From the halfway point, Bond opened up more than a second’s advantage over Brown by the time the 30 to go mark was reached, but Brownie used patience and traffic to close back in.
Over the next 10 laps Brown shaved the gap down to a half-second, and when the caution flew with 15 to go the gap was two car lengths between the top two.
Following cleanup at the bottom of the frontstretch, where Alex McRae hit the water barrels with his No. 14, Tyler Thompson backed his car into the outside wall in turn one before another lap could be completed.
Once the race resumed, Alex Hoag took third away from Mike Bruce but the battle for the win was between Bond and Brown. With 10 laps to go, the gap was two car lengths, but Bond turned the afterburners up and extended the margin to three-quarters of a second two laps later.
From there it was an easy run to the finish for Bond, who crossed the checkered flag 1.585 seconds ahead of Brown after the polesitter simply had nothing to challenge with down the final stretch.
“My car really wasn’t that good all day,” Brown admitted. “Apparently we just missed (the setup). I thought we had a good car for today, but the weather or something just threw us for a loop and we had nothing to attack with there late in the race.”
“Oh well, though, we’ll take a second. I can take getting beat by him (Bond) any day.”
Alex Hoag completed the podium in third ahead of Mike Bruce and Dalton Doyle.
Anthony Losurdo, Camden Proud, Jason Simmons, Barry Kingsley and Brad Haynes completed the top 10.
Tyler Thompson, who finished 18th, was the SBS Classic Rookie of the Race.
Following the post-race festivities, Bond – a four-time SBS track champion at Oswego – admitted that this year may have closed the book on his fill-time career at the Speedway, and that if it had a Classic win was a solid way to cap the chapter.
“I don’t know if we’ll be back to do the full-time thing again – this might be it for the whole season deal for us. I’m getting old, the crew wants to do different stuff … I want to do some different stuff, so we’ll see. We might race part-time; I don’t know yet. Wait and see what happens.”
RESULTS: Pathfinder Bank Small Block Super Series; Bud Light SBS Classic; Oswego Speedway; Sept. 4, 2016
Feature (75 laps): 1. #74 – Mike Bond [3]; 2. #13 – Russ Brown [1]; 3. #7 – Alex Hoag [7]; 4. #22 – Mike Bruce [9]; 5. #01 – Dalton Doyle [4]; 6. #1 – Anthony Losurdo [8]; 7. #54 – Camden Proud [5]; 8. #98 – Jason Simmons [11]; 9. #91 – Barry Kingsley [13]; 10. #88 – Brad Haynes [17]; 11. #87 – Matt Magner [15]; 12. #04 – Kreig Heroth [14]; 13. #77 – Cameron Rowe [19]; 14. #90 – Greg O’Connor [23]; 15. #47 – Jon Tesoriero [25]; 16. #14 – Alex McRae [18]; 17. #8 – Josh Kerr [22]; 18. #93 – Tyler Thompson [28]; 19. #9 – Jack Patrick [10]; 20. #86 – Bryan Haynes [21]; 21. #23 – Cameron Black [20]; 22. #99 – Dennis Rupert [24]; 23. #37 – Jesse Bearup [12]; 24. #18 – Andrew Schartner [6]; 25. #76 – Scott Schaefer [16]; 26. #69 – Mark Castiglia [26]; 27. #15 – James Babcock [27]; 28. #50 – Dave Cliff [2].
SBS Consi (12 laps, top six transfer): 1. Bryan Haynes, 2. Josh Kerr, 3. Greg O’Connor, 4. Dennis Rupert, 5. Jon Tesoriero, 6. Mark Castiglia / 7. Tyler Thompson, 8. James Babcock
About the Writer
Jacob Seelman is the Managing Editor of Race Chaser Online and creator of the Motorsports Madness radio show, airing at 7 p.m. Eastern every Monday on the Performance Motorsports Network.
Seelman grew up in the sport, watching his grandparents co-own the RaDiUs Motorsports NASCAR Cup Series team in the 1990s.
The 22-year-old is currently studying Broadcast Journalism at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C., and is also serving as the full-time tour announcer for the Must See Racing Sprint Car Series.
Email Jacob at: [email protected]
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