Thursday night, June 20th, I returned to the Cresco Speedway located at the "mighty" Howard County Fairgrounds in Cresco Iowa for the first time in a number of years. I can't say for sure when the last time I was in Cresco for a race, but it was likely a Late Model race or perhaps a USMTS show and either way, it would have been more than a handful of years. The big event that brought me and lots of other people to the fairgrounds on this night was the first ever appearance of the Late Models sanctioned by MLRA. This was the first night of a two night swing for this Missouri based group as they head for western Iowa and Rapids Speedway in Rock Rapids on Friday night.
I loved the vibe I got as soon as I arrived in Cresco and stopped for lunch. It was kind of a throw back to an earlier era of racing and while I'm not calling the good folks of northeast Iowa stuck in time, on this day that's what it felt like to be on hand here. Billboards with signs pointed to the track and announcing that there was races in town on Thursday were part of it, but the best part of the day was the remote broadcast by the local radio station at the Casey's General Store located on the main highway and just down the road from the fairgrounds. The broadcast announcer was doing a remote for several hours in the afternoon at Casey's and he was "talking" up the races big time while giving a "blow by blow" account as he stood in the parking lot and watched the big race haulers roll by and head for the track. Turns out the remote broadcast was done by the gentleman who would later be the track announcer for the evening at Cresco(I'm sorry but I'm drawing a blank on his name) but he is also the announcer at Decorah. He was taking up to the minute weather reports from folks scattered around the Cresco area and giving listeners the word that while it was drizzling and dripping just a bit, it wasn't enough to rain out the races, which was totally true. The whole atmosphere was very much like a blast back into time, and a pleasant memory to boot. Later I would observe folks gathering in the stands and chatting away between events while perhaps sharing a "cold one" and it dawned on me that this was more than just a race night, this was a social event for the folks in town and the general area. There are still pockets of race tracks in the country that sport this atmosphere but they are much less fewer in number than they used to be, and that is a loss for the sport.
As I recall, the first time I ever came to the races in Cresco, the man in charge was Tom Barnes. Tom still is in charge of the action in Cresco so my memories are probably pretty accurate. Especially when Tom confirmed that this is his thirty sixth year at the helm at the Howard County Fairgrounds, a very tidy looking rural fairgrounds that is ready for the annual fair next week, perhaps one of the earliest in the whole state of Iowa. I also can remember coming to the fair races at Cresco and standing in long lines waiting to get into the grandstand as the fair races were strongly supported by the folks of the county. While they don't race weekly anymore at Cresco, the races that they do have seem to be strongly supported. The Fairboard, by the way, is putting on the show on this night. The Fair races, by the way, will be next Thursday night.
My thought is that the MLRA, once a great regional series, has reached a point where it has,quite frankly, overextended itself. A few years ago, this series was a terrific one that more often than not sported forty or more cars for all their shows as they raced primarily in Missouri and close by, adjoining states. Then other promoters got interested in booking shows, because they were presenting a great attraction with plenty of cars and some strong regional names that would occasionally be joined by some national driving stars. However, after a while this got to be a problem, as many of the drivers that supported this series were racing "stiffs" who had to work a regular job and take vacation to hit their close by shows. Now they have booked the majority of their races a long way from home and they have lost many of the drivers, like Tony Jackson Jr, Peyton Looney and many others that just can't chase the wide ranging series any longer. And when they travel to areas where there aren't a lot of local open motors drivers around, they wind up with fifteen to twenty car fields, which frankly just doesn't cut it for me. I think they need to rethink their business plan, and go back to one that was originally designed to meet the needs of their drivers from Missouri and the surrounding area. Just my thoughts on that. By the way, they had sixteen cars on hand for Thursday night's show, so they ran two heats and a forty lap feature. Also, they have gotten away from one of the more enduring parts of their program which was no time trials and using passing points to set the feature lineup. Thursday, it was announced that they voted at the driver's meeting whether to time trial or not, a mistake because you never let the drivers decide, because their interests are in sharp contrast to those of the fans, the ones paying the bills and expecting to be entertained. So they time trialed, lined the heat races straight up from times and in the two heats and forty lap feature, we saw zero passes for the lead of any of the three races they presented. Hum, perhaps something quite short of putting on a show, don't you think?
The way the track set up Thursday, being on the outside pole was the place to be for the Late Models as all three races were won from that spot. Chad Simpson started the forty lap main from there and got the jump on Will Vaught and led all forty laps. There were two yellow flags during the race as as the Late Models burned a fast lane around the track, you had better be in that lane or you were going backward, which made passing an even tougher chore than normal.
Vaught lost second when he made a mistake on the first restart and picked the inside lane and Tyler Bruening drove right around him for second. Bruening pushed as hard as he could but Chad paced himself and had plenty of tire left for the end of the race as he pulled away after getting past a nasty backmarker that simply wouldn't yield the fast lane. Simpson was finally able to "strong arm" his way past the slower car and then it was Bruening's turn. The most excitement of the race was when Tyler got tired of messing with the slow car as Simpson got away and he gave the backmarker a good "body slam" and moved him out of the way, which caused his fans to stand and cheer. And I applauded the move too. Why does someone a lap behind feel they must race with the leader and when he finally gets by, not realize that there might be another contender chasing the leader? Or was this just a case of being stubborn and not yielding to the obvious? Vaught settled for third with Chris Simpson and Logan Martin rounding out the top five as it appears that there are only six drivers chasing MLRA points here in June and one of them, Jake Neal, broke a motor in his heat and was done for the night.
Late Model race fans might be interested to learn that Jordan Yaggy, racer from Rochester Minnesota and one that would normally attend races such as this venue, has not yet been cleared by his doctor to return to racing following his horrendous accident in West Liberty as he is still having some night vision problems. There probably isn't a great rush to return anyway, as they do not yet have a car to replace the one that was wrecked in that accident.
You knew that Late Models were a rarity in northeast Iowa when the Head Starter and his assistant were spotted taking pictures of the four wide formation before the green flag flew from their unique perspective on the flag stand.
Support classes for the night included USRA Stock Cars, B Mods and Hobby Stocks. Included in Thursday night's field was USRA and USMTS heat Todd Staley who towed his Stock Car to Cresco before he heads out for a three night weekend series with his Modifieds.
The best race of the night was the B Mod feature, by far. High school student Keagen Einck took the early lead from the prized outside pole spot but when he jumped the cushion in turn one, Ben Moudry drove under him to take over the top spot. However, unlike the rest of the competition on this night, Einck would not settle for just falling in line and he attacked to get the lead back. Using a very daring high side move in turn three on the cushion, he drove back beside Moudry and they raced side by side down the front chute before Einck was able to get the lead back. It was a high risk move on this night the way the track was racing, but Einck pulled it off to the appreciation of the crowd. Moudry should also be congratulated for racing clean, as he had plenty of opportunity to move out and run Einck either into the wall or over the cushion. Moudry instead raced hard but had to settle for second with Taylor Skauge finishing third.
The Hobby Stock feature saw Steve Larson start in front and wind up there at the end, as he pulled away for an easy win, lapping cars and putting much distance between himself and the field. Joshua Ludeking held off the competition to finish second with Chris Hovden third as the loose material blowing around caused some overheating problems for the racers Thursday.
Mitch Hovden was the only winner not to start on the front row as he took the Stock Car feature race. Lynn Panos was the early leader until overtaken by Hovden, who was then challenged by Kyle Falck for the lead. Falck was putting heavy pressure on and it appeared that he was ready to make a pass, when he got hung up in turn three, the car dug into the track and he got up on two wheels before spinning to a half. He did restart the main and work his way back up to fifth as he appeared to be the fastest car on the track, but Hovden would collect the big paycheck with Panos and Dillon Anderson next in line.
It was a tough day for track prep as rain was in the forecast and it looked very threatening. In fact, it did sprinkle on and off for about two hours before race time but never hard enough to threaten the show and folks continued to arrive, despite having the windshield wipers on "delay" for most of their trip. The track did roll in hard but there was lots of loose material blowing around as the surface never did clean off too well and it did get quite dusty in the grandstands, thanks to a ill East wind blowing. It was also annoying that the two speakers in front of us in the open grandstand were not working all night either, so we missed a little of what was going on because of that.
The crowd was a big one for the return of the Late Models and the indication was that this will now be an annual event which seems a wise choice by the Fair Board. However, they might want to investigate what other racing series are out there and available to see if they can perhaps find someone that could put on a better show and bring a few more cars into town. The last race ended around 10:30 and a large amount of the crowd headed for the pits to see these cars up close and also visit with their "Saturday" night heroes.
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