**James Tiernan Muscles Through at Kokomo, Edges Out Billy Rowlee** James Tiernan controlled the feature at Kokomo to take the checkers, but this wasn't a coronation. Billy Rowlee ran him down hard in the closing laps, turning up the pressure when it mattered most. Tiernan held the line and held his nerve to seal the win. Todd Brandt rounded out a solid top three. The real story underneath belonged to Jeffrey Steward, who started twentieth in the feature and absolutely drove through the field to grab tenth—a ten-spot gain that made him the hard charger of the night. Todd LaBoube led the most laps early and set the tone in his heat, but couldn't quite piece together a complete feature performance. Petteri Kotovaara's qualifying run showed serious speed on the money lap, and he converted that into his heat win as well. Dustin Griffitts cleaned up in the consolation to punch his ticket forward. Tiernan's got the early season momentum, but Rowlee showed he's got the pace to challenge any night.