PESTKA WINS AVALON EASTER TRAIL OPENER

By Bruce Williams (Courtesy Auto Action)

In a dominant lights-to-flag win, SA’s Daniel Pestka has taken out the night one main event of the Easter Sprintcar Trail at Geelong’s Avalon Raceway.

It was a repeat of the same performance exactly a year ago for Pestka who also won night one of the 2024 Easter Trail at Avalon Raceway.

Driving the Stark Family SA27, Pestka recorded the fastest time in his heat time trial group. 

Starting out of position four, he made an outside move into turn one at the start and by the exit of turn two he was in the lead and never headed.

The combination of qualifying points and maximum heats points put him in pole along side the always hard charger and former Australian champion Jamie Veal.

At the start of the 30 Lap A Main, sponsored by Camden Signs, Pestka starting on the outside charged into turn one and into the lead.

A caution at the end of the second lap brought about a single line restart and duo continued to battle hard with Veal never more than a few car lengths behind the SA27.

As the pair raced through lapped traffic, Veal saw an opportunity and dived to be alongside Pestka. 

But he remained cool and despite the constant pressure of Veal in the lapped traffic, Pestka held off Veal in a 29 lap sprint to the flag.

They had so much speed that third placed Ian Madsen was a long way back.

Pestka was both relieved and satisfied with the win when he spoke to Auto Action after the race.

“Everything sort of went my way and got past the lap cars early when I needed to and I didn’t really test myself too much, just went as hard as I could and it worked for me,” he said.

“It was pretty juiced up and was pretty slick and slippery at the start, and then the track slowly come in.

“But it took ages to get the grease off of it and then it was fast but still pretty single lane.”

However, it was not a smooth night with a brake drama unfolding in the heats.

“Actually the bloody bolt fell out of it, I’ve never had that happen before,” Pestka said.

“The track was hooked up so wasn’t a good time when that happened, the track was so grippy.

“I really needed my brakes all the time, so managed to scrape through in that one.”

Pestka has had a solid season highlighted by a Max’s Race triumph, but he has had a frustration where things did not click when they mattered most.

“We started off the year not too bad, and then right at the time when all the big races, with the good money come, we just ended up being no good,” he said.

“The same thing happened last year and I think we’ve worked out why.

“We did the exact same last year and we think it’s that these cars don’t last that long and we should have brought a new one out at Christmas time.

“With that we just couldn’t get that car to work and we just put a new car together and the thing was going on again.

“The cars we use are made in China and that’s all we can put it down to, you can only get about half a season out of them and then you need to put a new one together.

“We can’t afford to change to a different brand because they’re all made in America and they’re all much more expensive.”

Attention now turns to Mount Gambier’s Borderline Speedway tonight where the second race of the three-night series takes place, (Saturday night, April 19).

Pestka has past success having claimed a 360 race at Mount Gambier earlier this season.

It is an important race given his Stark family team is based out of Port MacDonnell located a half an hour’s drive south of the track.

“We will try again tomorrow. It’s a bit of a home race there and the boys always put a fair bit of effort into making sure we do a good job there.

“I’m sure we’ll go alright and just see what happens.”

Action at Borderline Speedway kicks off at 17.00 SA time tonight.