NWAAS: Greg Edwards, Matt Waltz Share Twin 75 Victories at Langley Speedway

Greg Edwards and Matt Waltz split twin 75-lap NASCAR WHELEN All-American Series feature victories at Langley Speedway on Saturday evening; Edwards winning the first during the latter part of the day-time hours and Waltz visiting victory lane during the nighttime.

Edwards, 43, and Waltz, 24, are both regulars at Langley Speedway and usually fierce competition. Both, after dominating their respective feature, scored their second victories of the season at the close-quarter racing short track.

Waltz, who qualified on pole for the first feature, was quickly spun around on the initial restart from contact with Nick Smith; that incident allowed Edwards to jump to third after starting seventh due to a bad qualifying attempt.

Following the spin, the green flag was re-shown and the fans quickly witness Edwards power pass Mark Wertz and Brandon Gdovic for the race lead; however, that was only the beginning of his dominance.

Edwards paced the entire race, leading from the third lap until the conclusion, and winning by a significant margin.

“We had a bad qualifying lap; I just slipped a little bit,” Edwards said in victory lane following the dominating victory. “We were very concerned in practice because we didn’t have the funding for multiple sets of practice tires, so we were only about middle of the charts.”

“I don’t know what the leaders did up there but after (starting 7th) and the first caution we ended up third on the restart and the car just went.”

Wertz finished second after battling with eventual third place finisher Brandon Gdovic for the majority of the race. Waltz rebounded to finish fourth after passing Brenden Queen, who finished fifth, in the final stages.

Therefore, based off those results, the second twin’s lineup was acquired; featuring Edwards on point, and an angry Waltz starting fourth.

Quickly, following the green flag being shown for twin two, Edwards picked up exactly where he finished in twin one, leading.

However, after showcasing his talent by passing Gdovic and Wertz, it was clear that Waltz would be a force to reckon with before the closure of the night.

Waltz, who led the most laps in the Denny Hamlin Short Track Showdown last weekend at South Boston, powered to race lead after 15 circuits and much like Edwards in the first race, he looked to be unbeatable.

This time though, a caution flew with 16 laps remaining, allowing the field to re-group and catch back up to Waltz, who had built an entire straightaway lead.

Yet, despite the help from the caution, the field was unable to de-reign Waltz who easily remained the leader and sailed to victory lane ahead of runner-up Gdovic and third place finisher Edwards.

“We knew the car was fast all day, especially in practice, we got run over in the first feature, Nick (Smith) does that sometimes,” Waltz explained during his victory lane celebration. “We passed some cars on the outside there which was cool, just got to thank the fans and the crew.”

“We had a cancer survivor here with us tonight, so really glad to get a win with him here, that really means a lot.”

Waltz and Edwards are now, unofficially, within a few markers of each other in the driver standings; both are battling for the Langley Speedway 2014 track championship.

Results (first set begins twin one, second set being twin two)