Justin Ryan beats Seth Moody in cat-and-mouse game at Berlin Raceway

Justin Ryan beats Seth Moody in cat-and-mouse game at Berlin Raceway
By Steve Kaminski
Skaminsk@mlive.com MLive.com

MARNE – Every time Justin Ryan of Grand Rapids pulled away late in Saturday night’s 75-lap Super Stock feature race at the Berlin Raceway, caution waved to wipe out his lead.

Strangely, Ryan said that was the best thing that could have happened to him.
Ryan held off Seth Moody over the caution-filled waning laps to capture his second consecutive win of the season. Ryan also won last week’s season-opener.

“I think if we would have had a longer green flag run, he would have got to me,” Ryan said. “My car would start to go away a little bit after the longer runs, so I think the caution helped me out a little bit. I was able to cool off the tires running around under yellow, then get away for a couple of laps.

“That’s not always the case, but I will take them any way that I can get them.”

Moody dominated the first half of the feature, only to watch his lead disappear on a lap 37 caution. Ryan was able to charge past Moody when the race was restarted, and while he led the rest of the way, Moody continued to hound him to the finish.

Saturday marked the season debut of Berlin’s Modified division, and Ryan Hamm said that he was expecting to finish second to Billy Shotko. But he was able to overtake Shotko with eight laps to go in the 30-lap main. Hamm then held Shotko off for a 1.3 second win.

“Billy Shotko has always been fast,” Hamm said. “He was fast last year and he is fast this year. We were good in practice, and in the second practice, we fell on our face. We missed something. We got it back in the heat race a little bit, and then we made a couple of more adjustments for the feature, and it worked out good. I had a lot of fun. It feels great.”

Tony Davis of Wyoming outdueled Brian Tillema of Byron Center to win the 25-lap Sportsman feature for his second career feature win and first since 2008. Tillema, who won last week’s opener, grabbed the lead on lap five, but he was never able to escape Davis. Davis caught Tillema at the race’s halfway, and the two then battled door-to-door without making contact over the next seven laps before Davis pulled away.

“It is career win No. 2, and it feels great,” Davis said. “We put in a lot of hard work and I feel we made a lot of good decisions with our body style. We contacted some people, and they helped us out a lot.

“Brian treats everyone with respect out here, and he has treated me as good as anyone has out here. I wanted to do the same.”

Mike Speet, of Holland, earned his second consecutive win, too, taking first in the 10-lap 4 Cylinders main. He won the feature race, set fast time and captured a heat race, just like he did last week.

Speet started 15th in the 17-car field, but he needed only three laps to charge into the lead. He barely stayed out of trouble, though, since there were two cautions even before a lap was completed. Speet said he was fortunate to escape unscathed.
“I started way in the back, and there was a lot of trouble around me,” Speet said. “Every single (accident) was a near miss. I got tagged a little bit one time when a guy was trying to get underneath me.”

SUPER STOCKS (75 LAPS) 1. Justin Ryan, 2. Seth Moody, 3. Nate Walton, 4. Will Olmsted, 5. Dave Lake, 6. Bob Bliss, 7. Denny Anderson, 8. Andrew Nylaan, 9. Dave Hull, 10. Dennis Mann, 11. Cole Roelofs, 12. Warren Speet, 13. Joel Baker, 14. Jeremy Munniksma, 15. Tim Stuart, 16. Trever McCoy, 17. Kelsey Steele

MODIFIEDS (30 LAPS) 1. Ryan Hamm, 2. Billy Shotko, 3. Billy Eppink, 4. Kevin DeGood, 5. Adam Chase, 6. Randy DeBoer, 7. Ryan Gruppen, 8. Ben Welch

SPORTSMAN (25 LAPS) 1. Tony Davis, 2. Brian Tillema, 3. Randy Veldman, 4. Andrew MacIntosh, 5. Mitch Meppelink, 6. Nick Sherrington, 7. Allen Davis, 8. Kirk Meissner, 9. Tyler Nawrocki, 10. Tyler Sterken, 11. Gerry Shepard, 12. Dave Cutler, 13. Scott Root

4 CYLINDERS (10 LAPS) 1. Mike Speet, 2. Charlie DeJong, 3. Chuck Norris, 4. Darrell Holtzlander, 5. Dave Duyst, 6. Jackson Walker, 7. Seth VanHorssen, 8. Paul Ritchie, 9. Dan Schoenborn, 10. Kyle VanDrunen, 11. Jason Essex, 12. Jerry Smith, 13. Rob Ream, 14. Robbie Ream, 15. Dan Ream, 16. Zack Clark, 17. Jake Loesch
HEAT WINNERS: Ryan Hamm (Modifieds); Randy Veldman, Scott Root (Sportsman); Mike Speet, Zack Clark (4 Cylinders)

FAST QUALIFIERS: Nate Walton (Super Stocks) 92.130 mph; Kevin DeGood (Modifieds) 92.340 mph; Tony Davis (Sportsman) 85.519 mph; Mike Speet (4 Cylinders) 78.385 mph