The wrap up of many race track's regular seasons has coincided with the recent heat wave, making it even more challenging to get race fans and drivers out and participating of such miserable nights.
The final event of the 2023 racing season at the Buena Vista Raceway, aka "The Beaver", was held on Wednesday night, August 23rd under such conditions. At BVR they don't, as such, have a championship night but rather the conclusion of the points race is on this night and at the end of the night, the six drivers, one in each class, will be crowned the point champions. And with the way that IMCA calculates their points and with the car counts such as they were, only a couple of the point titles were in jeopardy at the beginning of the night. In four of the six classes, the point leader just needed to take the green flag to guarantee the title while just the Sport Mod and Stock Car divisions had real races going into the season's finale.
I had the chance to speak with track promoter Trent Chinn for a few minutes as he took a break between doing some duties at the infield concession stand and heading back out to pack the track some more. He told me that at this point, everything was up in the air for 2024 in terms of his involvement with the tracks that he promotes. He has had an incredibly busy Summer as he is the promoter of record here at Buena Vista but also at the Clay County Fairgrounds in Spencer and the Hancock County Speedway in Britt.
Tonight would conclude his season at Alta, next Friday is the wrap up at Britt with the rescheduled Night of a Thousand Stars and then his season concludes with two nights of high profile racing during the Clay County Fair in Spencer in September.
He said that right now he could be running three tracks next year or it could also be zero tracks. After the seasons are complete, he will start meeting with Fair Boards and then negotiations will begin. He said that both Alta and Spencer have had good years with good crowds in the stands, although Alta has struggled with its car count all year. Britt was a struggle this year, as they knew it would be, as they are trying to raise a "Phoenix" back up from the ashes. The two times I was there I thought the car counts were good and the crowds fair, but those were also both special events.
He didn't come right out and say so, but I got the indication that at the end of a long season, he was getting tired of all the drama and other things that a promoter has to deal with, especially when you are hearing it from both the competitors and from the Fair Boards. It can be a lot of grief and long nights and then multiply that times three and it must be a real challenge. It is amazing that someone as young as Trent, he's only twenty four, has taken on such a work load in what is such an explosive market. He said that maybe there's another perfect job waiting for him outside of racing so I think he's keeping his options wide open, as he should.
The numbers at race time were: ninety four degrees with a "feels like" temperature of one hundred and nine degrees as the humidity was over bearing. And just as I've seen at other tracks over the course of hte last week, the crowds were down and so were the number of competitors. It's probably a good thing that they were wrapping up the season on this night as forty seven cars spread out over six divisions is a number that is not sustainable over a long haul. The only class that had double digit numbers was in the Hobby Stocks and they just barely broke into that category. In my area, in order to run two heat races there must be at least ten cars on hand and signed in but that must not be the case in IMCA as they ran two sets of heats for the Bombers and Stock Cars with only five and four cars in the heats. It is true the Bombers were not sanctioned but the Stock Cars were .
Championship Night was sponsored by Tyson Turkeys and Jim's Sewer Service and I want you to consider the irony of those two sponsors on board as sponsors on the same night. That was a very strange pairing indeed. Wednesday night was also a big bike giveaway night at the track and despite school being in session for many districts around here, there were a goodly number on kids on hand, trying to win a bike.
The track was in good shape for racing Wednesday despite the heat as humidity, while not friendly for us, is a friend of a racing surface and generally speaking, humid nights produce good racing surfaces if the track prep has worked hard enough to get that moisture into the surface. Trent told me that he had been watering since 9:30 am on this day and the product was a good surface with very little dust, despite a strong South wind that was blowing right into the grandstands.
Racing would get started shortly after 7 pm and with the small number of heats, it would take just forty minutes to complete all the qualifying which was followed by the drawings and then it was time for the main events.
Sport Compacts would start out the feature event action and Caine Mahlberg would come from the third row before one lap was completed to take the lead. He would then run away from the field to score an easy win. Cody Gorden and Levi Volkert would follow him home with Volkert being crowned the point champion.
Jarrett Franzen would take the early lead in the Sport Mod feature. Franzen, who has been pulling all the way from Maquoketa fairly often on Wednesday nights to race, would only hold the lead briefly before he was overtaken by Rusty Montague. Montague would pull away from the field and keep Jake Simpson, who has a small window of opportunity to pass Rusty in the point standings, behind him as he drove on for the win plus the title. Simpson and Franzen would follow him across the line.
The Bomber feature got the crowd more excited than anything else as apparently the demolition derby crowd was dominant in the stands on this night as the spins and near crashes got them more excited than real racing. The Bomber drivers are apparently slow to learn as they were spinning out and running into each other like it was opening night, not the end of the season.
There was, however, a pretty good battle for the lead as Wyatt Johnson led early and it took most of the race for Will Smith to ease past Johnson on the high side of the track and become the first of three Smiths to win on this night. On the last lap, Johnson attempted a banzai move on the inside but when Smith adjusted his line, he wasn't there for Johnson to bank off of and instead, Johnson spun out of contention. Max Pogeler and Ryler Ziegmann would complete the top three. Smith would also be the champion.
The Stock Car feature would be one class where the title would be settled on the final night. Stefan Sybesma had a one point lead over David Smith as they raced the final feature race of the season. This race would also be the most competitive of the night with three different leaders as Devin Tripp and Brian Blessington both had stints as the leader before Tim Rupp took over the top spot. However, once Rupp got the lead, he drove away from the field to take the win. Smith would work his way into a solid second place while Sybesma tried to come from the fourth row by using the top side and that didn't work for him on this night as he could only get to fifth and that would give the title to Smith.
The Modified feature was a "walk over" for Chris Abelsen who would start in the second row but have the lead before one lap was completed and then would drive away from the field. At the finish, he would have the better half of a full straightaway lead over Jesse Rogotzke and Doug Smith. Abelsen was also the point champion and it was noted that he has switched chassis brands since I last saw him race as he is now in a NF1 chassis out of Sioux City.
The Hobby Stock feature would complete the evening's entertainment and we would wrap things up on a good note as the Hobbies produced the best feature of the night. It would be a tight three car battle between Mike Smith, James Johnson and Kurtis Bonnesen for the win. Bonnesen would be the early leader until Smith got by him and then put some distance on the field. However, neither Bonnesen or Johnson would give up and as the race drew close to completion, they had both caught the leader. Johnson was riding right in the tire tracks of Smith and it was interesting to note how they both switches lines on the track, trying to find that small edge.
Near the end, Smith was protecting the low side and this gave Bonnesen a chance to move up to the top and gain ground. They took the white flag in tight formation but while both the contenders tried their best, Smith ran a solid last lap and would hold them both off by the smallest of distances with Johnson second and Bonnesen next in line. Smith would also win the Championship, giving the family three feature wins on this night and also three Championships as they had the fendered classes covered. You could tell the crowd was a bit lethargic on this humid night, as there were only a few "one fingered salutes" to the winners and back and forth in the crowd compared to normal when the crowd is much more livid, one way or the other.
All racing was complete by 10 pm when the mechanics took to the oval and I took leave of the scene. Thanks to Trent Chinn and all the staff of Chinn Racing Promotions for their help. We may perhaps meet again as a trip to the Clay County Fair may be in the cards.
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