May 5, 2006; Columbus, WI. - Tyler James, of Oconomowoc, used his front row starting position to his advantage and dominated the season opener at Columbus 151 Speedway this past Friday. James and Justin Schultz brought the 21 car field to the green flag and remained side by side for the opening laps. The front six rows stayed in a pack behind the leaders until a caution flew on lap three for a spinning car on the backstretch.

Photo Highlights

Tyler James developed a huge lead in the Late Model Feature, and held on to grab the win. Pictured with him is his Father. #30 Grant Lindner of Poynette won his first Street Stock Feature of the 2006 season. #96 Alan Dorn won his first Hobby Stock Feature of the new season at Columbus 151 Speedway.  way to winning the contest.  #77 Sean Watters beats out the #4D of Bud Riedner to win his first Bandit Feature of the season. Bruce Havel came out of retirement to run one last time with the Back-Ups he so enjoyed and won the Feature.

On the restart, the field was lined up single file and James was on the point. 30 laps of green flag racing went by as the cars formed a freight train around the speedway without much passing. James would gain a solid advantage over the second place car of Schultz, and that would prove to be the winning margin. At the checkered, James took the win followed by Schultz, Don Gaserude, Jim Syvrud and Dean Schultz. Aaron Wilke set the pace with a 13.232 second lap in qualifying. Heat winner included Jason Deppe, Jeff Steenbergen and Tim Woollen.

Grant Lindner of Poynette came from the inside of the second row to capture the 30 lap Street Stock main event. Tylor Schultz grabbed the initial lead with Dennis Schwark in pursuit. Caution flew on lap 6 and on the restart, Lindner went high into the first turn for second place. He would gain the position down the backstretch and begin working on the leader. One lap later, another caution would put Lindner on the rear bumper of Schultz. Once the green came back out, Lindner took the top spot away and began to drive into the sunset. But defending track champion Kevin Anderson would not let him get away. Once Anderson got by for second he began to run down Lindner and with two laps remaining had caught him. But lapped traffic aided Lindner and Anderson was unable to make a move. At the line, it was Lindner ahead of Anderson for first and second followed by Schwark, Schultz and Don Trush. Rookie Tim Syvrud held down quick time with a 14.093 second tour of the oval. Heat winners were Schultz and Bobbi Bishofberger.

Alan Dorn led 19 of 20 laps en route the Hobby Stock feature win. Jarrod Sutherland and Brian Piller brought the field to green and on lap one Dorn made it three wide for the top spot. Dorn would take the lead in turn 4 and never relinquish it despite the valiant efforts of Jim Tate, Jr. Tate used a great restart after the only caution of the race to move into second and fill up Dorn's mirror. For ten laps, Tate tried every move to get around Dorn, but could not pull it off. Dorn took the checkered followed by Tate in a close second. Piller, Lincoln Keeser and Larry Moen rounded out the top five. Quick time belonged to Moen while Piller and Andy Raley were heat winners.

An exciting finish led to a victory for Sean Watters in the 18 lap Bandit feature. The caution free event saw the top four finishers come from outside the top six spots. Watters made his way through traffic and was in second by lap 10. Meanwhile, Bud Riedner was weaving through the field and by lap 13 was behind the leaders of Watters and Kurt Clapper. On the white flag lap, Riedner went low to get around Clapper and the two made contact. Clapper got loose and Riedner checked up which allowed Watters to grab the lead and take it to the checkers. Watters crossed the line first followed by Riedner, Greg Ovadahl, Rodney Mundt and Clapper. Fast time was held by Ovadahl. Heat winners included Michael Hiemann, Ryan Oetzel, Riedner and Clapper. Paul Novotney took the consolation and Jacob Vanoskey won the last chance event.

Rounding out the nights events was the Back Up division. Bruce Havel did battle with George Wachuta for the win in the 8 lap feature, with Havel gaining the win. Wachuta finished second, and Dave Moore third.

Next Friday night, May 12, at Columbus 151 Speedway is Pepsi Triple 60's series round one with a 60 lap late model feature. Also, the Midwest Super Truck Series makes their first appearance at 151 this season. Time trials begin at 6:30 with racing at 8 pm.

For complete results from the RACESTAT computer click here