Friday, May 26, 2023

Sanders Back On Top At Deer Creek USMTS Opener

 The traveling stars took on the local heroes for the first night of the Southern Minnesota Spring Challenge on Thursday night, May 25th at the Deer Creek Speedway near Spring Valley Minnesota. For Rodney Sanders, it would be his first win in the series since last August as he shook off a long dry spell with his first win of 2023 and moved himself into a close second in the year long point standings behind Jake O'Neal. 

Along with the USMTS, the local B Mods also ran a full program with the winners of the twin eighteen lap main events being Dan Hovden and Gavin Shaw.

Forty six Modifieds and forty three B Mods would sign in to race on Thursday night on another beautiful night for racing in southern Minnesota. The usual USMTS format would be in effect with the drivers split into five groups for qualifying with the top six in each group being inverted for the heat races and then passing points used after that to determine who would make the main and who would have to slug it out in one of two Jeff Broeg sized B Features. And not unusual to the work of time trials, the first driver to hit the track, Tom Berry Jr, would be the quickest overall at 16.225 seconds as the track quickly slowed down once qualifying began with the other groups' fastest qualifier being between four and six tenths slower. And this is why qualifying is divided into groups and not run as one large group. 

Five heats and a pair of B Features would set the running order for the main. As usual, the drivers who follow this series came in full force as the top twenty in points and twenty four of the top twenty five were in attendance. However, unlike some years, it seemed like more of the local drivers took at least Thursday night off but they could still show for the weekend when two more full shows are on tap and the money just gets bigger. 

Things got off to a spicy start when in Modified heat three there was a tangle between race leader Al Hejna and Brandon Davis, the local driver that everyone was fearing after he came from nineteenth on the grid to win the track opener last Saturday. The drivers had differing opinions as to who was the guilty party but the bottom line was the Davis went off on the hook and Hejna was signaled the "one finger" tribute by Davis before he left, followed by some tough talk by Hejna. 

Davis would make an epic comeback through the night, making the main event from sixteenth in a B Feature only because the apparent winner was disqualified for a technical issue. Davis would then drive up from twenty third to fifth in the main as he really has the competition buzzing here at this track as he runs a chassis that he built himself and runs a smaller motor than most on alcohol rather than racing gas. 

With the provisional starters that included former national champion Dereck Ramirez, twenty eight drivers would take the green for the thirty lap main that highlighted the Thursday show. And admittedly, to this point it had been a rather staid program by Deer Creek standards with most drivers hugging the low side of the track and not a lot of passing going on as the surface just didn't seem to want to clean up on this night. However, the last trip by the prep crew before the Modified feature turned things around and there was an immediate change as the feature race would turn wild and wooly with drivers all over the track, some ridiculous slide jobs hurled and a crazy thirty lap main with several plot twists. 

Dan Ebert would lead the first lap but he was quickly overtaken by veteran Terry Phillips for the top spot with Ebert and a charging Tyler Wolff coming into the picture after Wolff started seventh. Slide jobs were the rule and there were some doozies being thrown during the first half of the event as drivers charged forward. Hejna and the consistent Alex Williamson were also running in the top five. 

Wolff was really on the march and just past the halfway point he moved in to challenge Phillips for the lead. He threw a slider on Phillips that may or may not have been clean to take the lead but Phillips clearly didn't think so as he returned the favor as the leaders racing into turn one. Phillips was on the inside and pinched Wolff up the track, neither backed off and both ended up crashing into each other and the concrete. Wolff got the worst of things as he car was heavily damaged and went off on the hook. Phillips changed a tire and went to the rear while innocent victim Ebert, running third, crashed into the mess and also had to change a tire. 

Suddenly, Hejna found himself in the lead with Williamson in second. Meanwhile, Sanders, who started sixteenth and hadn't shown up in the top five yet by the halfway point, made a tear and he was up to third for the lap nineteen restart. Sanders went to the high side of the track and blew past Hejna to take over the lead. He then pulled away but he wasn't out of the woods quite yet as Jim Chisholm used the low side of the track to drive into second and he began to pull in on Sanders. 

It got quite close in the last few laps but Chisholm didn't have time to establish a forceful challenge and he settled for second as Sanders drove on for his one hundred and thirteenth USMTS feature win. The steady Williamson would finish third ahead of O'Neal who started twenty second and Davis. Twenty four cars were still on the track at the finish and all on the lead lap. 

The Deer Creek Speedway has established a new policy for 2023 and that is if a class has more than forty entrants they split the field in half and run two feature races, both paying the same. Of course for most tracks this isn't even a factor as not many places get forty of any one class and some struggling to get forty total!

This is not the case at Deer Creek when it comes to B Mods as they had over forty for their opener last Saturday and used this new format and once again on this night, with forty three of them and truly not any travelers from far away as most are local or area racers, two features were run. Actually, this is kind of nice as everyone is then guaranteed to race a feature race and everyone gets a feature check. Some don't like the fact that a single "best driver" of the night isn't established but overall is seems good to me and actually makes it feel like the show moves faster without those dreaded B Features. 

The first feature for the B Mods would see Hunter Kennedy take the early lead and hold on to the top spot for sixteen of the eighteen laps. Dan Hovden, veteran Iowa racer, would start eleventh and gradually work his way up. When he passed Colby Mann for second, he really picked up the pace and began to reel in Kennedy, who had a nice sized lead. There wasn't much lapped traffic but the one car Kennedy needed to pass gave him trouble and when he hesitated on where to pass that car, Hovden jumped on the opportunity, blowing past Kennedy and taking the white flag as the leader. He would pull away from Kennedy on the last lap to take the win. The apparent third place finisher was disqualified so Joe Chisholm ended up third. This race had a lone yellow flag and all but one of the twenty two starters finished. 

The second B Mod feature would start the other half of the field, with the drivers selected for each race alternatively based on their heat race passing point totals. Ben Moudry would take the early lead and expand on it as he pulled to nearly a full straightaway on the field. But suddenly, just one lap after the halfway point, he suddenly slowed and pulled into the infield. 

Gavin Shaw would then inherit the lead and drive on for the victory with Spencer Stock coming from thirteenth to finish second. The win would be a nice present for Shaw who stated that he was graduating from High School on Friday night and wouldn't be racing on that night. The tech team apparently had their pencils sharpened on this night at two more drivers that finished, or so they thought, in the top five were disqualified with the official finish finding Dennis Dunbar third. 

An interesting side note to the evening's action was the news that track majority owner Mike Sorensen is working on a new racing tool to be used for track prep. He designed and built the machine himself and it is used to "tickle" the track surface but they claim it works much better than a "lay lay" and that it doesn't have all the moving parts of that piece of equipment that frequently breaks down. They used it during the program on this night and it sure seemed to help pep the track up. I'm told that Sorensen has sold four of the new machines so far and was seen recently in talks with Joe Kosiski and Ricky Kay about the tool.  

As usual, the track staff and management are always friendly and accommodating here. Special thanks to Campground Manager Bill Nelson for allowing me to sit in his booth and also thanks to minority owner Cole Queensland and Randy Queensland for their hospitality. There is a reason that this track is so highly thought of by many.  

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