Instead of "turning tail" and heading for home after the races in Hibbing, we decided to head farther North into uncharted territory and after another a four hour ride through first the Lakes region of Minnesota and then onto the prairies on extreme Northwestern Minnesota, we crossed the Red River of the North and rolled into Grand Forks North Dakota.
Farming is "king" here, especially for potatoes and beans and the world's largest processing plant for french fries, one that serves most of the McDonald's restaurants in America, is located within a couple blocks of the River Cities Speedway, located at the county fairgrounds. In fact, when we come to the John Seitz Memorial Late Model special here in September, a race by the way that every Late Model fan should see at least once, the annual Potato Bowl featuring the University of North Dakota and who ever their opponent would happen to be on that year, is in full swing. And when they have the big "warm up" event for the community and students, what do you suppose they serve in copious amounts? That's right, beer and french fries are both flowing in seemingly endless quantities. Binge drinking I've heard of before, but have you ever heard of binge french fry eating? It apparently does happen.
But I digress. Along with college sports at the U.N.D., auto racing is big business in Grand Forks at the River Cities Speedway. Seldom can you find a town that supports racing any stronger than they do in Grand Forks, across the river in East Grand Forks and the little farm towns that surround the metro area. I think there are more community businesses that support this track and put their names on race cars at this track than anywhere else than I can think of. Come to a race just once at River Cities and you'll see exactly what I'm talking about.
Of course, when they do come to the track, the speedway itself gives them plenty to remember and excite them. There are not many tracks in the entire country that offer such a wide open, thrilling and spectacular show as the one offered at River Cities every Friday night. First of all, how many tracks in the Midwest, or for that matter in the entire country, offer a weekly program that features both 410 Sprints and Late Models along with two support classes that also get big numbers. Competitors to race are not a problem at River Cities. They have routinely been pulling in nearly thirty 410 Sprints every week, around twenty Late Models and twenty or more Midwest Modifieds and Street Stocks. That's right, four classes is what they have every week, unless they have a special in which they will cut down the classes racing.
River Cites is a high banked quarter mile bullring that upon your first visit will have you just shaking your heads at the excitement and wild activity going on with three and four wide racing on a track that provides spectacular racing. In fact, such a well known authority as WoO Sprint announcer Johnny Gibson rates River Cities as his favorite track, and understandably so.
The whole front chute is wrapped with large grandstands and when all seats are filled, over six thousand people can fit into the stands. They run the Outlaw Sprints twice during the year and the Late Models once and on those nights, there are seldom seats available.
On Friday night, along with the WoO Late Models, they also ran the 410 Sprints and for the second time this year, they also brought in the WISSOTA sanctioned Mods. One of the Modified drivers set up a six race mini series involving this track along with the Devil's Lake Speedway for the Modifieds. A five thousand dollar point fund has been set up and even though Modifieds don't race here except for a couple specials, so many drivers desire to race at this track that twenty nine of them turned out to race on Friday representing two states and Canada! I forgot to mention earlier that Winnipeg is only about one hundred and fifty miles North of here and a large number of Canadian drivers and fans support this track on a weekly basis since the Winnipeg track races on Thursday nights.
Twenty six 410 Sprints signed in to race also along with thirty three Late Models as a number of the local drivers showed up to race, even though their spec engines are under powered on what turned out to be a night when the more power, the better.
Just like HIbbing on the previous night, the weather threw a curve ball at the race track but again, for the second straight night, the racers and fans prevailed. Everything was moving smoothly and they were just about ready to hot lap when, on a night when there was zero chance of rain, a threatening looking cloud drifted in from the Northwest and it started to rain lightly.
Because the pit area sits so low at River Cities, and the same black dirt that holds moisture like a sponge on the track is also in the pits, when the skies threaten, the drivers scramble to get out of the area. Many of the drivers remember previous bad experiences here where they have had to be pulled out of the pits with a tractor, so as soon as the first drops of rain fell, the Late Model rigs went barreling out of the pits, seeking higher ground out in the parking lots with some actually having to drive a block or more down the city streets seeking a place to ride out the storm.
Well, for most, by the time they got parked the rain had stopped but then the same procession had to be reversed so, needless to say, things didn't get started on time.
But also, just like at Hibbing, that little dab of rain plus the humid night produced a race track that was "bad fast" and a handful for even the most seasoned driver. When they finally got around to qualifying, nineteen drivers broke the old track record with Mike Marlar setting a blistering new mark at 11.321 seconds. Folks, that is flying. While the Sprints didn't qualify and never do here except for the WoO shows, they were times in their heats well under ten seconds per lap!
Racing was intense but also featured very few yellow flags and once they got started, the program moved along at a good clip. The Late Models started twenty four cars for their fifty lap main event and as you can imagine, the lapped traffic was unbelievable. Clanton started on the pole and was the dominant car for the whole race, moving out to a small lead which he was able to maintain despite all the traffic he had to fight through.
But while Clanton was pretty comfortable in front, the battle among those fighting for top ten positions was wild. Tyler Erb was spectacular as he nearly turned his car over a couple times when he jumped the berm but he still hung on for second and Brandon Sheppard came from ninth to third so you can imagine how hard he was driving.
The main had only two yellows with a late once setting up a three lap sprint to the finish but Clanton hung on for the win.
The only "downer" of the night was in the Sprint feature. While River Cities is known for having some spectacular wrecks, the "norm" is for the Sprints to get through their show with not much for problems. Unfortunately, that was not the case Friday with seven yellows bogging down the program and even causing the normally patient River Cities fans to grumble. In a strange occurrence, two race leaders took them selves out of the top spot when they ran into cars at the back of the pack and spun out. This happened to both Thomas Kennedy and point leader Austin Pierce although there were enough yellows later that Pierce was able to work his way back up to second.
If you think the lapped traffic is wild in the Late Models, imagine twenty six Sprints in the main which is what they ran Friday.
Dustin Strand had a couple of disappointing runs with his Late Model after having run so well in Arizona back in January. So he took out his frustrations by rolling out his Modified and winning the Modified feature that wrapped up the night and even though it was approaching Midnight by this time, most of the crowd stuck around to watch the Modifieds race. They had a good run with only one yellow on the first lap and then they ran nonstop to the finish. Ward Imrie, from the Winnipeg area, has been running very well this year so far with his MB Customs car, and he led the majority of the event but Strand, who builds his own Milleneum chassis Modifieds, tracked down Ward with just a couple of laps to go for the win. Another Canadian driver, Jerome Guyot, finished third.
Even though the Sprints were maddening on this night, overall the race program would get a big "thumbs up" for their efforts. The crowd is always big and energized here and just going to the races at River Cities is a fun experience. If you've never been here before, I would put this track at the top of my list of those that you absolutely must visit at some point. It's that good.
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