The Controlled Chaos drivers and their cars travel to Florida for the second time this season; the state where championship leader Darryl Lozier won his first event at the Tampa Open, fending off Will Murphy and Ben Hadsell on the podium with his now closest rival Will Thompson finishing fourth.
But we begin with the first heat and third place Scott Hutchins has just one final in the last four events; he will match up against the red hot Norm Gibson who has been on the podium in those same four events, winning the Texas Nationals, and Andy Bing who has also gone off the boil a little bit with one set of points in five weeks.
Darryl Lozier goes in heat two with three other members of the top ten in Jamie Eilers, Ben Hadsell and Tom Gariepy. Eilers won back-to-back events recently in the Summer Sizzler and Summer National Derby events but only has one final, a fourth in Louisiana, in the next three events. Hadsell missed two in a row after finishing second at both the Summer National and Texas Nationals, and Gariepy only has one final to his credit, eleventh in the Indy Nationals, in the past eight weeks.
Finally, Matt Welliver enjoys some top billing as the winner of the SidelineStrategy.com Derby as he got to rub shoulders in the pre-event build up with four of the top names this season. Will Thompson is desperate to close that twenty-two point gap on Lozier but Joe Ramage and the aforementioned Hutchins are just 2.5pts back on Thompson, and Will Murphy continues to search for an end to his final-less streak of six weeks.
Absentees this week are Steven Redden and Rob Remaley and are replaced by three-time finalist Bobby Gallagher and non-finalist Tommy Miller. Both injured parties picked up their knocks in the previous round, but while Redden will be back next week Remaley is going to be convalescing for eight to ten weeks.
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