Nothing could stop Anthony Beare from strolling to a 10th SSA Street Stock South Australian State Title on his home track Borderline Speedway on Saturday night.
Beare’s pink Holden Commodore was an untouchable figure for the competitive 42-car field.
The Mount Gambier local went through the heats undefeated before leading all 25 laps of the quarter mile oval in the race for the title.
A late dash to the line gave Jacob Mills second place in his Mitsubishi Magna ahead of Nathan Thorne, Michael Clark and Jayden Blomeley.
Beare said it felt special to claim a 10th title after three years of trying and a challenging build up to the race.
“We have had a pretty big few months with a little girl coming along and missing home, so it means a lot,” he said.
“I had not got one (a state title) for a few years and tried hard to get the 10th and thought it might not come, so I am very happy to get this one off my back now.”
Chasing a third straight state title Steve Gartner lined up alongside Beare on the outside of the front row, but could not get the jump off the start line.
Beare led the field, while Gartner got engaged in a good battle with Matt Nelson.
However, with just three laps down, Nelson came unstuck at the final corner and almost hit a tyre bundle before pulling off the track to retire.
Thorne started to threaten the Gartner’s bumper before the reigning champion’s title defence came to an early end with 15 laps to go.
Shortly after Gartner was joined by other contenders Bailey Heinrich and Donald Irving.
With Beare cutting through the lapped traffic, it appeared the feature may not experience any interruptions, but with 10 laps remaining Jason Duell stopped on the exit of turn two right in front of the leader.
The yellow flags returned a couple of laps later when Criag Clayton and Jacob Mills both hit the concrete wall.
The cautions did little to dazzle Beare, who controlled each restart and blazed away to the chequered flag, but a tense battle for the podium places emerged.
Mills found his way past Clark before edging out Throne for second moments before the finish.
Having led the race from start to finish, Beare said gaining track position during the heats was key to staying out of trouble.
“You need luck to win these things,” he said.
“We were definitely quick enough, but so were a few others, but it all just fell our way.
“I just tried to stay smart at the front because track position was everything and you had to fight if you were not which is why many did not finish.
“We may have looked dominant in the feature, but the hard yards came during the heat races.”
The state triumph is a sweet reward for Beare after a crazy lead in towards the race.
Having raced for the WA state title, Beare and his family was locked in quarantine, which was helped by a new member to the family.
“I got locked out in quarantine because I went to WA, so it wrecked one of our weekends, but at least it was at home and we just had a little girl which was a great thing to spend time with her,” he said.
“But other than that is was difficult.”
Beare now heads across the border to try his hand at saloon car racing at Winton before fighting for the Victorian Street Stock title a week later.
Jayden Edwards and Nigel Reichstein won their respective B Mains, while Lucas Roberts crushed his opponents with a dominant victory in the Super Sedans race.
After a great battle for the lead, the Limited Sportsman A Main went to Katelyn Worthy ahead of Jock Baker.
