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PREVIEW: Kyle Busch to start 15th in Sunday’s 50th Snowball Derby

snowball derby track action -- visitpensacola.com

The golden anniversary of one of the most popular short track races in all levels of stock car racing takes place in Sunday’s Snowball Derby.

The 50th running of the Super Late Model classic takes the green flag at 3 p.m. ET at 5 Flags Speedway in Pensacola, Florida. The race will be televised on pay-per-view on Speed51.com.

Only 37 of the 67 cars that submitted entries will take part in Sunday’s 300-lap main event around the high-banked paved half-mile.

Qualifying took place Friday, with the top 30 drivers locked into Sunday’s show (see full qualifying list below). Three other drivers will receive a provisional position start, while four additional drivers will have one final try to qualify for Sunday’s field in Saturday night’s 50-lap “last chance” race.

Among notables in Sunday’s race are 2015 NASCAR Cup champ Kyle Busch, along with a number of young NASCAR drivers including Noah Gragson, Mason Mingus, Ty Majeski, Brandon McReynolds, Harrison Burton and Corey Lajoie.

snowball derby 50th anniversary 2

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series former champion Johnny Sauter was originally entered into the Snowball Derby before a hard wreck during practice Thursday forced the Wisconsin native to withdraw his entry.

Preston Peltier will start from the pole, while defending Derby winner Christian Eckes failed to qualify on a tiebreaker Friday, but will race Sunday because of a past champion’s provisional.

Kyle Busch was not happy with his 15th place qualifying effort, particularly since he and his team had a strong two-day practice at 5 Flags right after the NASCAR Cup season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“Obviously 15th isn’t where we wanted to qualify, but Rudy (Fugle, crew chief) and all the guys made our Toyota, Phoenix Construction Camry a lot better for final practice,” said Busch, who was sixth-fastest in Saturday’s final practice session.

“We made some 20-lap runs and we feel like we have good long-run speed, but we’re probably still lacking a little bit of speed firing off compared to the guys that qualified up front.”

Busch has one Snowball Derby win to date, in 2009.

Several well-known former NASCAR drivers are past Derby winners, including the late Pete Hamilton (1974), Donnie Allison (1975) and Darrell Waltrip (1976), Ted Musgrave (1988) and Rick Crawford (1989).

NASCAR has really taken a hold of victory lane at the Derby in recent years. Starting with the younger Busch brother’s win in 2009 and Johanna Long’s triumph in 2010, NASCAR drivers have captured the Derby in virtually every year since, including two-time winners Chase Elliott (2011 and 2015) and Erik Jones (2012 and 2013), and John Hunter Nemechek (2014).

Snowball Derby winners


  • 1968 Wayne Niedecken
  • 1969 Friday Hassler
  • 1970 Wayne Niedecken, Sr.
  • 1971 Dickie Davis
  • 1972 Ed Howe
  • 1973 Dickie Davis
  • 1974 Pete Hamilton
  • 1975 Donnie Allison
  • 1976 Darrell Waltrip
  • 1977 Ronnie Sanders
  • 1978 Dave Mader III
  • 1979 Freddy Fryar
  • 1980 Gary Balough
  • 1981 Freddy Fryar
  • 1982 Gene Morgan
  • 1983 Mickey Gibbs
  • 1984 Butch Lindley
  • 1985 Jody Ridley
  • 1986 Gary Balough
  • 1987 Butch Miller
  • 1988 Ted Musgrave
  • 1989 Rick Crawford
  • 1990 Rich Bickle
  • 1991 Rich Bickle
  • 1992 Gary St. Amant
  • 1993 Bobby Gill
  • 1994 Tammy Jo Kirk (first female Snowball Derby winner)
  • 1995 Jeff Purvis
  • 1996 Rich Bickle
  • 1997 Bobby Gill
  • 1998 Rich Bickle
  • 1999 Rich Bickle
  • 2000 Gary St. Amant
  • 2001 Wayne Anderson
  • 2002 Ricky Turner
  • 2003 Charlie Bradberry
  • 2004 Steve Wallace
  • 2005 Eddie Mercer
  • 2006 Clay Rogers
  • 2007 Augie Grill
  • 2008 Augie Grill
  • 2009 Kyle Busch
  • 2010 Johanna Long
  • 2011 Chase Elliott (At 15, youngest winner in Snowball Derby history)
  • 2012 Erik Jones
  • 2013 Erik Jones
  • 2014 John Hunter Nemechek
  • 2015 Chase Elliott
  • 2016 Christian Eckes

Here’s how Friday’s qualifying played out. Just the first 30 drivers are locked in. Three others, including defending champ Christian Eckes, are locked in with provisional spots, leaving four remaining positions to be filled in Saturday night’s last chance event.

1 48 Preston Peltier 16.319
2 26 Bubba Pollard 16.344
3 112 Augie Grill 16.419
4 5M Mason Mingus 16.437
5 75 Jeremy Doss 16.441
6 81 Chase Purdy 16.460
7 14D Chris Davidson 16.461
8 91 Ty Majeski 16.475
9 53B Cole Butcher 16.480
10 55D Spencer Davis 16.514
11 9C Jeff Choquette 16.514
12 18 Casey Roderick 16.520
13 14C Connor Okrzesik 16.521
14 36 Dan Fredrickson 16.521
15 51 Kyle Busch 16.530
16 4 Kyle Plott 16.530
17 26S Chandler Smith 16.544
18 99L Raphael Lessard 16.552
19 11B Logan Boyett 16.553
20 18G Noah Gragson 16.571
21 20 Brandon McReynolds 16.573
22 12 Harrison Burton 16.576
23 46 Cole Rouse 16.582
24 00 Anthony Cataldi 16.609
25 53J Boris Jurkovic 16.621
26 07 Corey LaJoie 16.624
27 19 Kason Plott 16.649
28 01 Jake Crum 16.653
29 13 Cassius Clark 16.658
30 51N Stephen Nasse 16.660
31 2W Donnie Wilson 16.660
32 15 Christian Eckes 16.660
33 9K Derek Kraus 16.664
34 55 Brandon Oakley 16.705
35 32D Tyler Dippel 16.705
36 8F Tate Fogleman 16.734
37 88 Garrett Jones 16.743
38 33 Dustin Smith 16.744
39 7 John DeAngelis Jr 16.749
40 11R David Rogers 16.769
41 79 Kyle Bryant 16.778
42 89 Jeremy Pate 16.782
43 22 Donald Crocker 16.786
44 79A Joe Aramendia 16.815
45 16 Steven Davis 16.843
46 45 Rich Bickle Jr 16.847
47 5 Jerry Artuso 16.855
48 58C John Coffman 16.882
49 43 Dennis Schoenfield 16.897
50 4R Ben Rowe 16.947
51 64 Garrett Evans 16.967
52 32 Stuart Dutton 17.137
53 58F Jeff Firestine 18.159