Friday, March 24th marked night number two of the King of America Modified Nationals VII at the Humboldt Speedway in Kansas. As per the new format instituted for this year's race, night two would include all the qualifying heats for the USRA Modifieds to earn points for Saturday night's finale plus a full show of USRA B Mods would be held with their highest payoff of the weekend as the winner would go home with fifteen hundred dollars.
The forecast was grim at best for Friday with heavy storms and possibly damaging winds and hail in the outlook. If one would have followed the forecasts from the last few days, you would have been sitting at home, rather than subjecting yourself to the possible whims of Mother Nature. By all appearances, there were a bunch of both drivers and race fans that did exactly that, as there was a significant drop this year so far in both the pit side and spectator side of things. However, the hearty and/or fool hearty were still on hand, waiting to see just what the weather would bring.
While the storms seemed to toy with us most of the day and other parts of the region were getting some serious weather, the area around the race track remained dry. Alternatively, skies would darken and then they would lighten back up but except for a few drops of rain, nothing more serious occurred. Most of us were of the mindset that the night would be a winner if we could just get as much of the qualifying in as possible and hopefully not having to go to a double event format for Saturday. So, from that regard we were blessed.
USMTS and track officials were on "their A game" on this night and the drivers certainly cooperated also. Once the racing started, it was virtually nonstop action from then on as one race nearly beat the finish of the previous one on to the track. And the racing was excellent for the most part too. While one might not get too excited by a format that hosted mainly just heats, these were not your normal type heat races where drivers are just running hard enough to make a redraw or qualifying position. Every gain of position with the point system is vital so the drivers race with a purpose far beyond what a typical heat race would provide.
And the track didn't disappoint either. It appeared that they had removed quite a bit of the black material left from hard slick surface of Thursday and then had given it a good soaking. It provided for us a good two groove track that didn't appear to wear out, even as the races continued to march on to the track, heat after heat. And best of all, not once did they stop to do any maintenance on the track, other than to scrape the walls off of mud so the drivers could see the corners better.
As the proceedings started to wind down, the storms finally found their mark and with the fifteenth and final heat race for the Modifieds on the track, it finally started to rain and with the track hard by then, it didn't take it long for the track to become too slick to continue. So, for Saturday, the only races that will be needed to be completed before Saturday's program can commence are the final Modified heat and the B Mod feature. It certainly could have been much worse and we really caught a break.
The only unfortunate part was that with the Modified portion of the program night quite completed, officials won't be able to calculate the points and determine starting positions for everyone until that last race is in the books. However, that is certainly a minor inconvenience compared to what we might be looking at.
For Friday's qualifying, only one new Modified showed up and that was Brad Waits from Minnesota, who was rumored to have been trying to make it for Thursday's show but suffered a vehicle breakdown on his way down from Minnesota. Just as surprising was the fact that with the best payoff of the weekend on the line for the B Mods, only two new cars showed up from Thursday night's show. So, to this point, we are looking at a field that was down forty Mods from last year plus a handful of B Mods. The easiest thing to blame is the weather and perhaps the most sound reason too, but that many missing bodies in the pits for three nights must carry a significant hit to the promoters.
Among those that looked the strongest in the Modifieds over the course of the night were Rodney Sanders, the only driver to win two heats, Mitch Keeter, Ryan Gustin, Dereck Ramirez and defending champion Zack VanderBeek but until the points are calculated, we won't know how just exactly how everyone is sitting.
My only somewhat negative thought of the night is for the second straight night, the usually prompt staffs at Humboldt and the USMTS failed to get the show started on time. With virtually everyone just sitting around all day waiting for the races and waiting to see if it would rain, somehow the races still managed to get started late. Although it wasn't a huge amount of time, that missed opportunity was more than enough time to get the last Modified heat finished and if they behaved themselves, perhaps even the B Mod feature. Picky perhaps, but with everyone having one eye on the sky, it would have been nice to see that first green flag fly right when it was supposed to.
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