As he pulled into his pit after Saturday night/s J.B. Dewar/Bandit sprint car feature at Santa Maria Speedway, A.J. Burgin just sat in his car and let the moment sink in.

The Kingsburg native had tried several times in his racing career to win a feature at a track that his father once dominated at, but had never been successful despite several close calls.

This time, though, Burgin was able to break his duck at the 1/3-mile clay oval, holding off Danny Olmstead for the win, his second of the year and his first ever at Santa Maria.

"That/s a great way to get the monkey off my back here," said Burgin, who also took over the Dewar/Bandit points lead with the win. "We/ve probably had six chances to win here, and we/ve given them all away."

This time, there was no stopping Burgin, who collected his third top-five finish of the Bandit season: After taking over the lead from Fresno/s Davey Knott two laps into the 30-lapper, Burgin had the measure of the field, pulling out to a lead as big as half a lap at one point.

The race also featured a rarity in the Dewar/Bandit ranks 7 a long green-flag stint. A series more known for multi-car accidents and multiple caution periods saw the first 19 laps run without interruption.

"It was kind of strange to have that many laps strung together in this series," Burgin said. "It got to the point that by the time that caution came out, I was huffing and puffing."

Despite A.J./s previous run of bad luck at SMS, the Burgin name has seen its way into the record books before. Burgin/s father Frank won three winged sprint car titles from 1975-77 and normally serves on A.J./s crew. However, the elder Burgin wasn/t able to make it out to SMS on this fateful night.

"It/s going to be one interesting phone call to him after this one," Burgin said. "He/s normally at every race, but he couldn/t make it the one night I win."

Burgin started the 19-car feature from the outside of the front row, alongside pole-sitter Knott, and the two rocketed away from the field in the early stages. However, Knott bowed out of the battle two laps in with a bobble going into turn three, handing Burgin the lead for good.

Once Burgin took off, the battle became a fierce five-way tilt between Knott, Olmstead, Gary Rayburn Jr., Steve DeMott and four-time Dewar champ Jimmy Thompson. The four swapped spots for most of the way, until Thompson bowed out in spectacular fashion on lap 22, suffering a steering failure and ramming into the turn-three wall. The Arroyo Grande resident was unhurt and fine, but the car/s night was over.

Once Thompson/s car was cleared away, Burgin and Olmstead made one final push to the checkered, a two-car battle that fizzled out when Olmstead fell back with two laps to go.

Olmstead took second,followed by a hard-charging Davey Pombo in third, Knott and DeMott. Rayburn, Richard Harvey, Jr., Scott Holloway, Jason Montgomery and Rusty Carlile rounded out the top 10.

Jeremy Heroux put out an early challenge as the driver to beat in the Mini Stock ranks with his second win in three starts this year, getting by Brian Nunes at mid-race and pulling away for the 20-lap victory.

The Nipomo driver took back the points lead from defending champ Tom Grzincic of Atascadero with the win, while Grzincic fell back slightly with a sixth-place finish.

The main came to a rousing halt four laps in when a turn-one pileup saw Chris Claborn do several barrel rolls, collecting Warren Flick along the way. Flick, however, was able to return to the race later in the action.

Nunes finished second, followed by Mike Weigel, Ben Caswell and Darrin Davis.

Chuck West of Clovis held off Steve Lambert of Lake Elsinore at the line for the win in the NMRA TQ midgets.

May 2, 2004