Video: Larson's Epic Charge At The Thunderbowl After Starting 20th

Rico Abreu and Kyle Larson are synonymous names for most sprint car fans. The best friends from Northern California are the fastest current rising stars in the state and shared the spot light this past weekend at their favorite track, the Tulare Thunderbowl. The USAC West Coast 360’s and King of the West Sprint Car Series came together for two nights of action for the Chris and Brian Faria Memorial.

Image Credit: North West Racing Productions

Friday night saw Kyle Larson sweep both events. The nineteen year old set fast time in his USAC West Coast 360 season debut, won his heat race and the thirty lap feature event piloting Keith Ford’s #72 King Racing Products / A&A Precision Machine Ellis. Larson started fourth in the feature event and made daring moves to get around Richard VanderWeerd for the lead on the twenty-third lap. Larson pulled away from the field after a late race restart to earn $1,500. Bud Kaeding, VanderWeerd, Matt Mitchell and Brent Kaeding rounded out the top five.

Larson drove the well known Paul Silva owned #57 in King of the West action and found himself back in victory lane. “Paul Silva puts together a great car and it really is a pleasure to drive this thing,” said the 2010 Chris & Brian Faria Memorial winner. “I always love racing at this track so it feels pretty awesome to get another win here.”

Brent Kaeding jumped to the early lead in the thirty lap feature event before doing a complete 360 on the slick surface handing the lead to Tommy Tarlton with Tim Kaeding challenging. Larson passed Kaeding and quickly pursued Tarlton taking the top spot by lap ten. Series point’s leader Tim Kaeding sat in third place before spinning and doing a complete 360 dropping back in the field. Jonathan Allard made his way into second place and began to hunt down Larson but fell .287 of a second short at the checkered flag. Tarlton, Roger Crockett, Kyle Hirst, Evan Suggs, Bud Kaeding, Peter Murphy, Bobby McMahan and Andy Gregg completed the top ten.

Saturday’s action started off rough for Larson as he flipped during the first lap of the USAC West Coast 360 heat race. His night wasn’t over however as he climbed into the back up car and raced his way into the feature event from the b-main. Starting twentieth, Larson moved through the field quickly and found himself in the top ten by lap five with Matt Mitchell checking out from the field. The first caution came out on lap sixteen with Larson sitting in fourth place behind Mitchell, Bud Kaeding and Richard VanderWeerd. With no cushion, cars bounced off the wall and Larson maneuvered his way into the lead and swept the USAC West Coast 360 weekend. Kaeding and Mitchell completed the top three.

Image Credit: S and S Photography

Larson looked as if he was going to go four-for-four on the weekend leading the King of the West feature event. Ironically, with four laps to go his motor let loose and went into flames ending his tremendous weekend. He handed the lead over to his best friend and up and coming star Rico Abreu who won his first sprint car feature event only a few weeks ago. Abreu held off a charge from Jonathan Allard to claim his first King of the West and 410 victory.

“It feels great to get my first 410 win tonight and having it come at my favorite track makes it even better,” stated the twenty year old from St. Helena. “We won that 360 race a couple weeks ago, but this is pretty big to get our first KWS win. I want to thank my whole team and family for all their support.”

Allard, Tim Kaeding, Tommy Tarlton, Kyle Hirst, Roger Crockett, Trey Starks, Brent Kaeding, Andy Gregg and Peter Murphy completed the top ten.

The USAC West Coast 360’s will have a break until June 9th when they head to Hanford’s King Speedway. The King of the West will be at the historical Calistoga Speedway Memorial Day weekend for the annual “Salute to Walter T Ross” and “Tribute to Gary Patterson.”