SPEEDWAY: Paterson a Super Star on a Super Night of Junior Sedan Racing at Aelxandra

Linken Paterson took victory in two of four Junior Sedan feature events on Saturday night at Alexandra Raceway after winning the Top Star Junior Sedan final and the Junior Standard Saloon final whilst Jake Bradley from Geelong won the New Stars and Riley Taylor took victory in the Junior 1200cc Sedans. Other winners included the Victorian champion Lee Beach in the Sports Sedans and Matt Leek in the Standard Saloons.

The home of Junior Sedan racing is Alexandra Speedway and this year with the Victorian and Australian titles coming up in the Speedway Sedans Australia Juniors class, a huge field was keen to get some laps in for this Junior Sedan Promotional Association point score night. The Top Star field had nine heat races, a last chance qualifier and then the feature race, such was the size of the entry numbers.

Qualifying wins went the way of Bree Simpson from Woori Yallock, Jayden Bryant, Jack Murphy from New South Wales, Seth Sloane, by just .127 of a second, Linken Paterson, Dylan Barrow, River Paterson, James Oliver, and the only driver to win two of the nine qualifiers, Linken Paterson. Despite a decent number of visiting drivers to the track, Alexandra members won eight of the nine qualifiers. In the last chance qualifier, Cameron Smith from Mildura, River Spitzbarth, Maddy Capon and Nathan Miles finished in qualifying spots for the feature race.

Under the green flag, Linken Paterson took the race lead quickly from Bryant, Oliver, Barrow and Simpson. Oliver was the first of the fancied potential winners to pull out of the race on lap six with mechanical issues or damage whilst Paterson continued to lead Bryant, Barrow, Simpson, and Carter Metcalfe.

Metcalfe moved forward over the next seven laps and with a couple to go had settled into the top three. Linken Paterson greeted the chequered flag to take the win from Bryant, Metcalfe, Barrow and Simpson.

Billy McBride, Jake Bradley, and Will Fallon shared qualifying wins in the New Stars before the finale. Fallon was the early leader fresh off winning the last New Star final at Alexandra Speedway in December. Bradley is currently the number one driver in the development division of the Junior Sedans and on the back of a win in the Piston Cup at Redline recently, he assumed controlled the lead. Bradley went on to win from Fallon, Jasmine Bryant, Zammy Noseda and Braiden Webster.

Victorian Speedway Council 1200cc Sedan racing competed across three heat races with Riley Taylor, Fallon who was competing in two classes on race night, and Arthur Hutchinson won the three heat races before the final. Taylor started in pole position in the final. Having been gaining confidence through the season as he stuck with Hutchinson in other events, Taylor would go on to win the final, his first victory in a feature from Fallon, Jack Kershaw, Bryce Leek, and Ella Sheedy.

Rounding out all the Junior Sedan action was the Junior Standard Saloons. Victorian champion Damon Ingram was visiting from Warragul along with a host of drivers from Gippsland to turn laps on the fast Alexandra Speedway, the venue of their upcoming Victorian title. Ingram won the first heat race before Linken Paterson driving Wayne Sheerman’s race car took a win in the next. Zac Barwise won the third qualifier with Ingram again a winner in the fourth. Paterson won the fifth with Harry Cecil winning the sixth qualifier with results placing Paterson, Ingram, Cecil, and Barwise in the top four starting spots for the final.

After five laps of the final Paterson was leading Cecil, Ingram, Dylan Barrow also doing double duty on race night and Barwise. Five laps later positions remained the same before Ingram on lap eleven moved to second and Cecil dropped to fourth. The chequered flag dropped and a steward’s penalty to Ingram changed the results slightly. Paterson took the win from Barrow elevated to second and Cecil to third whilst Ingram was dropped to fourth place in front of Rhys Meakins.

Along the way Linken Paterson in the Standard Saloon Juniors set a one lap record that would have been good enough to be recognised as the Open aged Standard Saloon record also. Our Ladies in Gent’s in the Standard Saloons will need to pull their finger out at the next show to rectify this. Perhaps it wont be too long before Paterson himself steps into the class to compete at Alexandra.

In Sports Sedan results Lee Beach, Josh Service and Steve Kershaw won heat races before Beach finished with the feature race win from Kershaw, Brendan Miller, Service and Dillon Taylor and in the Standard Saloons Daniel Stewart won two of the three heat races with Matt Leek taking a win in the third. In the final Stewart led the first seven laps before Leek made a move to the lead going on to win by more than a second. Leek the winner from Stewart, Brodie Ardley, Matt Davis, and Courtney Meakins.

This weekend’s Track Records were;

Ssa Junior Sedans

1 Lap – James Oliver – Alexandra – 22.159 – February 2022

Vsc 1200 Juniors

1 Lap – Riley Taylor – Daylesford – 22.987 – February 2022

Vsc Standard Saloons

12 Laps – Matt Leek – Nyora – 4:50.822 – 26th February 2022

Junior Standard Saloons

1 Lap – Linken Paterson – Alexandra 21.856 – February 2022

8 Laps – Zac Barwise – Colac – 3:15.263 – February 2022

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