Mark Dilley - Sun Valley Speedway 2005


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Dilley looks to rebound at Mosport Speedway Wheel troubles out west frustrate Dodge driver’s title hunt VERNON, BC – When the CASCAR Super Series takes to the half-mile oval at Mosport Speedway this Saturday night for the eighth event of the 2005 schedule, Mark Dilley will be looking to bounce back from a tough tour of western Canada. The Dodge / PowerWater / Exide / Mobil 1 / Exide Charger driver had a strong car in both National events out west, but wheel troubles left him with frustrating results at Calgary’s Race City Motorsport Park and Vernon, BC’s Sun Valley Speedway. In Calgary, the Barrie, ON resident started eighth in the MOPAR 300 (on July 23) after finishing fourth in his 100-lap qualifying sprint race the night before. Dilley climbed as high as second in the 300-lapper before wheel trouble knocked him to 21^st in the final results. A broken shock absorber in his Twin 100 heat at Vernon resulted in a 10^th-place result in the sprint race and a deep starting spot (20^th) for the Sun Valley 300 (on July 30). But with a strong car and a repaired shock, it took Dilley just 90 laps to climb to second-place in the feature event. Unfortunately, the troubles that hampered the team’s efforts at Calgary returned in Vernon and the veteran came home 14^th in the final results. “The wheels fell off… literally,” said Dilley, of his trip out west. “At first, we thought it was just a matter of something being left loose in Calgary, but now it looks like we have a problem with one of the airguns. The same thing happened on three wheels at Vernon. There’s something wrong with the regulator or the gun. But the bottom line is that the car was fast in both races.”	LOOKING AHEAD: Dilley is confident that the Whitlock Motorsports team will have the problem solved for this weekend’s race at Mosport. The Dodge Charger driver headed west in second-place in the National points chase, and returns in fifth overall. On the bright side, Dilley finds himself just nine points out of third, but will have to post some impressive results to run down championship leader Don Thomson Jr., who is 124 points ahead of Dilley. “We need to get going hard now that we’re back,” continued Dilley. “That was a big hit and it made things tougher for us the rest of the way. I won at Mosport in 2001 and we’ve had success at most of the other tracks we’re going to the rest of the season. So even though we only have five races to go, we’re heading to some tracks we like.” RACE NOTES: Dodge driver DJ Kennington won both Super Series feature races during CASCAR’s tour of Western Canada. The veteran started sixth in the July 23 MOPAR 300 at Race City Motorsport Park and took the lead from runner-up Peter Gibbons with 15 laps to go at the high-banked, half-mile oval. And at Vernon’s Sun Valley Speedway, Kennington started on the pole for the Sun Valley 300 and denied fellow Dodge driver Brad Graham his first-ever Super Series win when he passed him with just three laps to go.