Another $30,000 champion would be crowned on Laris Motorsports Insurance Thursday at the Moser Engineering Spring Fling Million presented Optima Batteries at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. A consistent car count of around 400 single-entered drivers returned to take their shot at parking in the Fling winner’s circle on day three.
The Laris Pro final was over on the starting line with the advantage going to the ‘66 El Camino of Mark Faul over the ‘95 Oldsmobile of Richard Mason. Faul collected the $1,000 Pro Bonus and champion trophy before combining into the quarterfinals of Super Pro.
The five remaining drivers on the ladder included Preston “Peeps” Pennington, Phillip Pennington, Kris Whitfield, Bob Cireddu, and Mark Faul. Faul turned it just .005 red and ran it down to be dead-on six to advance Whitfield. The all-Pennington sibling match-up was double red with the lesser of the two redlights falling in Phillip’s favor. Cireddu was dead-on nine in his bye run.
In the semifinals, Pennington used a reaction time advantage to secure a spot in the final over the final remaining door car of Cireddu, while Whitfield was .005 on the bye to earn lane choice.
Whitfield locked Pennington out of his first Fling event win to take the Laris $30,000 Thursday big check back home to Littleton, CO. Whitfield’s track record at the Flings includes a $3K win at the 2013 Spring Fling Vegas, a $30K win at the 2022 Spring Fling Million, and three final round appearances at various Flings over the years.
With high mile per hour headwinds throughout the day, the LVMS track crew and Fling Team members maintained a safe racing surface. With winds expected to persist through Friday and temperatures predicted to drop, it was decided that Million Dollar Friday and 30K Saturday would be reversed with the intent to run the Fling Million in better conditions. Moving forward, in Friday’s event drivers will race for the FTI Performance 30K and at least $200,000 on Million Dollar Saturday.
Race fans can tune in tomorrow at 8 a.m. PST for Round 1 of FTI Performance $30K Friday. Everything will be streamed live from our own channel @RaceTheFlings on YouTube. Our in-house camera crew is slated to deliver one of our best broadcasts yet this week with live timing, a finish-line instant replay camera, starting line camera, exclusive interviews, and more courtesy of Hoosier Tire and JEGS Performance.
Subscribe to @RaceTheFlings on YouTube to receive alerts on more live Fling racing action.
This story was originally published on April 5, 2024. 
