STARS Racing Series at Will Cagle's East Bay Speedway: Report and Results
9 February 1998
Gibsonton, FL - Keith Nosbisch of Valrico, Florida captured the opening race of the STARS Racing Series 1998 Season Thursday night at Will Cagle's East Bay Speedway in Tampa, Florida. Driving the Rocket Chassis/Fulco/Adams used Auto Parts #02 Camaro, Nosbisch held off 1996 & 1997 STARS champion Steve Francis over the final 10 laps of the 40 lap feature event pocketing $4000 for his first ever STARS Racing Series sanctioned "full-points" event. Bob Pierce finished third followed by Mike Balzano and Dale McDowell. Rounding out the top 10 finishers were Freddy Smith, Rick Eckert, Billy Moyer, Jack Boggs and Bill Frye. At the drop of the green flag outside pole sitter John Gill and pole sitter Nosbisch battled for the lead with Gill leading lap one over Nosbisch, Pierce, Balzano and R.J. Conley. Nosbisch grabbed the lead on lap 5 only to have Gill take the lead back on the next circuit. Gill and Nosbisch raced hard for the lead over the next several laps with Nosbisch wrestling the lead away on lap 16. Gill would fall from the action one lap later moving Conley into second. Francis, who had started 12th, had worked his way to third by the halfway point with Pierce and Balzano, who had worked his way back through the field after an early race spin, rounding out the top five. Francis and Pierce worked their way past Conley on lap 21 and took off after Nosbisch. Francis pulled away from Pierce by lap 25 and started to track down Nosbisch catching the leader on lap 30. By lap 35 Francis was side by side with the leader but couldn't find his way past Nosbisch as the East Bay Veteran worked the inside groove on his way to victory. 74 drivers were on hand for the $21,000 event with R.J. Conley setting quick time at 14.825 seconds around the semi-banked 1/3rd mile. Heat race wins were taken by Pierce, Steve Barnett, Ken Nosbisch, Keith Nosbisch, Ray Cool and Gary Stuhler. Keith Nosbisch scored the ISKY RACING CAMS Fast Dash while Delmas Conley, Smith and Moyer took the triple PRO SHOCKS "B" Mains Fin Pos. Car# Driver Laps 1 02 Keith Nosbisch 40 2 15 Steve Francis 40 3 23 Bob Pierce 40 4 E1 Mike Balzano 40 5 17M Dale McDowill 40 6 00 Freddy Smith 40 7 24 Rick Eckert 40 8 21M Billy Moyer 40 9 B4 Jack Boggs 40 10 66F Bill Frye 39 11 53 Ray Cook 39 12 38 Kenny Pettyjohn 39 13 12A Rick Aukland 37 14 71C R.J. Conley 28 15 12 Jason Smith 23 16 68N Ken Nosbisch 20 17 68 Tim Hitt 16 18 75G John Gill 16 19 71R Rod Conley 7 20 19 Gary Stuhler 5 21 32 Greg Lucas 4 22 15P Scott Peltz 4 23 00H Chuck Harper 4 24 75 Bart Hartman 4 25 71 Delmas Conley 4 26 89 Steve Barnett 3 John Kaiser -- The Auto Channel
