Champion Speedway
East River Drive
Owego, New York

EAST COAST SPEEDWAY SERIES
Buman and McBride steal the show at Champion!
By Jason Bonsignore
Photos by Steve Koletar
Champion Speedway, Owego, NY June 7, 2014

On June 7th Champion Speedway featured a traditional scratch and handicap program and as usual the handicap races provided some good entertainment.

Handicap heat race action kicked off with Mikey Buman coming off the 50 yard line to take a win. Taking second was Corey Brookes, who came from the 30, third went to 40 yarder, Jerry Harman, fourth was Joel "Bull" Parsons, who was making a comeback after a 10 year break, and Don "Wheels" Wheeland rounded out the pack. Reigning East Coast Points Champ, Tuff McBride was in good from to win the second heat. Once he got through traffic, he had to hold off a charge from Adam "The Missile" Mittl, who was coming from the 50 and would finish second. Third place went to young, Roger Roberts, while Ray Barondick was fourth and Andrew Clark was out. Casey Donholt then took another back yardage win off the 50 marker in the next outing. Brandon Bruzek was holding a transfer for a bit but Alex Heath got into him and pushed him out and would go onto second place, when some felt the race could have been stopped. Russ Cornell steadily held onto third position with Spencer Portararo fourth.

Buman was sharp again in handicap semi number one. He would win from the back with Donholt following him through for second. Brookes was having one of his better meetings in a while and took the last transfer with a third. Parsons was fourth, just ahead of Portararo while Hazard Heath was out with bike issues. Not to be outdone, McBride answered with another win as well, again with Mittl on his tail. The Missile would take second and Harman grabbed the final transfer to the feature. Barondick was a respectable fourth, Cornell fifth and Roberts sixth.

The multi-time Eastern Champ, McBride was running some vintage laps on this evening and won the first scratch heat from the outside against Donholt. Portararo was third while one was lost with mechanical gremlins. Buman also again won his heat with Parsons second, Heath third and Cornell fourth. Mittl handily won the next heat over Harman, Brookes and Barondick.

Buman kept his streak alive by handing McBride his first defeat of the night in scratch semi-final one. McBride would hang on for second and Harman and Brookes would go to the last chance by being third and fourth. Mittl made a great start from the outside to beat Donholt in the other semi-final. Parsons was third and Heath fourth and they would be seen in the last chance again as well.

Harman would make no mistakes and took home the final transfer to the scratch main by winning the last chance. Brookes rode the inside well to pull away from Parsons for second. Heath was lost with bike problems.

McBride leapt out of the start from gate one in the scratch final and was in command for 3 laps but Buman kept working the inside and coming up hard under McBride until McBride just bobbled slightly and gave Buman the small window he needed to squeak by. As Buman went by on his Pelito sponsored Jawa, McBride had to give way and Donholt and Mittl freight-trained up the inside as well. Buman went on for the victory with Donholt second and Mittl third. McBride came fourth and Harman fifth.

Prior to the handicap final, young Spencer Portararo, rode a determined race to win the Division Two finale. The first two weeks of the season he has been the one to beat in D-2 competition. In Division Three wars it was Jim "Dirty" Sanchez, who traveled all the way from NYC to take home the bacon! Lonni Whitmore took his second win in a row in the ATV pro class while Shane Smith also won ATV Am.

After narrowly missing the win in the Scratch Main, Tuff McBride was back out to take care of business in the handicap final...he quickly got himself up into the lead from the 40 but after several laps, Corey Brookes got a little too sideways coming out of turn two and collected Donholt thus bringing out the red flag and stopping the race. The riders were correctly staged, single file in order of the previous lap for running the final two laps and McBride, on his Justice Brothers/Oakley/Oury/Silkolene/Scotts Headers/Sylark Diner/Southern Tier Insulations/Arai GM, sped way in the lead and never looked back to claim the handicap Main! Buman, capped off a great night with a second, Harman was third, Mittl fourth.

Sadly on the morning of June 8th, news broke that former rider, fan and friend of East Coast Speedway, Howie "The Hammer" Oakden, had passed. A celebration of Howie's life, along with the Hank Bassett Cup and the largest gathering of Legends, in many years, for the Oakden celebration, will be held at Champion's next event, June 28th at 7pm!

Scratch Main
1. Mikey Buman
2. Casey Donholt
3. Adam Mittl
4. Tuff McBride
5. Jerry Harman

Handicap Main
1. Tuff McBride
2. Mikey Buman
3. Jerry Harman
4. Adam Mittl
5. Casey Donholt DNF
6. Corey Brookes DNF

D-2 Main
1. Spencer Portararo
2. Roger Roberts
3. Don Wheeland
4. Andrew Clark
5. Brandon Bruzek

D-3 Main
1. Jimmy Sanchez
2. Pat Farrell
3. Cameron Taylor