Electronic Christmas Trees, That Is

Las Vegas is not known for its generosity to visitors, but Kyle Seipel and Peter Biondo have turned that sad fact on its head. For the past six years their K&N Spring event, held at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, has lined the pockets of many racers with long green. This is especially true for the past three years as the dynamic duo bumped their boffo event up to the Spring Fling Million.

But wait, there’s more. In addition to the hefty winner’s payouts, there are a plethora of “side bets” during the event, doling out considerable coinage plus thousands of dollars’ worth of product, including two race cars.

Before we get to the action, some event info is in order. Big-buck bracket races have largely been the purview of dragsters. Biondo and Seipel altered this dynamic by separating the long cars from doorslammers until later rounds of competition. Because of this, nearly half the Vegas field had doors.

Initially, the Vegas Fling was comprised of Super Pro and Pro (i.e. “Box” and “No Box”). With the advent of the Million and increasing car count, it was decided to race only Super Pro. Not wishing to alienate the Pro racers who had faithfully supported the program, the honchos decided to include an elite 38-car Pro field. This group runs to a class winner, who is then inserted into the following Super Pro round.

The bucks began to flow on Wednesday with the Maytag Silverstate Refrigeration $30,000-to-win race. It was way past 11:00 p.m. when Round 7 commenced. The players were Andy Schmall, Peeps Pennington, Dom Meziere, Brad Johnson, Jack Sadler, Marko Perivolaris, Buddy Ferrell and George Lewis. These were split evenly between door cars and diggers. In Round 8, Sadler red-bulbed, advancing Johnson; Meziere defeated Lewis; Pennington ran out to advance Ferrell; and Perivolaris used a better reaction time to gun down Schmall. Meziere was the only remaining door car.

In the first half of the semis, Johnson, a big winner at the inaugural NHRA Vegas Four-Wide, fouled against Perivolaris. On the other side, Meziere, also an NHRA National Event winner, used a better reaction to best Ferrell. The final was door car vs. dragster, piloted by California drivers.

Perivolaris, who recorded two .000s and a .001 reaction times, again launched first and held on to defeat Meziere. If Marko’s rather uncommon name sounds familiar, it’s because he won last year’s Spring Fling final-day race.

Racepak anteed up 30 large for Thursday’s festivities. Yet another arduous day, by the ladder round, Round 7, 11 racers remained in the fray. Scott Stockton moved into the Super Pro field after winning the Pro 38 class: Jim Shelton, Al Quigley, Paul Lorton, Wes Barnard, Dustin Wurtz, Luke Bogacki (last year’s Million Dollar winner), Gary Williams, Lane Dicken, Kevin Thorp and Sean Shaffer. The survivors from that round were Quigley, Wurtz, Williams, Bogacki, Dicken and Stockton.

For the quarters, six cars remained. The only door cars belonged to Quigley and Stockton. When the smoke cleared, Quigley, Bogacki and Dicken advanced to the semifinals, and based on his .002 reaction time, Dicken received the odd car bye, moving him into the finals.

In the semis, Quigley missed the tree with a .057 reaction time to Bogacki’s .011, which ultimately produced the win light in Bogacki’s lane. On his bye, Dicken hit the tree with a .006, giving him lane choice.

An interesting final round found Dicken, runner-up in the 2016 Million to Jeff Verdi, facing off against last year’s Million Dollar Man, Bogacki. For Thursday’s finale, Bogacki left first with a .008 light, and it was Dicken’s fate to miss the tree with a .021, giving Bogacki room at the finish line for the win.

Now for Friday and the main event, a billboard-sized check for the amount of $260,000 (up from last year) awaited the winner.

Round 6 started off with the Pro 38 final where Andy Schmall wasn’t intimidated by the 100-plus NHRA National Event winner Dan Fletcher, defeating him to move into Round 7 of the Super Pro field. The other survivors were JR Lobner with two cars, Dylan Stott, Johnny Ezell, Aaron Kinard and Randell Reid.

For Round 7, Lobner received the bye with his first entry to move that car into the semifinals, while Stott and Kinard also advanced with Lobner’s second entry defeated by Reid.

The semifinal’s first pairing was Stott and Reid, with Stott launching prematurely by -.001. Lobner then relied upon his reaction time advantage to defeat Kinard.

It was Lobner vs. Reid vying for that oversized check. Despite both men’s success in NHRA competition, there’s little doubt that neither has had the opportunity to score such a sizeable financial reward.

For the mega-payday, Reid held the starting line advantage and never looked back. And with that, as part of his winnings, Reid and his crew were whisked off in a custom limousine to a suite at the swanky Cosmopolitan Resort on The Strip.

Saturday was the last hurrah and the third 30-thou pay out.

Four hundred and twenty cars made the first round call and down to the ladder round with 10 left. The combatants were Pro 38 Saturday champ Brian Cireddu, Gary Williams, Courtland Carter, Darrel Contreras, Logan Warr, Ryan McClanahan, Ted Kellner, Vinny DiMino, Jason Schade and Johnny Ezell.

Round 7 witnessed Williams take out Carter, DiMino best Schade, Warr eliminate Contreras, Cireddu defeat Ezell, and McClanahan nail a perfect light to defeat Kellner. With five returning for Round 8, McClanahan picked a good time for a .000 reaction as it gave him the odd car bye, propelling him into the semis.

In the quarterfinals, Ciredd defeated Williams, and DiMino took out Warr, while McClanahan skated via his bye. Carding a .007 light, Cirredu earned the semifinal bye and the opportunity to participate in another Spring Fling final round. In last year’s Saturday finale, he was defeated by Marko Perivolaris. Two door cars and DiMino’s dragster were jousting for the win.

In the semis, DiMino might have chosen a bad time to miss the tree as McClanahan was .001 to his .039. But DiMino’s dead-on-the-dial with a “4” proved to be too much for McClanahan to gauge as the win light shone in DiMino’s lane, sending him into the finals against Cireddu.

For the final payout of the Fling, it was DiMino all the way with the reaction time advantage and a 4.744 on a 4.73 dial to take the money back to New York.

Kudos to Seipel, Biondo and crew, and The Strip staff for pulling off a near flawless event. Dealing with that many racers for that many days … well, you might just as well be herding cats. This event has gotten better with each passing year, and 2019 is looking plenty bright.

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