29th annual Hank Perry 240 – Report

The 29th annual Hank Perry 240 was held this past weekend in Spokane, Washington. This race doubles as round #2 of the Northwest Championship Tour and always draws a large entry count, in part due to being held on Memorial Day weekend each year. This year was no different and “The Hank” attracted close to 300 entries. The 3 day event consisted of Friday practice, 3 rounds of qualifying Saturday and triple A-Mains Sunday with single 30 minute nitro A-mains. Q1 of the 2WD Buggy class with 26 entries saw the AE of Dave Gullickson edging out Kyosho’s Tayler Wonders by only a tenth or two. Q2 and Q3 would see Kyosho’s on top with Tayler taking round 2 and Derek Rasheed taking round 3. After all the qual points were calculated, and the tie-breakers were accounted for it, would be Rasheed with the overall TQ with Dave 2nd and Tayler 3rd.

In the opening A-main Tayler Wonders would start 3rd but would end up in the lead by the end of the first lap. Tayler put in a smooth, mistake free run and took the win fairly easily, about 5 seconds over 2nd place. Unfortunately TQ Derek Rasheed would be unable to make the start with a mechanical issue with his controller just before the race started. A2 wasn’t as mistake free and smooth as A1 for anyone. Dave Gullickson would end up driving the most mistake free and took a hard fought win. Kevin Soukeroff drove all the way from his 7th starting spot and took a solid 2nd with Corby Story 3rd. With Dave Gullickson and Tayler Wonders having a win apiece, the third A-main would decide the overall winner for the day. TQ Derek Rasheed would finally get to run without mechanical issues and after giving up the lead to Gullickson on lap 1, would go on to lead laps 2 thru lap 10. The 3 way battle for the lead came down to the very end and after running 3rd for most of the race, Tayler Wonders would move into 2nd by the end of the second to last lap. Going into the last lap Rasheed would make a small mistake at the end of the straight, allowing Tayler and Dave to get by. Rasheed and Dave got tangled and Tayler would go on to take A3 and the overall win. Behind him Dave Gullickson would finish 2nd with Kevin Soukeroff coming in 3rd.

4WD Buggy with 35 entries would have Jesse Munn (Kyosho) winning all three qualifiers to take the overall TQ. Keith Hadley would end up qualifying 2nd, also with a Kyosho, and Hot Bodies Nick Buechler would start 3rd for Sunday’s mains. A1 then didn’t go as expected for many drivers. After leading the first couple laps Jesse would traction roll at the end of the straight, lose a few spots and then after a few crazy sequences would ultimately fall back to 9th on lap 3 but he was able get back into 4th by the end of A1. The second A-main featured a very bad first lap for what seemed like everyone except for Jesse. Gifted a 5 second lead on the first lap, Munn would go on to with the main comfortably with the only 12 lap run of the day. For A3 the track was getting extremely abrasive and was very edgy to drive on. After leading the first half of the race, the track would bite Jesse a few times and he dropped back to 3rd behind Nick Buechler and Keith Hadley. With 2 laps to go Keith made a small mistake and Jesse snacked by, setting up a last lap battle with Buechler. Nick cased one of the triple jumps just a little bit and Jesse was able to sneek by and take the win by just 0.2 seconds to wrap up the overall win from Nick Buehler and Keith Hadley.

TLR’s Mike Dana would TQ the first 2 rounds of Electric 1/8 Buggy with 60 entries to wrap up the overall TQ. Privateer. In the main event Keith Hadley, coming from the 4 spot, would come back from a rough start and move into the lead with a few minutes to go to win A1. In A2 Keith would start stronger, move into the lead by the end of lap 3, and take the win to wrap it up in 2 mains. Mike Dana would grab the runner-up spot, Jeremy Potter rounded out the podium in 3rd.

Pro Nitro Buggy qualifying on Saturday went to almost midnight and the results were all over the board with the changing track conditions and so many fast drivers running well. The 30 minute A-main had TQ Nick Buechler leading the first lap but he would stuff a pipe on lap 2. Jesse Munn, coming from the 2 spot, was able to get by and led the next 29 minutes, to hold off a late charge by Buechler and to take the win. Behind Nick Buechler Shane Preugschat finished in 3rd place.

Thanks to Jesse Munn for the report.