As the laps wound down at Orange County Fair Speedway, Tanner VanDoren battled for the lead with a car quite familiar to him. He had put together that car last year for car owner Charlie Lord. Now it had Dan Creeden behind the wheel. That motivated him even further, leading to his first big-block modified win at the Middletown, New York, oval.
“It was a weird feeling to be racing against my old car,” VanDoren, of Slatington, Pennsylvania, said. “Late in the race, me and Dan were checked out — ahead of the field by a second and a half — in two cars I built.”
The yellow flag waved late in the feature, leading to a restart with two to go.
“Before the caution, I could hear my old car behind me,” said VanDoren. “Then [Creeden] decided to go underneath me in turns one and two, so I went to the top in three and four. I ran the top as fast as I could. On the restart, I chose to start outside. I told myself to make speed and go as fast as I could.”
VanDoren races for his family-owned team. The first big-block victory meant a lot for him.
“We finally did it — we broke through,” VanDoren said. “I know how hard we worked to get here. I was relieved that we got it done. For me, I accomplished something with this win that I can keep building upon.”
While Tanner VanDoren celebrated his milestone win, he couldn’t help thinking about Stewart Friesen. A July 28 wreck in the Super DIRTcar Series at Autodrome Drummond severely injured him.
“I’ve been praying for Stewart — he’s always in my thoughts,” said VanDoren said. “As drivers, we all accept that something bad could happen to us on the racetrack. I pray for Stewart to recover and be racing with us again real soon.”
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
