Matt Urban earned the biggest victory of his career as he held off John Flinner and Chub Frank to win the Pittsburgher 100 last night at Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Motor Speedway in Imperial.

Sanctioned by the Renegade DirtCar Racing Series, the 15th annual Pittsburgher weekend began with more than 70 dirt late models attempting to earn one of the 28 starting positions and a shot at the $22,000 first prize.

Urban, of Northeast, Pa., held off a furious charge by Flinner as Frank waited in third for either to make a mistake. With two laps to go and Urban unable to get around lapped traffic, Flinner charged to the low side of the track and grabbed the lead by inches. On the high side going into Turn 1, Urban edged back in front, pinning Flinner to the bottom. Rather than knock out both, Flinner fell back behind Urban and secured second.

"I was being cautious with the lapped car and about lap 80 the motor picked up a miss so I didn't have everything I needed down the straightaway," said Urban, who took the lead from polesitter Gary Stuhler shortly after a mid-race refueling break. "I was trying to be smooth with the car to keep my momentum up. Then I see Flinner sticking underneath me and I said I can't mess around here. I just took the outside and hoped it would hold."

Flinner, of Zelienople, is often accused of rough driving but in this case he gave Urban plenty of room on the wide half-mile oval.

"That's the only way I would race Matt. Had it been anybody else, even Chub, I would have run it in there because I know Chub would have done the same thing to me," said Flinner, who has won the past three late model titles at Lernerville Speedway. "Matt got a little aggressive a few times and just about took the side off me on one restart but I figured we're just racing."

After taking the lead with two laps to go, Flinner believed he would finally win the Pittsburgher, a victory that has eluded him since he first raced in the event in 1993.

"Chub says you've got to be hungry to win these, and I'm freaking starving. I got up on the fence and I'm thinking, 'I got it, I got to get this.' When we went into turn one I was thinking [Urban] might be out there. I should have just let it go up to the fence, but we would have hit. I couldn't see him. I looked as far as the window post and I'm like, 'He's still there.' I figured I'd just let it roll and I'm like 'Oh, man, it'll never happen.' Then we're running on tires that are about to explode and I'm thinking, 'Maybe he'll break first.' "

But Urban's motor held up for the final two laps, keeping Flinner and Frank at bay.

"John and I got to racing each other and Matt got away from us," Frank said. "I thought there was going to be a big wreck at the end, that's how fast the track was going and everybody was racing for the win."

Mike Balzano finished fourth followed by two-time PPMS late model champion Al Atallah, who needed a provisional to make the main event after crashing in his qualifying race.

Doug Dodd, Jack Pencil and Todd Andrews won the B-main events. Gary Stuhler won the Dash that determined the top six starting positions and started on the pole.