It doesn't seem to matter what the sanctioning body is or what the track size is, Bobby Pierce just continues to roll as he racks up win after win across the Midwest, running a schedule that sees him go where the money is and not worrying about points for any single series.
His latest domination took place at the Stuart International Speedway in Stuart Iowa on Thursday night, May 2nd as a part of a scheduled four night swing by the MLRA through the state of Iowa and then wrapping up in Illinois.
Thursday night's win was probably one of the more impressive as things were set up to be a bit tougher for him on this night. Stuart was a race track that he had never seen before and the tight quarter mile(or less probably) bull ring is a bit tricky to drive, although most of the other drivers in the field were probably in the same boat as Pierce.
Making things just a bit more interesting and challenging was the fact that MLRA was back to using their normal qualifying procedure that involved drawing for heat races and then using passing points to determine the feature race lineups. I guarantee that passing points makes the heat races about 200% more interesting than putting the fast cars right in front for the heats and also adds some drama to the event, which after all, is supposed to be at least part entertainment and not just a high speed contest. Plus, this allowed the program to commence right at the advertised time of 7:30 pm and despite the fact that track promoter Mike VanGenderen is one of the best at getting his shows stared on time, I guarantee that if they had time trials, even MVG couldn't have pulled off a 7:30 pm start.
Anyway, Pierce drew the back row for a heat and then with some bottle necks at the start, he was only able to advance from seventh to fifth in his heat so the result was that he started thirteenth in the main event. But then the show began.
We all know that Pierce has good equipment but so to do a lot of other drivers. The difference right now in the fact that Bobby is winning so much is that, quite frankly, he is just out driving the rest of the competition with his bold moves and willingness to move around and try different grooves. He also seems to be right at the top of his game when it comes to "reading" the race track and what changes it is going through as an event progresses.
The track started to slick off in the Late Model feature after having been very much tacky and high speed earlier and he was the first to spot what was happening and take advantage of it. The leaders at the start of the race went to the bottom and he took advantage of that by moving up the track which gave him room to preform a series of high side passed and despite the fact he started in the seventh row, he was soon challenging for the lead. It also didn't hurt that the four yellows in the first ten laps kept packing the field and giving him the opportunity to make multi car passes on restarts, not just knock off one car at a time.
Soon he was challenging for the lead and when he blew past Tyler Bruening on the outside down the front chute, the race was over. The rest of the event say his main challenge being to navigate through the traffic. Chris Simpson was eventually able to pass Bruening for second but he would have nothing for Pierce.
What bad luck for Payton Looney as he led the first couple of laps until blowing a motor and dropping out. One wonders is he even has a spare power plant to get through the rest of the weekend.
I do not know what has gotten into Jordan Yaggy this year, but I sure am liking what I have been seeing the past few weeks. He is still driving the same Rocket chassis he had last year and is still using the same motors from Pro Power but something has sure changed as he has found a lot of speed and at all sizes of tracks, particularly at the smaller tracks where I think he was probably weakest. I did not talk to him after the race but I'm betting that he will consider the ten lap or so, side by side battle with Hall of Famer Billy Moyer, who he eventually passed for fifth as one of the highlights of his career to date. Moyer passed him, Yaggy fought back to ensure a side by side race that lasted a number of laps and then Yaggy eventually moved past him for good. The old Jordan Yaggy could never have done that.
A twenty four car field showed for the Late Models, which was plenty large enough for Stuart, particularly since there wouldn't be room to start more than that many cars anyway. Thirteen of the top twenty in MLRA points did make it to Stuart. It was good to see a couple of the SLMR cars from Nebraska join the competition as the Kosiski boys were on hand plus a couple of IMCA cars in the person of Richie Gustin and Chad Holladay were also on hand. With the Davenport race for MLRA already canceled for Friday, it would be nice to see the MLRA cars journey to Denison, put on a plate and race with the SLMR cars but that's likely not to happen.
Along with the featured Late Models, the IMCA sanctioned Sport Mods, Stock Cars and Hobby Stocks were also a part of the show. All three classes provided nice fields of cars and some good racing. The Hobby Stocks kicked things off and they did a great job, with a twenty car field going nonstop in their main event and providing lots of action. Shannon Anderson, who has been very ordinary in the appearances I have seen by him so far this year, picked up his game at Stuart and came from the third row to take the win. The battle between himself and Chuck Madden Jr was a good one with Anderson eventually able to slip past for the win.
The Stock Cars had a wild finish with Buck Schafroth coming through for the win. On opening night I was on hand to witness Buck flip his car after clipping come infield tires but he has now come back to win his second in a row at Stuart. He started on the outside pole thanks to the point average and he took the lead right from the start. His team mate Todd VanEaton was giving him a strong challenge and was is a position to challenge for the lead until his car spit out a drive shaft, ending his night.
Then it was defending national champion Mike Nichols challenging Schafroth. They put on a great two car battle with Nichols trying to drive inside Buck on every lap. The tacky track was causing Schafroth to hike up the left side tire and it appeared he was very close to actually lifting off the track with both inside tires but he held on. Then, on the final corner as Nichols gave it his all, he actually got too much traction and the left side of his car took air, allowing Schafroth to drive home uncontested. Nichols' last lap bobble allowed Shawn Ritter to sneak into second. Ritter came out of no where after a nondescript heat race when he ran into the first turn wall forced him to start fifteenth in the main but what a charge he made after that.
The Sport Mods wrapped up the evening with a rolling demolition derby as several multi car crashed cut down the field. Twenty five cars starting the main was probably just a few too many and the result was a lot of torn up cars. When they finally got down to racing, there was a nice five or so car battle for the lead with Tyler Inman making a late charge to take the win as he was able to get his car working on the bottom right at the end and make a couple of key passes. I was a bit confused as he was a part of a late crash but got his spot back and I'm not sure that happened to all cars that were involved is similar crashes but he really did make up a bunch of positions to earn the win. I was surprised how few spectators left after the Late Models were over and instead stayed for the Sport Mod main. Clearly, there were plenty or race fans and not just Late Model fans on hand.
The crowd was a good one although I thought that the opening night crowd might have been a bit bigger but I might be wrong on that. Either way, the $20 admission price(which was a very fair charge), should have helped to pay the large purse. The Late Models definitely put on a good show at Stuart and I would be shocked if they don't return again next year and it would almost seem that the Deery Brothers and Malvern Bank Series would also be a good fit at some point too.
No comments:
Post a Comment