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OSCAAR HOT RODS
Tyler Hawn Scores Pair of Wins in Mid-Season Series Action By Bryce Turner with files from Ashley McCubbin he middle stretch of the OSCAAR Hot Rods season began at Full Throttle Motor Speedway, with a race that was postponed a week to July 22. Cole Weber earned the pole position following the invert of the top-eight qualifiers. It wasn’t an opportunity he took lightly, pacing all 30 laps en route to victory lane. He did not win it easily though, as his No. 9 hot rod was challenged on a series of consecutive restarts, by a variety of competitors. Rob Wark wound up parked on top of Travis Farrow, after contact, with eight laps to go. Sent to the back of the field, Wark avoided the two incidents that followed, on the ensuing restarts, making a couple of passes in the closing stages to score the runner-up finish. Kyle Woods, Ed Peterson, and Ryan Cowan rounded out the top-five. Next up was Peterborough Speedway, on August 5. Starting from the eighth position, Rick Spencer-Walt took second with just 10 laps on the board. On Lap 20, caution when Bill Clarke went up in smoke, with Nick Clarke and Matt Spry tangling together as they slid in the fluid. Spencer-Walt got a good restart on the high side, taking the lead and driving away to the victory. Tyler Hawn held on for second, followed by Rob Bromley, Steve Book, and Cowan. On August 19, the series visited Sauble Speedway, where Hawn wasted no time working his way forward, taking the lead on Lap 7. He did not look back from there, as he weaved through lapped traffic en route to the win.
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(Above) Tyler Hawn was a regular visitor to OSCAAR’s Hot Rod Victory Lane during the middle of the 2023 season. Photos by Steve Traczyk (above) and Rod Henderson / CanadianRacer.com
“I love Sauble Speedway, it’s one of my favourite tracks to go to,” said Hawn. “We worked really hard on the car all day, made lots of adjustments, trying out some different things. The car just kept getting better and better.” Bromley, Book, Farrow and Matt Hopkins completed the top-five. Hawn says that his team is really big on preventative maintenance and noted the amount of time they spend in the shop. “We put four hours a night in the car minimum, every night, even if we’re off a weekend,” said Hawn. “Our program is a lot like J.R. Fitzpatrick’s, where you see him make lots of posts about the work he does on his car, me and my crew are the exact same. We go through everything, every week, because we don’t want to show up to the race track struggling.”
Next up for the series was Brighton Speedway, the lone dirt race on the calendar and the only race that is standalone from the OSCAAR Modifieds. It was also an event postponed by nearly a month, taking place on September 9. Hawn worked his way through the field methodically to take the lead with just four laps on the board. Pacing the final 16 laps, he pulled away to the win, parking his 1966 Pontiac Beaumont in victory lane. “We did a little bit of chassis adjustment before we made it to the race track and it worked out all day,” said Hawn. “The car was really good. I was watching a lot of dirt racing videos, trying to see how different lines and stuff like that work, and we had a good day.” Brandon Crumbie kept his impressive hot rod dirt podium streak going, making it three in a row, with a runner-up, as he filled in for Jeremy McLean. Connor Ellis, Book and Cowan rounded out the top-five. Hawn missed the Brighton race last year and got dirt tires for this year, through Steve Book. He says that he showed up with essentially the same set-up as his previous race, at Sunset Speedway. “A lot of teams, they have a neutral set-up and they go back to that set-up after every track; we don’t,” said Hawn. “We do our bolt checks and we go over the whole car every week and do our gear change and all that, then we see how the car is in practice and we just go from there.” The Hot Rods would conclude their season with races at Delaware, Flamboro and Peterborough speedways. IT
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