On Thursday, September 29th, I made my first visit in at least two years to the 141 Speedway near Francis Creek Wisconsin. For those of you from Iowa who know Toby Kruse from his duties running the Marshalltown Speedway, this is the "other" Toby Kruse, the one who barrels up to Wisconsin every Saturday morning after things are wrapped up in Marshalltown to run the show at 141 Speedway every Saturday night; a track he co-owns with the Ratajczak brothers.
Allow me one minute to rant here. If it wasn't for my friend Jon, who during a discussion last weekend while we were talking about our racing schedules for the coming weekend mentioned that 141 was going to be having a Late Model show on Thursday, I would not have known about it at all. It seems that this was a fairly recently added on event, one that will be the start of the annual Creek Classic that will run on Friday and Saturday featuring full shows for a group of different classes that regularly run at 141.
However, since checking their schedule early in the year, other than seeing results on SpeedNet, I had not checked on the 141 website or face book page for months. So, unless you frequented those, there would have been no way that you would have known about the show.
Back in the day when racing papers were numerous and weekly, in twenty minutes I could scan through a paper and find out who's doing the winning and check schedules and advertisements for upcoming events. Now, the only way to duplicate that process is to check every website and face book page for every track in the Midwest, and who has time to do that?
I have often said that I knew what was happening in my own state of Wisconsin in regard to racing better twenty years ago than I know now, in our age of so-called electronic enlightenment. The Checkered Flag Racing News was a much better source of information to me than all the face book pages and websites put together, and much more handy. So, if it wasn't for a casual conversation with a friend, I would have sat home on Thursday and then have been hugely upset later when I found out that I had missed a chance to see a very interesting racing doubleheader.
It seems that 141 ran a "Red, White and Blue" series for their IMCA Modified class this year, a three race series with each racing paying a grand and a point fund for the series. The final race got rained out and Toby, being ever the sharp guy that he is, came up with the idea of running this race on Thursday and also booked the WDLMA Late Models to come in for a show also. I was told that this was the first time the Late Models had run at 141 in around five years but can't confirm that. What I can tell you was there was a very good crowd for the two program event. The evening was also used as a practice session for the other classes that will be racing over the weekend at 141 also with sessions scheduled periodically throughout the evening.
Since I was last at 141, some changes have been made. The facility is "space challenged" with there just not being enough room for all the pit and parking space needed. Where I used to park is now pit area and except for motorcycles and handicapped parking, all the spectator parking is across a rather busy county highway. And for this event, every pit space was reserved and taken also, so a number of race cars also had to park across the highway in a farmer's field next to the spectator parking lot. This is a relatively busy highway and it looked like a real unsafe condition to me. They had track workers monitoring the parking and actually escorted the race cars back and forth across the highway but for the spectators, you were on your own to get across the road, one that was dark and unlit after dark. I didn't like this a bit, but they have few alternatives at this point.
A tight knit schedule had been formulated that allowed heats, B's and features for the Modifieds and Late Models and in between, practice laps for the other classes. Everything was tightly scheduled and they adhered to their schedule, making for a fast paced and tight program that was completed before 10 pm and then allowed more practice until the track was shut down at 10:30 pm. What I found to be most interesting was that after heats in both classes, there was a brief practice session scheduled and for the first time ever that I can remember, cars that raced in the heats in the two classes, some that made the main and some that didn't, made some quick adjustments and actually got to hot lap their cars to find out if the adjustments were correct before they continued racing . That was a first for me.
As usual, events at 141 draw lots of race cars and forty seven Modifieds signed in to race for the grand to win show. There were also twenty five WDLMA Late Models set to race. Racing started right at the slated time of 7 pm and five heats for the Modifieds followed with four Late Model heats. B features in both set the field for the main events.
Twenty four Mods started the twenty one lap main which turned out to be a good race, slowed only three times for minor spins. R.M. Van Pay was the early leader but track point champ Johnny "Hitman" Whitman started on the outside pole and after a good side by side battle, Whitman took the lead. He was severely challenged by Marcus Yarie at several times during the race and it was fun watching Mike Mullen hammer the cushion as he moved up from tenth to fourth but at that point, he could get no farther forward. The was a pretty good cushion so the drivers had two distinct lines to work with and while the bottom was favored, there were plenty of drivers also working the top side.
The late charge was made by "The General", Troy Jerovetz who came from eleventh for finish second but Whitman was just too strong for the field. Greg Gretz ran a strong race to complete the top five. The Modifieds will compete in two full shows here this weekend with each show being independent so likely, even more cars will show for the weekend. The big question will be the weather with a not so good forecast at this point.
The Late Model main was a very entertaining event also. Twenty cars started, racing forty laps for twelve hundred dollars to the winner. Most of the top runners in the WDLMA were on hand and the forty lap race was completed with only two minor yellow flags.
It was a battle between Jim Schmidt and Mitch McGrath for most of the race with Schmidt the early leader and McGrath chasing. Schmidt was running the low groove and McGrath was hammering the cushion. He had incredible speed but was having problems jumping the cushion and losing time and for a brief time, he dropped lower on the track. This didn't work for him as he started spinning his tires and was challenged for second.
A yellow on lap twenty four allowed him to get back on the top and he used it to his advantage as he blasted past Schmidt to take over the lead. Meanwhile, Nick Anvelink, from tenth and Jared Siefert, from eighth, were both advancing and suddenly, as the laps ran down, the top four were closely bunched as the cushion was a bit sketchy and McGrath had his hands full.
However, he muscled the car around the track and held off Schmidt while Siefert, who turned many a lap here in Modifieds before moving up to Late Models last year, snuck past Anvelink for third. Sixteen of the starters were still on the track at the end in a fast paced race without a lot of contact.
The evening then wrapped up with a series of dashes. The five other classes practicing on Thursday were the Sport Mods, Grand Nationals, Street Stocks, Stock Cars and Four Cylinders. Drivers in those classes had the option of throwing twenty dollars in a pot and whatever the total amount was, it was "winner take all". Fields of between six and thirteen took part in the five dashes with a couple of the winners doing quite nicely for the brief, ten lap sprints. For the others, it was a chance to get some more laps under race conditions at a reasonable price.
For one of the rare times in recent years, Toby was doing his own announcing on Thursday night and it was good to hear him back behind the microphone for a change. For me, it was a good chance to catch some racing on the eastern side of state for a change. It was also a good opportunity to reconnect with some of the drivers that I know and others that I enjoy watching. There definitely is some top quality talent racing in all classes here and on this night, just making the Modified feature was a challenge with some very good drivers left on the sidelines watching come feature time. This is one of the very last specials in eastern Wisconsin and there will be a huge throng of cars for the rest of the racing this weekend.
As usual, it is always a joy to attend one of Toby's events which are so well organized and efficiently run. Thanks to him and the rest of the crew at 141 for a good night of racing.
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