Home-town talent first victor on new-look wider sprintcar track

The 35-year-old, who has raced sprintcars at the Allansford circuit for 18 years, claimed the speedweek finale on Monday, January 1, 2024 in front of a bumper crowd.

Veal rolled into victory lane ahead of Tasmanian Jock Goodyer, who celebrated back-to-back speedweek series wins, and fellow Warrnambool competitor James McFadden who stormed home from 11^th to finish third.

The club ripped up its concrete pole line and replaced it with a dirt ledge to define track limits during the Christmas-New Year break. It made the track four metres wider in a bid to promote passing.

"It is just a relief to be honest. It's been a big few weeks and it (the track) is all anyone's wanted to talk about," Veal told The Standard from the in-field.

"It was pretty racy all night. I got to watch all the heats, being in the last heat, and in my heat you could move around.

"It was a good night so I am happy. It was good, positive signs for the whole club going into the classic and Australian title (in late January)."

The former Flying Horse Bar and Brewery Grand Annual Sprintcar Classic winner started on pole but soon lost the advantage to Queensland ace Lachlan McHugh.

McHugh was forced infield with eight laps to run in the 35-lap A-Main with Veal leading Goodyer, Tasmanian Tate Frost and American Aaron Reutzel at the re-start.

Reutzel crashed into the wall between turns four and one with four laps remaining, forcing a red flag.

Frost tagged the wall and McFadden, who had picked off rivals early in the feature race, found himself in a podium position.

"It is just good to have a track where you could move around and have different lines here, there and everywhere," Veal said.

"A bit more of the bottom came in at the end. With the concrete (which was removed), we used to wear the whole bottom out whereas now seems to still have a little bit in there."

Veal's major aims are the classic on January 19-21 and the Australian title, both at Premier Speedway, the following week.

"I am just trying to cruise into it a bit more instead of racing it a bit more. This car we're running at Warrnambool is pretty nice so we'll just try and keep it straight," he said.

The A-Main started at 9.48pm and finished at 10.05pm - a positive result for organisers who have been aiming for a more family-friendly finish time.

Quick-time qualifying was in pre-seeded heat groups.

Terang's Jack Lee had quick-time for group one 10.313.

McHugh (group two, 10.47), Veal (group three, 10.47), Queenslander Jy Corbet (group four, 10.61) and Reutzel (group five, 10.84) were the fastest qualifiers.

Drivers were inverted for the heats.

Hamilton's Dane Court (heat one), Frost (heat two), Adelaide's Ben Morris (heat three), Sam Walsh (heat four) and Mount Gambier's Scott Enderl (heat five) scored wins.

American Chase Randall flipped turning into turn three with one lap remaining in heat four.

The top-14 drivers advanced directly to the A-Main with two B-Main top-three place-getters determining the final line-up.

Sam Walsh, Randy Morgan and Rusty Hickman advanced from B-Main 1 while Luke Dillon, Glen Sutherland and American Justin Peck were the best in B-Main 2.

The second B-Main featured a crash on turn two on the opening lap with Kobi Wright and Leigh Mugavin forced out of the race.