PARTS Trucks: Paul Jean wins first PARTS Pro Race
24 August 1999
MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- It was a strange night of racing for the PARTS Pro Truck Series at Montgomery Motor Speedway Saturday, August 21. There was no full moon, but strange things were happening, especially to the front runners.While the leaders dropped off one-by-one, Paul Jean was able to break the apparent jinx and take his first win in PARTS Pro Series competition. Mike Davidson must have had a lucky charm also, as he was able to ward off the bad luck to finish second.
Jay Dunham came from his 14th place starting position to take third place, while Fredrick Moore started 19th and finished Fourth. Another strong run was turned in by Bill Melvin, who started 13th but finished fifth.
In Division III competition, Linny Foster returned to victory lane after running down pole sitter Rod Burton. Foster made it look easy, but had to fend off Burton of LaFrance, S.C., who finished second. Frank Pass was third with Leslie Hammock and Tom Powers Jr. rounding out the top five.
Clay Young set fast time in qualifying to claim the California Quickshine Quicktime Award and start on the inside of the front row for the national feature. Young, who is a veteran road racing champion, felt he had a good shot for his first oval track win.
When the green dropped, Young charged into the lead and appeared he had the field covered until J.C. Beattie Jr. was able to get past Young on lap 18. On the following lap, Young was taken completely out of competition after being involved in an accident.
The incident also caused substantial damage to the truck of Dusty Williams, who qualified second fastest and was running in third at the time of the crash. Stephen Mothershed, who was running in the top five, had to pit with a flat tire.
Another early victim of the night was Derek Hagen. The Cadillac, Mich. driver was making another strong showing but a slight bumping incident cause problems with his cooling system and eventually caused him to drop out of contention.
By the half-way mark, the field settled into some caution-free racing. Beattie, who won in the last outing at Myrtle Beach Speedway, was the next driver to appear to be on his way to another victory.
At the crossed-flag mark, it was Beattie followed by Jean, Mike Davidson, Randy Gilbert and David Elliott. Four laps later, Jean made a pass on Beattie to take the point. Coming up on lapped traffic, Beattie took advantage of situation by taking back the lead on lap 68.
While this battle was going on up front, the two point leaders were battling for the fourth spot. Randy Gilbert and Fredrick Moore were side-by-side putting on a good show for the large gathering of fans.
That battle ended abruptly on lap 72, when Gilbert, who was on top of the point standings, had to pit with transmission trouble. Gilbert wound up finishing 15th, while Moore closed the gap in points by finishing fourth.
During the long green-flag period, Beattie was able to open a substantial lead over Jean, but the curse on the leaders continued when a large cloud of smoke suddenly came from the Beattie machine on lap 75.
Streaming a trail of transmission fluid behind him, Beattie head for the pits and retired from competition. Jean inherited the lead with only 25-laps remaining.
Keeping the fans on their feet, Jean and Davidson put on a good battle for the lead with Moore and Elliot putting on just as good of a show on for the third spot. The battle for third ended with Elliott crashing with five laps to go.
Jean got the jump on the restart and while Moore and Davidson battled for second, Jean pulled away. On the white-flag lap, Moore and Davidson came under the flag with less than a fender length separating them.
Before they could get back to the checkers, Jay Dunham, who had started 14th, came from seemingly nowhere to pass Moore on the last, taking third behind Davidson. Bill Melvin finished in fifth behind Moore.
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