Galletta's Karting Club

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 14TH 2024, OSWEGO, NY – We were thrilled to finally have enough racers to run (our minimum used to be 8, then eventually shrunk to 5 due to a lack of drivers) and the action was close and competitive. Matt Stevens evaded a wreck and picked off a loose Andrew Hook to take the 1st Feature, while Chris Stevens was also able to survive a few mishaps and take the 2nd. The most alarming thing this week was points leader AJ Larkin went for a wild ride when he overdrove too high in Turn 2, hit a few tires we use as a wall, and flipped. Out. Literally!

But first, we wanted to give a shout-out to some Galletta’s Karters at Oswego Speedway’s Classic weekend:

Labor Day Weekend ’24 – Congrats to Galletta’s Karters at Oswego Speedway Classic Weekend!

Congrats to occasional Galletta’s Karter Tyler Thompson on the 2024 Oswego Speedway Supermodified Classic 200 Victory (his 2nd Oswego Super Classic win), as well as one of our regular racers — AND current points leader (as of 8/14/2024) — AJ Larkin, scoring 6th (and an honorable mention to former old-school karter Cameron Rowe Sr. getting 2nd) in the Small Block Supermodified Classic! Afterward, we realized even more Galletta’s Karters than we mentioned and didn’t want to leave anyone out: Griffin Miller, Tony DeStevens, Lou LeVea Jr., and Dennis Richmond all got some Classic action in as well. We always say if we could get all these guys along with several of our All-Time Points Karters to all be in a kart on race day, the competition would be AMAZING!

And now back to our backyard speedway action:

4-CAMERA SPLIT SCREEN (Sponsored by R&C Sushi)

This is a SD rough cut of all four cameras, used to score the race. This race’s video (synching up) and point scoring were particularly time-consuming and tedious due to a lack of camera people, some new drivers, and a busy work schedule. Still, more than two months after the race’s completion, I finally got it done! 🙂

FEATURE #1 – 30-LAPS – START:

1. Andrew Hook | Galletta’s #43
2. Chris Stevens | Galletta’s #4
3. Anthony ‘AJ’ Larkin | Galletta’s #9
4. Matt Stevens| Galletta’s #74
5. Matt Bob | Galletta’s #6
6. David Hartpence Jr. | Galletta’s #0
7. Justin Thurston | Galletta’s #93
8. Tyler Kimball | Galletta’s #43
9. Melissa Stevens | Galletta’s #19
10. DNS – Greg Blanchard
11. DNS – Mike West

GoPro Camera with Chris Stevens (Sponsored by R&C Sushi)

Unedited Chris Stevens’ Helmet camera is back in action for today’s race and uploaded here.

The race was quite clean and very competitive (even the inexperienced new drivers were holding their own), but points leader Anthony “AJ” Larkin was involved in two accidents that hurt his bid to hold onto the lead.

The first is he hooked the left front tire of the #9 into the #4’s right rear driven by Chris Stevens, and they both had to go to the rear. The second, while coming back up through the field, he overdrove too high in turn 2 attempting to pass another kart, lost control, plowed into some race car tires, and was struck by another racer and flipped (the latter part was not captured on video because our usual race tower camera woman decided to prep for a busy work week instead of help record). He was understandably shaken up but otherwise seemed fine (as was the #9 and ready to resume racing).

Crash here!

However, he left in a huff and did not return (later examination of the video exposed he said, “Someone is gonna’ get killed out here. F***it!”), which hurt him in the points! A shame because he was flying and it’s not very often that anyone competes head-to-head with Chris and Matt for that annual points title. Only one other person came close — Kelly Miller in 2016, and he stormed off mere minutes before the Klassic 200’s start to clinch not becoming the 1st visiting driver to even win a Track Championship at Galletta’s! We hope that is not the case with AJ, but he seemed pretty mad and… um… well… sadly he didn’t have very nice things to say the next day when Matt texted to check in on him. 🙁 

Live Webcam from Turn 3! 

Unedited footage uploaded here.

FEATURE #1 – 30-LAPS – FINISH:

1. Matt Stevens| Galletta’s #74
2. David Hartpence Jr. | Galletta’s #0
3. Andrew Hook | Galletta’s #43
4. Matt Bob | Galletta’s #6
5. Chris Stevens | Galletta’s #4
6. Justin Thurston | Galletta’s #93
7. Tyler Kimball | Galletta’s #43
8. DNF – Anthony ‘AJ’ Larkin | Galletta’s #9
9. DNF – Melissa Stevens | Galletta’s #19
10. DNS – Greg Blanchard
11. DNS – Mike West

Tower Angle (Sponsored by… Nobody)

Our camera-woman Rung Stevens decided that she wanted to get some prep work done at work instead of recording our Tower angle, so a stationary camera was used. The problem was that the tripod was missing thus making the camera angle quite poor. Chris and Rung’s daughter Faith gave it a go in the 2nd race, but the focus was all messed up and we wound up missing most of it entirely. We uploaded the unedited footage anyway, and synched it with the other cameras in the other videos. 

FEATURE #2 – 25-LAPS – START:

1. Tyler Kimball | Galletta’s #43
2. Justin Thurston | Galletta’s #93
3. Matt Bob | Galletta’s #9
4. David Hartpence Jr. | Galletta’s #0
5. Andrew Hook | Galletta’s #83c
6. Chris Stevens | Galletta’s #4
7. Matt Stevens| Galletta’s #3
8. DNS – Anthony ‘AJ’ Larkin | Galletta’s #9
9. DNS – Melissa Stevens | Galletta’s #19
10. DNS – Greg Blanchard
11. DNS – Mike West

Stationary GoPro from the Start/Finish Line

…is uploaded here, unedited.

FEATURE #2 – 25-LAPS – FINISH:

1. Chris Stevens | Galletta’s #4
2. David Hartpence Jr. | Galletta’s #0
3. Matt Stevens| Galletta’s #3
4. Justin Thurston | Galletta’s #93 / #7
5. Matt Bob | Galletta’s #9
6. Tyler Kimball | Galletta’s #43
7. Andrew Hook | Galletta’s #83c
8. DNS – Anthony ‘AJ’ Larkin | Galletta’s #9
9. DNS – Melissa Stevens | Galletta’s #19
10. DNS – Greg Blanchard
11. DNS – Mike West

2024 Galletta’s Greenhouse Backyard Karting Point Standings

(as of 9/14/2024)