Tribune/Dan McGee On his way to winning the Virginia City Grand Prix, Justin Soul gets his bike refueled by his father Harvey during a pit stop.

By Dan McGee
Special to the Tribune

VIRGINIA CITY - Last week Justin Soulé was denied a possible win at Hungry Valley. This past Saturday he staged a dramatic come-from-behind charge to claim victory in the Virginia City Grand Prix

"I love to pass people and didn't want to waste any time," Soulé said. "I put my head down and tried to catch up to the front. I gave it my all on the last lap and even wadded up a couple of times and was surprised when I had to do an extra lap."

Since he was a late entry, Soulé started way back in the almost 300 rider field. At VC, riders are grouped in rows of 10 and every row starts with a 15-second gap between them.

Before every race, a "head start" position is auctioned off with the proceeds going to charity. This year 19-year-old John Cary, from Antioch, Calif., got a 30-second head start on the field.

Leading the charge, when the first row was turned loose was Jason Lulis from Brentwood, Calif.

Jason Alosi was first into the pits followed by Dave Mowery and Ryan Toomey, a Spanish Springs High student. Behind the leaders Soulé and VC High School senior Reece Honea were charging through the traffic.

Steve Garnett was first when the second lap ended with Steve Tichenor, Soulé, Gordon Ward, Quinn Cody and Honea in hot pursuit.

A flat eliminated Garnett's chances at a win and a spill erased Tichenor's several minute advantage over Soulé, who swept into the lead during the third lap.

A crash ended Toomey's chances and fortunately he only suffered minor injuries.

Soulé's torrid pace actually hurt him as he arrived at the finish just 30 seconds before he would have been given the checkered. As each rider runs a time, the 17-year-old North Valley High School student had to do one more lap.

Cody, Team Honda rider, claimed second while the flying Honea ended up third ahead of Gordon Ward and Tichenor, who slipped to fifth on the final lap.

Keeping watch on the proceedings was Fran Hull from the BLM.

"Staging this race is a complicated permit process," she said. "Clubs like VCMC, MRANN and other organizations are very pro active at keeping public lands clean. These events are in compliance with the ethics of land use and our goal of minimum impact."

This year the novice, women and vintage bikes raced Sunday. Over 300 riders showed up to contest the race, which was shortened to three hours for these riders.

This time two head start positions were auctioned off and the father-daughter team of Bob Collins and Terri Stephens had the winning bid. Like a good daughter, Stephens let her 67-year-old father lead after they got the start signal.

Tribune/Dan McGee On his way to winning the novice part of the VCGP, John Brain heads away from the pits.

A little over three hours later, John Brain, from Granite Bay, Calif. claimed the first overall spot. Following him was Kelly Postel, whose father won the VCGP twice while his grandfather was the National Hare and Hound champion in the middle 1950's.

"The course was excellent and the downhill magnificent," Brain said.

Then Postel, who is 16-year-old high school student, said, "This was fun and technical, especially the creek that runs under a bridge."

Postel's proud father Peter watched his son being interviewed and said, "I'm not used to being in the pits. This is a tough riders' course, but Kelly's been drug around courses like this all his life, so he's of the old school."

Tribune/Dan McGee Kelly Postel at the finish of the novice part of the VCGP.

Both days had clean starts and most crashes only resulted in minor injuries. The worst incident came on Sunday when a rider was hurt bad enough to be flown to Washoe Medical Center by Careflight.

Asked about the event, Donnie Bird, VCMC President said, "We had approximately 700 riders and Saturday was a raging success. Everything was good and our volunteers were excellent as we are a small club and depend on them."

Next year the expert and pro riders will race on Sunday while the novice, women and vintage riders will go back to Saturday.

• Despite a slight rain delay, the Reno-Fernley Raceway was able to run its entire program in an evening of hard racing.

Tribune/Dan McGee Roaring into the final turn before the checkered flag, Reece Wilson puts an inside move on his father Vukie to take the race.

The closest race of the night came in the Dwarf Car feature when Reece Wilson used a final lap pass to just take the win from his father Vukie. Another close one was in the Pro Stock main where Joe Specchio Jr. managed to best Dean Cichowicz.

"I just waited my time, then he opened the door just a bit and that was it," Specchio said.

Brian Coclich staged a runaway win in the Pro 4 division when he beat Kenny Martin and defending division Missy Natenstedt.

"It was a pretty good race but the car began to run hot at the end," Coclich said.

Dean Clark used a steady drive to claim the Hobby Stock win over Richard Italiano while Tori Edgington bested Matt Sherman for the Pure Stock victory.

• This weekend the Honey Lake Motocross Park in Milford, Calif. hosts a Saturday-Sunday round of the Old Timer National MX series.
  
  Saturday night the Reno-Fernley Raceway brings back the 410 Sprint Cars from the Golden State Challenge series. The racing starts at 6 p.m. with a program that also features the IMCA Modifieds.
  
  That same day, starting at 9:30 a.m., Top Gun Raceway in Fallon stages the third round of this year's ET Race series. That evening at 7 p.m. Thunder Bowl in Mound House hosts the latest round of the Northern Nevada Flat Track TT series.
  
  On Sunday the Sierra Motocross series will be in Lovelock at the Tufa Motocross Park.

OTHER RACING NEWS

• Three local sprint racers spent Saturday evening at Marysville, Calif. Mark Tabor Sr., finished fourth in the main while his son finished sixth and Mike Monahan ended up ninth.
• NASCAR's Grand National Auto Zone West series raced at Stockton 99 Speedway on Saturday where Steve Portenga finished third.
• Las Vegas native Brendan Gaughan raced to a 14th place finish in Saturday's Craftsman Truck series at Gateway International Speedway. Earlier that day Kyle Busch started 19th and finished second in the Busch Grand National race at Talladega Speedway.

RESULTS

• Virginia City Grand Prix
  Saturday - April 29
  Overall - 1 Justin Soul (Exp. 250), 2 Quinn Cody (Pro.), 3 Reece Honea (Pro.), 4 Gordon Ward (Pro.), 5 Steve Tichenor (Pro.), 6 John Wear (Pro.), 7 Josh Morros (Exp. 125), 8 Taber Murphy (Pro.) 9 Craig Hoffman (30+ Exp.), 10, Darrol Brown (Open Exp.), 11 Ronald Day (Exp. 30+), 12 Jason Lulis (Open Exp.), 13 Fritz Kadlec (40+ Exp.) 14 Irv Powers (Open Exp.), 15 Curt Wilcox (Pro.), 16 Peter Postel (40+ Exp.), 17 Chris Kaila (Open Exp.), 18 Dolf Vankesteren (40+ Exp.), 19 Dan Capperelli (Pro.), 20 Mike Williams (40+ Exp.), 21 Christopher Zito (Pro.), 22 Tony Swedburg (Open Exp.), 23 Josh Wilson (Open Exp.), 24 Adam Thissennnn (Pro.), 25 Kerry Edwards (30+ Exp.), 26 Damon Knoll (250 Ama.). 27 Robert Underwood (125 Exp.), 28 Troy Burchby (30+ Exp), 29 Jeff Broussard (40+ Exp.), 30 Johnny Mason (250 Exp.)

Sunday - April 30, 2006
Overall - 1 John Brain (125 Nov.), 2 Kelly Postel (125 Nov.), 3 Mike Scano (Open Nov.), 4 Dussen Muchie (Open Nov.), 5 Kenny Spencer (30+ Nov.), 6 Dan Lyons (30+ Nov.), 7 Steven Pirnick (125 Nov.), 8 Mike Webb (250 Nov.), 9 Gary Haney (40+ Nov.), 10 Jon turner (250 Nov.), 11 Bryan Lowery (30+ Nov.), 12 Tony Baxley (Open Nov.), 13 Kyle Yoder (Open Nov.), 14 Stewart Helmer (Open Nov.), 15 Tim Curtico (40+ Nov.), 16 Jason Piper (30+ Nov.), 17 Chris Jesbert (30+ Nov.), 18 Patti Henning (Women), 19 Cory Hutton (250 Nov.), 20 Jason Spengler (30+ Nov.), 21 Ryan Hoffman (125 Nov.), 22 Rrichard Christian (Open Nov.), 23 Greg Young (40+ Nov.), 24 Robert Holmes (40+ Nov.), 25 Travis Moreda (250 Nov.), 26 Rich Dandolo (40+ Nov.), 27 Jarod McPherson (250 Nov.), 28 Gene Reierson (30+ Nov.), 29 Jimmy Martinez (Open Nov.), 30 Maatt Zulim (250 Nov.

• Reno-Fernley Raceway - April 29

Pure Stock:
Heat Race Winners - #1 Brian Priest, #2 Tori Edgington
Main (20-Laps) - 1 Tori Edgington, 2 Matt Sherman, 3 Brian Priest, Darrick Rauscher, 5 Jesse James

Hobby Stocks:
Heat Race Winners - #1 Richard Italiano, #2 Josh Ogg, #3 Brian Moore
Main (20-Laps) - 1 Dean Clark, 2 Richard Italiano, 3 Carl Barlow, 4 Shane Ramthun, 5 Shawn Natenstedt

Dwarf Cars:
Heat Race Winners - #1 Billi Canham, #2 Vuki Wilson
Main (20-Laps) - 1 Reece Wilson, 2 Vuki Wilson, 3 Jeff Shurley, 4 Tom O'Neill, 5 Bill Brown

Pro 4
Heat Winners - #1 Skip Wise, #2 Missy Natenstedt
Main (20-Laps) - 1 Brian Coclich, 2 Kenny Martin, 3 Missy Natenstedt, 4 Danyale Urban, 5 Kevin Knight

Pro Stocks:
Heat Race Winners - #1 Jim Smith, #2 Tony Lewis, #3 N/A
Main (25- Laps) - 1 Joe Specchio Jr., 2 Dean Cichowicz, 3 Travis Peterson, 4 Jim Smith, 5 Kevin Mills