Portland, OR, July 5 -- Tom Kreger of Team Vancouver became the fourth different winner in five races of the American City Racing League's eleventh season. The series for Cosworth-powered Super Sports 2000 and Ford-engined Sports 2000 machines made its second Portland stop of 1998 over the July 4th weekend. There was also a new polesitter for the race, with Brad Pierce sitting in for the absent Chris Ronson in the Team Las Vegas Lola and doing a masterful job in the very wet Top Five qualifying session. Peter Zarcades qualified second to make it an all Las Vegas front row.

Kreger (Vancouver), Joe Giroski (Portland), and Stephen Romak (Fresno) surged into the first three spots at the green flag as cars went six wide into Turn One. Polesitter Pierce lost his rear diffuser in the melee, and spent the rest of the race fighting a very loose car. Kreger began opening a gap, and Giroski held off Romak until Lap 7, when the Team Fresno driver moved into second. Zarcades got by Giroski on the next lap, making fairly significant body contact in the process. This led to a black flag for a stop-and-go penalty, and Zarcades rejoined in eighth spot.

A four-car train composed of Dennis Pavlina (Seattle), John Bachofner (San Francisco), Edd Ozard (Reno) and John Ostlund (Fresno) battled for fourth through seventh. Ozard worked his way past Bachofner on lap 10, then hounded Pavlina for the remainder of the race, finally making the pass on the last lap. Up front, Romak inched closer and closer to Kreger, putting on heavy pressure the last five laps. Kreger held on for a slim .18 second victory margin, taking his first-ever ACRL win.

The Sports 2000 class winner was Spencer Trenery (Las Vegas) for the third race in a row. "B" polesitter Frank Arnold (Fresno) uncharacteristically spun three times, putting him out of contention. Ian Wood (San Diego) came home second, followed by John Bachofner (San Francisco), who was penalized for a starting infraction. Romak's second place and Ostlund's sixth combined to give Fresno the Team victory.

Surprisingly, only a few cars showed up with the new rear wing, and the top four finishers were wingless. Pavlina, Ostlund, Zarcades and John Lombardo Jr. (San Diego) were the only winged entries. Romak had a wing mounted on the Van Diemen chassis, but again elected to race the Lola.

Lombardo was a DNS due to off-track problems including a trailer break- in and an accident with the team tow vehicle.

The ACRL is in hiatus until the Los Angeles street race September 5-7, giving the teams plenty of time to install and test wings and to continue development of the new chassis that have appeared this year.

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