The final checkered flag of the 2016 racing season in the state of Minnesota flew on Saturday night, October 22nd with the concluding round of the Topless Nationals at the Wagamon's Ogilvie Raceway.
Nearly all the race cars returned for Saturday night's second session of racing after preliminary qualifying took place on Friday night. Substituting for the Hornets, who ran a full show on Friday night were the UMSS Traditional Sprints, or in other other words, wingless Sprints running either a 602 or 604 crate motor or restricted motors of about the same relative power and cost of the MidMods or B Mods. However, I have been told that a 525 crate motor option with restrictions may be in the rules for next year, and in fact, I already know of one team that has already purchased a 525 crate for next year. At $14,000 a pop, where's the economy in that?
Multiple B features were needed for the MidMods and Mods with the other classes starting all cars in the main events. For the first time that I'm aware of, the Traditional Sprints race group time trials as they hot lapped before their individual heat races. Officials then inverted five for each heat with the cars staying right on the track and racing without a break as the officials called down to the drivers their starting spots. Normally I believe they draw for starting positions for their heats. I'm not sure if this is a proposed change for 2017 or not, but I do know that some of the tracks they race at don't have the technology to do this as it was done Saturday night.
One advantage of the cars racing topless was that it gave a couple of the drivers a chance to string some lights on their roll cages in celebration of the season. Both Matt Dickey and Justin Oestreich had colorful Halloween themed lights on their open wheel cars. Oestreich has done this every year since the Topless race started.
A couple of interesting notes from the pits Saturday included the return to racing of "Dyno" Don Swearingen to the racing ranks. Dyno raced for years in the Late Models and did quite a bit of traveling in his day including going to Robert Smawley's race at Kingsport Tennessee in the old NDRA days. I remember him being there because so was I!
In recent years Dyno's son David has raced a MidMod and his daughter Krysta a Pure Stock but they adorned David's car with Don's old number #07 and he raced the MidMod this weekend.
The two car team of John and Josh Kallas pulled all the way from Hurley Wisconsin for this weekend. If that doesn't seem too far, check your map and you'll see that Hurley is just across the border from the U.P. of Michigan! By the way, Hurley was(and is) well known as one of the most wide open towns in the Midwest, if you know what I mean!
If fact, their trip was so far that they arrived too late for Josh to run his heat race on Friday and he just tagged the field for the feature on Saturday. Josh is a first year driver in the Pure Stocks and looking for track time so he just took the roof off his Pure Stock and he ran with the Streets! John tells me that his Jet MidMod is for sale and he is looking to buy a different car for next year. John got a lead on this current car from his friends the Sorensons from North Dakota and Montana after they met while pitting side by side one year at the WISSOTA 100 in Huron.
Also making his racing return after a number of years was Bob Smith. Smith had a highly successful career racing both open wheel and fendered cars but gave it up a few years ago to help his daughter start her racing career in a Hornet. However, just recently he purchased a Street Stock out of North Dakota and they allowed him to tag the field Saturday, after not having been on hand Friday as he just got the car finished up. It would appear that he will be returning to racing on a regular basis next year.
In all honesty, the feature races on Saturday weren't near as good as they were two weeks earlier during the Fall Classic. There were way too many yellows that kept breaking up the flow of the races and the track didn't hold up near as well as it did two weeks ago, even though there were at least a hundred less cars racing on it.
Three drivers continued late season hot streaks. Ryan Satter, Jeremy Nelson and Dave Mass all won either a feature race last weekend at Granite City's National Championship Weekend or features at the Fall Classic, one week earlier.
Satter dominated the Street Stock feature and also had his best year yet, finishing third in WISSOTA national points. Satter, who comes from the wide spot in the road also known as Dent Minnesota, made a bold three wide move on the opening lap of the feature and gained the lead. Despite six yellows that brought the field back to him, on each restart he was dominant was was not challenged to the finish. Justin Vogel, who won here two weeks ago, finished second.
The Midwest Mod feature went to soon to be crowned national champion Jeremy Nelson. Switching back to his GRT chassis this weekend which he seems to rotate on a weekly basis with his MB, Nelson caught a high flying Eric Lamm to get the lead and then take the win. Lamm has been extremely strong in recent weeks also, taking a win last Sunday in Granite City. He jumped out to a big lead running the cushion but when the track started to take rubber, Nelson caught him quickly and Lamm was one lap too late getting to the rubber. "The Cobra", Cody Lee, had his second strong run of the post season here, finishing third.
They farmed the track at this point and the Traditional Sprints then put a real good show in their main event. Johnny Parsons III(of the famed Parsons family) led from the start running the low side. James Giassi was working the high side and gradually gained on Parsons, finally catching him with just a couple laps to go and executing a classic high side pass for the win. There were fifteen Traditional Sprints on hand for the show.
Mass killed the field in the Super Stocks, getting to the front early and holding on through seven yellows for the win. Mass has been extremely dominant at the end of this year, winning several special events along the way. Dexton Koch and Dustin Nelson trailed Mass.
The Modified feature brought with it a ting of controversy. Dave Cain and Josh Angst redrew the front row and the race was a two car battle from start to finish. Cain got the early lead but Angst was all over him, looking high and low for an opening. Angst did appear to be faster but the crafty Cain used the groove well and kept Josh behind him.
Then, after two and a half races, the track again started to take rubber, and all the drivers dove to the low side. The track became a high speed, one groove affair with Angst continuing to pressure Cain. The leaders started to hit lapped traffic which became a problem for both of them as they tried timing it right so they didn't try to pass the slower cars in the corner and get moved out of the rubber groove.
Angst played it perfect with only six laps to go as he pinned Cain on the low side of the track exiting turn two and tried to drive around him. Cain was blocked by the slower car and Angst was ready to pass him so Cain did the only thing he could do and that was to "dump" the slower car, spinning him out of the way so that Cain could maintain the lead. This triggered the yellow for the spinner and then it became a waiting game to see how track officials would call it.
I know that there are some promoters and sanctioning bodies that always announce that the leader must pass the slower cars, not drive through them. Other tracks and promoters fell that the leader has the right to move slower cars out of the way if need be. On this night and at this track, the decision was made to restore Cain to the lead and send the slower car to the back of the pack. Some in the crowd agreed, and some did not but that was the decision they made.
Cain controlled the final six laps and made sure that he didn't give Angst any openings as he drove on for the win. Jeremy Nelson had a nice night as he moved up for third at the finish. Some of the drivers hand signaled the starter to go single file on the last restart because of the narrow groove, but they went double file and there was plenty of banging as everyone fought to get to the rubber. Nelson was a big gainer because of this while Justin Oestreich came out a loser on the deal.
Thus the 2016 racing season in the Upper Midwest came to a close. Even with cool temperatures, the crowd was very good on Saturday night and after some shaky early years, it seems that this late season wrap up race has developed some solid "legs" and will be a yearly staple on the "Big O's" schedule.
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