Sunday, December 2, 2018

Pierce, Bell and Harrison Top Gateway Dirt Nationals Finales

After two days of preliminaries, it was time on Saturday night, December 1st to crown some champions in the third annual Gateway Dirt Nationals at the Dome at America's Center in downtown St. Louis, Missouri.

Last chance qualifying would start off another long day as promptly at 3 pm, the first of the Late Model Last Chance races would take the green flag. There would be six Last Chance races for the Late Models, followed by four each for the Midgets and Modifieds. Twelve to fourteen cars would start each of the races with only two in the Late Models and three in the Midgets and Modifieds moving up to the main events. Based on the scenario, you can just imagine the intensity level of the races and the lengths that some drivers would go to try and make it into the main events. Needless to say, the racing was aggressive to the highest level and the number of yellow flags and wrecked cars would attest to that premise. In fact, of the fourteen races that were run in the afternoon, only three went green to checkered and there were a few ruffled feathers among some of the drivers when they got spun or had tires speared flat by other drivers, all in an effort to get to the front.

After the preliminaries were completed, a break was taken to freshen up the track and get all the extra presentations set for when the official race program would start at 7:30 pm. There were lots of pyrotechnics and other flashy eye catchers to start of the show and the crowd was more than fired up to see all the special things that have been a part of this event. The crowd appeared to be a huge one with the entire lower bowl of the area appearing jammed  and some people even sitting in the upper sections of the arena.

Driver introductions are a big part of this show and a great source of entertainment to get the fans fired up to see the first green flag. By far, the Late Model drivers put on the best show and it was left to those two drivers that brought down the house last year to again get the crowd revved up. First, Scott Bloomquist was introduced and he broke through the smoke and haze with Rico Abreu on his shoulders that nearly brought down the house. But if anything, he was "one upped" again by Jason Welshan who produced a banner that stated" no provisional needed", a telling commentary on Bloomquist's efforts which required some sort of past champions provisional to get him into the show. His telling commentary was worth a howl for all, and I suspect even Scott B. was probably chuckling a little bit himself on that one.

With all the hoopla behind us, it was time to wave off the first of the three feature races with the Late Models going first. Unfortunately, on this night the hype would be much better than the substance as it was not a night for any classic racing action. Truly, the only one of the three features that would come any where close to expectations was the Modified main.

In my opinion, racing inside on such a tight track is very much a crap shoot to begin with and some nights are great and others not so go. And I would say that much of what made this weekend probably not the best this show has had to offer would center on the race track. Other years, the track would be at its worst for the opening night but each following night would produce a track that was much more raceable and not nearly so hard on the equipment. However, that was not the case this year as the track was brutal all three nights and it seemed that no matter what they did, it just did not show much improvement.

The attrition rate was very high in all three feature races with only half the Late Models and Modifieds around at the end while a slightly higher percentage of the Midgets would complete the full distance.

Bobby Pierce totally dominated the Late Model forty lapper. He started on the pole and led the entire race and seemed to be just cruising most of the distance. He was driving a smart race and his car's set up seemed to be supreme and he was able to roll around the track without getting airborne and bouncing around like most of the others did. It seemed that the only real challengers would be Brandon Sheppard and Shannon Babb and after Sheppard got a flat tire early and Babb did his best to destroy his car before finally throwing in the towel, the only way that Pierce would lose would be if he had some kind of mechanical issue.

Even the race played into his favor as both times he caught the back of the pack, and lapped traffic would likely be the only thing that could mess him up, the yellow flag waved and he had a clean track in front of him again. His margin at the finish was a solid one and runner up Billy Moyer was in a defensive mode, just trying to finish and protect his position. Don O'Neal finished third.

The Midget feature, I thought, might be the one where the cars would be able to go all over the track and we would see a lot of slide jobs and changing of positions. However, that proved not to be the case either. Early on, Christopher Bell and Tyler Courtney had a pretty good race for the lead, but once Bell got established, the race was for second. Ten yellows slowed the action including a couple of minor flips, but fortunately there were no big time wrecks which seemed a bit surprising, especially given the fact that the cars were taking a lot of air, depending on the line that the drivers were running. Courtney and Kyle Larson took shots at getting to the front but for both it resulted in them getting DNF's when their cars and the track came to odds.

It took three tries to get the last lap in but it was Bell that held his ground and didn't make a mistake that would open the door to any challenger. Shane Golobic drove a careful race and he advanced as others fell out and he would finish second while Rico came from tenth to third.

The Modified feature produced the only real battle for the lead. Josh Harris started in front and maintained that lead for the first half of the race as almost as if by magic, the first fourteen laps ran nonstop before the first spin produced a yellow. That first yellow saw a tail end car spin and race challengers Ray Bollinger and Dean Hoffman couldn't get stopped in time and were forced to go to  the tail of the field. One lap later the same scenario played out yet this time Mike McKinney was allowed to maintain his position, which had many of the crowd in our area scratching their heads and worse.

Harris continued to lead but he was blocking the low side and going so slow that while McKinney couldn't get under him, defending UMP national champion Mike Harrison said, "nuts to this" and he jumped to the cushion. It was a bold gamble and one that while we had seen it work successfully in other years, so far in 2018 it hadn't worked out.

However, Harrison kept the hammer down and he was able to edge past  Harris on the outside of turn one and for the first time in three nights, the roar of the crowd could be heard over the engine noise as his move was roundly applauded. Harris eventually went out with a flat tire and while McKinney was digging on the bottom and trying to get pat Harrison, Mike held on for the highly appreciated win. Levi Kissinger finished in the third spot.

And so the final night of the third annual event was in the books. Certainly the crowd size was spectacular as the popularity of the race seems to just grow and grow. I'm sure that there were many in the pits, however, not too pleased with the large amount of damage done to a high number of the race cars. While there will always be plenty of contact when racing in such tight corners, the issues associated with the rough track will have to be addressed to both minimize the damage to the cars and improve the overall racing action.

Between pre race activities, post race interviews and necessary track prep, the final three feature races took nearly three and a half hours to complete so it was again quite a long night. I am still of the opinion that a three class program, done as it was this year, will not fly for a number of reasons next year and I am anxious to see what the plans are for 2019. That being said however, there is no denying what a spectacular event this has grown into so quickly and for those people that have not been to this race yet, it is something that any race fan, no matter what your favorite class is, must experience once.

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