Every time before when Aaron Marrant had something good going at Lakeside Speedway, inevitably something always bad happened right after. It was hard to imagine that after the solid year that he had last season, Marrant never visited victory lane during the points season. Don't get me wrong, Marrant did win a feature during OctoberFast, but it just wasn't the same as winning one during the season. Tonight Marrant got that out of the way for 2010.

"I was running out of real estate up there," said Marrant, "I was just sure that he (Tom Charles) was going to get me."

Marrant started the main event outside of row number 3. He took little time in getting to the front. Marrant set sail on the top side of the track and by lap #2 found himself at the point. From there he would open up a huge lead on the rest of the field.

It was close racing for everyone else behind Marrant. The field spent so much time battling with one another it allowed Marrant to scoot farther and farther out in the lead.

Just as Marrant would build up a lead, a yellow flag would bunch the field back up again. Evaporating any advantage that Marrant built up. Once the green flag would drop, Marrant would motor back out to a comfortable lead.

Marrant eluded to the fact that every time something good happened, something bad followed.

As the field took the white flag from flag man, Terry Watland, a competitor spun on the front stretch. This brought out the yellow flag. It meant that Marrant would have to start from scratch all over again and hang on for 3 grueling laps. Tom Charles, Nick Deal, Tim Karrick and Joe Walker would now be ready to give whatever they had left to overtake Marrant.

The final restart of the night saw Charles get the advantage as the two came out of the second turn. As the momentum for Charles slowed, Marrant came back on the inside down the back straight. The two drivers went side by side through the turn and Marrant had Charles by a few feet as they received the white flag.

Marrant went to the top of the track, while Charles used the low line. Tim Karrick had also become a player on the last restart. Karrick began to creep into the picture as these two battled it out. In the end Marrant got the advantage down the back chute on the last lap and would hold on to the victory.

"I was thinking to myself that I just gave this one away," said Marrant, "I got into 1 a little easy, because of the hole and he got by me. I was expecting him to try and go under me when I got back by him, but he didn't. This win feels great."

Charles would finish 2nd, as a hard charging Tim Karrick settled for 3rd, Nick Deal turned in an exciting 4th place finish and rounding out the top 5 was Joe Walker.

For 10 straight features, there were 10 different winners. That stat ended tonight as Gene Claxton picked off his second Grand National feature win of the season.

A dry slick condition has played havoc with some drivers in all classes at Lakeside Speedway. Tonight in the Grand National feature, it seemed as if there were a ton of cars battling for the same piece of real estate. In the midst of that battle was Claxton, a multiple time track champion in the class.

About mid way through the feature a switch clicked inside the cockpit of Claxton and he put it in another gear. Inside, outside, in the middle, on the bottom or up by the wall it didn't matter where he was at. He was going to the front and it didn't seem to matter who was in his way.

"We had some things go wrong with the car in the last few races," said Claxton, "we are getting them figured out. Tonight I just had to wait for an opening."

Claxton waited for his opening and then checked out on the rest of the field. It was the 2nd straight week that a Grand National owned by Mike Johnson, owner of I-35 Speedway, took home the top honors.

Early leader, Tim Shields, finished in the runner-up position, Darren Kling started 11th in the feature and finished strong in 3rd, 4th went to Gary Donaldson and 5th was Steve Dibben.

Bobby Tavis spent most of his rookie season a year ago learning the ropes of racing a Factory Stock at Lakeside Speedway. The sad thing that what most fans of Lakeside remember him for isn't his racing ability. It was the fact that he flipped over the turn 3 wall! They can forget about that now, Tavis added his name to the list of winners in the Factory Stock class on Friday night.

"It's an unbelievable feeling," said Tavis, "this is better than driving off my trailer and going over the wall."

The feature started with Tavis on the pole and finished with him still in the number 1 position. A tough feat for any driver to go wire to wire, especially at Lakeside Speedway.

Tavis had to be nervous as a late race yellow gave the field a chance at knocking him off the top spot. JR Billings looked as if he was going to take the top spot from Tavis with just a few laps to go. Billings ran up high in the first corner and came out with the lead heading down the back straight. Tavis fought back on the low side. As the two drivers came by the flagstand it was Billings with a slight advantage. When they went back into 1, Billings pushed up into the wall taking him out of contention.

Tavis would stay with the bottom line. He would give a little wiggle coming out of turn 4 as he received the white flag and from there he would motor on to his first Lakeside Speedway feature win.

Darrin Christy had another strong run for the 2nd week in a row finishing 2nd, Billings recovered to finish 3rd, 4th went to Justin Seifert and rounding out the top 5 was last week's winner, Marshall Jewett.

Next Friday night racing continues at Lakeside Speedway. Gates open up at 5 p.m., hot laps at 7:00 p.m. and racing action gets under way at 7:30 p.m.

For more information visit www.lakesidespeedway.net.