Brandon Davis Tops Modified Dandy at Webster City

 The second half of the Fall Futurity was held as a late afternoon event on Sunday, October 22nd at the new look, Hamilton County Speedway in Webster City Iowa. Originally planned as a Friday and Saturday show, that schedule was changed at the end of last weekend when the miserable weather  rained out just about everything in the Midwest. 

The Mason City Motor Speedway ran their final event of the year instead on Friday night with the Fall Futurity backed up to Saturday and Sunday. 

In the meantime, they were working furiously on the track in Webster City with some fairly substantial changes in the track taking place since the last race just weeks ago. The track was shortened with some light poles on the inside of the track being removed so that the track could be brought in on its ends and a lot of new jersey barricades were put in place to form an inside wall around the track. The old entrance/exit it turn one was covered up with that being a solid wall and the race cars now stage on the inside of the track in turn three where they then roll on to the track for the start of events. One trip by the grandstand and they are ready to race. 

In essence, the track really hasn't been shortened as much as it has been widened but that is a good thing in that it really opens up the corners and allows racing of a more side by side manner. Some drivers were right up against the outside just as they had always been but there are now several lower lines in the corners to race on also. I suspect that after a few more races those lines will be come even more used. After all, Sunday was just the second race ever on the new configuration so it will take some time for the full scope of the changes to be effective. I was told that the low groove was pretty rough on Saturday but almost nonstop work by a wide variety of heavy equipment from before I got there right up to race time had changed that considerably and again, with a few more races I would assume it would get nothing but better. 

The outside wall is now gone and whether that is a good thing or a bad thing is debatable. There were still plenty of drivers right up on the top side but they had nothing to lean on. All I know is that going off the end could provide a pretty rough landing now. They did have to pull one Stock Car out of the weeds after he got too high in turn two. Fortunately, he ended up no where near the river that runs behind the back chute. 

The race cars will park toward the front of the pits thus improving the site lines for the fans and making it easier to sit low in the grandstands and still see the entire track. 

The last time I saw promoter Todd Staley, he was in a harness after having surgery but all healed up now, he was back driving his Stock Car in competition with that class as well as supervising the operation. Always a man on the go, I did manage to corner him long enough to get a few words from him. 

Set to wrap up the USMTS season this coming weekend, he was hoping that they wouldn't leave the Lakeside Speedway surface open so that it could suck up the water from this week's expected rains. He is hoping to wrap up the season with races at Lakeside and 81 Speedway in Park City Kansas this weekend. Having already crowned a champion in Rodney Sanders, the Junghans Memorial at Lakeside is a big race and they want to get it in. 

As far as next year for the USMTS, there has been a change in philosophy on their scheduling for next year. They have discovered that the multi day shows are difficult for tracks to make happen so look for no more than six of the three day shows in 2024 at such places at Deer Creek, Cedar Lake and Ogilvie. There will be a number of three race weekends but they will likely be at three different tracks with close proximity to each other and more two night shows at an individual track.  The schedule is due to be released in about three weeks with the opener likely to be at Rocket Raceway Park in Texas once again. 

Five sanctioned classes would be in action on Sunday with USRA Modifieds, Stock Cars, B Mods and Hobby Stocks racing along with the Late Models who were running SLMR rules. Eighty cars would be on hand for the Sunday finale to the racing season with no B Features needed. This was a good number for what would hoped to be a quick show on a Sunday with some weather scheduled to move into the area later on. 

And it was exactly that; a very quick show. All the heat races were spun off in under one hour and while they continued to work the track for the features, they had many specials at the concession stand as they were likely clearing things out there too. 

Using the typical draw/redraw format of the USRA, the Late Models would be up first on the refreshened track. Bad news for the rest of the field would find Tad Pospisil drawing the outside pole. He would take the lead right at the start and would dominate the event, only running into any issues when he had to deal with lapped traffic that was running the same lane as he was. 

Just like many other tracks, whether new or veteran facilities, making a track racey for the Late Models is a tough task with their wide tires and moisture seeking chassis. We would see the other four classes all over the track on this Sunday with them racing from right on the hub to the grassy confines right up next to the wall. 

Except the Late Models that is. They would all line up right on the inside lane and hug the inside Jersey barriers, making it tough to pass and tough to lap the slow cars. However, Pospisil would get his way through the field to the extent that he would win easily. Brian Harris was the show as he came from eighth to finish second, working hard and using parts of the track that others scorned. Jason Hahne would finish third. 

Dustin Gulbranson would lead from start to finish to win the Hobby Stock feature. Again, he drew the outside pole and would show the way from start to finish. There was a good battle for second with Chris Hovden outdueling Scott Dobel for the spot. 

Then the Modifieds rolled out and we would be treated to by far the best race of the night. And while Brandon Davis was officially scored the leader of all twenty laps, it was not near that easy. Kyle Brown put on a show as he quickly moved up from the third row to challenge Davis and what a fight they had for the lead. 

Brown would throw slider after slider at Davis and Brandon would cross him over time after time as they continued to jockey for the lead. Several times it looked like Brown was going to grab the top spot but each time Davis would re maneuver and lead back to the line. Brown would make his biggest attempt with just a couple laps left with another monstrous slider but Davis would hold him off and with his momentum killed, Brown would have to settle for second with Ron VerBeek third.  Tyler Davis was point chasing all the way from Kansas but he would end up backwards on the track after just two laps and call it an evening. 

It took until the fourth feature of the night to see the first pass for the race lead, but the B Mods delivered with Harley Dais leading the first six laps after starting in that prized outside pole position. However, Harley was getting looser and looser and drifting dangerously close to the front stretch wall and finally it would be Ty Griffith that would duck under him and take over the lead. 

Griffith is a master at this track and the changes made didn't seem to bother him as he found a line high on one end and against the Jersey barricades on the other end that saw him pull away for the win. Shadren Turner, also likely chasing points, came from Missouri to finish second with a pair of #56 cars crossing the line in that order with Joe Chisholm third. 

The Stock Cars would wrap up the evening with a two car duel for the win that saw Austin Meiners lead the opening lap, then give away the lead to Nate Whitehurst, only to fight his way back into the lead some seven laps later and then go on for the win. 

Things got dicey with just three laps to go when the first yellow of the race flew and on the restart, Bill Crimmins would take Whitehurst for second and try to flag down Meiners for the lead but Austin had a big enough advantage that Crimmins couldn't catch him and would drive home for the win. 

I believe the track prep crew spent a huge amount of time on the new surface and their efforts were rewarded with a much improved track on Sunday. A quick Sunday night show was much appreciated by all with the whole program running off in about two and a half hours. As always, thanks to Todd and Janet Staley and the whole crew at Hamilton County. With a whole off season to settle, it will be interesting to see how the new look track races in 2024. 

Doar Tops List of Winners at Ogilvie

 The dirt track racing season in the state of Minnesota ended on Saturday night, October 21st with the completion of the 13th annual Topless Nationals held at the Wagamon family Ogilvie Raceway.

With nearly three hundred race cars in the pits and full house in the grandstand on Saturday, it  certainly wrapped up the 2023 racing season in the Gopher state in a big way. Micro Sprints joined the card on Saturday night so there were eight classes running either just feature races or a multitude of B Features, depending on the class.

Racing would begin promptly at 5 pm on Saturday with ten B Features to be contested before the main events could begin. Nearly all drivers returned for the Saturday night action so there were some very large, Jeff Broeg sized B Features to be run first with very few of the starters added to the mains. It was "go big or go home" time for many and the results would set the running order for the tail end of the pack for the mains. Only the Late Models, Hornets and Mod Four would not run B's with all of them slated to run the main event. Apparently the word got out that full fields were not yet in place in two of those classes and there were several additional entries that would tail the fields for those mains, making the complete car count for the weekend at two hundred and ninety cars plus the Micros. By the way, I overlooked the fact that there was actually one Michigan driver on hand too so there were six states and two Canadian provinces represented. 

Super Stocks were first on the track for their main event with twenty five drivers taking the green as Shane Sabraski, last year's winner, was added as a provisional starter after he couldn't make the grid through a B Feature. It was a miserable weekend for Sabraski, at least by his standards, as while he would charge from twenty fifth to sixth in the Super Stock feature and come from eighteenth to eighth in the Modified main, not battling for the win in at least one class is way below is normal standards and probably his poorest effort of the entire Summer. 

The Super Stock feature would see third generation driver Brandon Duellman out fight Dexton Koch to take the win. Duellman would start on the pole and lead the first thirteen laps before Koch came from the fifth starting spot to drive past Duellman just as the halfway signal was given. Shortly thereafter, the lone yellow would fly for a spinning car and bunch the field.

Strangely, Koch, who showed so much speed in taking over the lead, just didn't have the same burst once the race restarted and three laps later Duellman was able to repass him and take over the point. Duellman would then pull away over the last five laps to take the win over Koch, who was going for his twenty ninth feature win of the year, and Dylan Nelson who's late charge got him up to third. Only three cars failed to finish the event. 

Pat Doar closed out another spectacular racing season for the New Richmond Wisconsin veteran as he would lead all forty laps to win the Late Model feature and take home four grand for his efforts. He redrew the outside pole and would jump into the early lead with Josh Zimpel,  Steve Laursen, Kevin Eder and Shane Edginton chasing him. 

A couple early yellows would keep the field bunched and this gave Edginton the opportunity to move forward as he pulled up to challenge Laursen for second. Doar would maintain the lead but things would get tighter when during a long green flag stretch, the leaders would catch the pack and Doar had to make some nifty moves to keep a charging Edginton behind him. 

Track management made the mistake of just watering the track before the main events, rather than ripping it up and the track started to take rubber during the Late Model feature, forcing most of the drivers to the bottom lane and making passing of the slower cars even tougher. 

Doar is smooth as melted butter, however, and he was able to find a way through the traffic while stretching his lead at the same time. The battle for second was a dandy though, with Edginton and Laursen trading the spot three times before Edginton would hold on for that position. 

The race ended just in time for Doar too, as when he pulled into victory lane he had a flat right rear tire, likely the result of the rubbered up conditions. For Doar, it was his fourteenth feature win of 2023 in another banner season that included the WISSOTA Challenge Series championship among his other prizes. 

Track workers then ripped the track after the Late Models were done and there would be no more track issues the rest of the night as they likely second guessed why they had waited to do so. 

Modifieds would hit the track next with twenty four taking the green for this race which may have provided the biggest surprise of the night. Joseph Thomas would take the early lead and would run up front for the first eight laps with Ward Imrie and J.T. Johnson moving in to challenge him. 

Imrie, the Canadian driver from Winnipeg and a former national Modified champion, would really put the pressure on Thomas and as the handle started to go away on Joseph's car, Imrie would drive past him to take over the lead. By the halfway point of the race, Imrie would lead but both Jeremy Nelson and Don Eischens were moving forward. 

Nelson was really strong on the low side of the track and he took over the lead from Imrie, only to see Ward saved by the yellow flag. However, one lap later Nelson would make the pass stick and he would then pull away over the final ten laps to score the impressive win. Nelson is a former track champion here at the Big O, but this season has been a quiet one for him and his win in the finale was his first of the year here in the Mods. Eischens, who has had a very strong second half of the year after he brought out a new car, would finish a strong second with Imrie hanging on for third. 

Tommy Bawden would win his twentieth Mod Four feature win of the year as the soon to be crowned 2023 national champion recorded another first place run. It was a tough race though and while Bawden was the third leader of the race, he didn't take the lead until there were just three laps remaining in the contest. 

Dean Larson had led the opening lap but he was soon passed by Tommy Pogones and Pogo Jr would lead right up to the final late race pass by Bawden. It seemed that Bawden was biding his time and when it was time to go, he powered under Pogones for the lead and then pulled away in the final three laps for the win. Pogones would get a solid second with Larson rounding out the top three. 

David Swearingen is a tough one to beat at Ogilvie in the B Mod class and once again on Saturday, he would dominate the proceedings, starting on the outside pole and taking the lead from Travis Schulte on lap two and then leading the rest of the way for the win. 

Schulte did hang with Swearingen for most of the race, only loosing second to Joey Jensen with six laps to go. Jensen pushed hard to try and take away the lead but under green flag conditions he just couldn't match the speed of Swearingen, who would drive home for the win. Soon to be crowned WISSOTA national Midwest Mod champion Zach Benson would drive up from eighth to finish a strong third and probably could have used a couple more yellows to help his cause, but the B Mods did well with just two yellows for minor spins. 

I knew it wouldn't be a fair fight and Tim Johnson proved this to be the case as the Brainerd driver dominated the Street Stock feature with his Stock Car, taking the lead and running away from the field in a division where this typically is not the case. 

I talked to Johnson before the race and he admitted to me that the Stock Cars have motors more powerful than the Street Stocks and also weigh 250 less pounds and the only thing holding them back is the crappy tire they run on. 

But Johnson, who is one of those rare drivers that could make a wheel barrow competitive, and has a multitude of wins and national championships in various classes, would just hug the bottom lane of the track, take the lead from soon to be crowned WISSOTA Street Stock champion Justin Vogel, and then pull away from the field. Vogel, who loves to pound the cushion, just couldn't find enough speed on that line and Johnson would baby his car through the turns and then use its superior speed on the chutes to pull away. 

The battle for second, however, was a good one with Derek Turner, the Fargo North Dakota driver, nipping Vogel for second as they dueled back and forth for the spot. The Street Stocks did a good job with only two minor yellows in their race, where hopefully management will rethink their rules for next year's event or it will be a Stock Car show with no one else bothering to try. 

The Hornets would wrap up a long night that stretched to the Midnight hour with Matt Dittman passing Jeff Rohner on lap five and then leading the rest of the way for the win. Late in the race Kole Kampsen would get past Rohner for second and close on Dittman but he would run a smooth line and drive home for the win. 

While I didn't report on the Micros, I can say that they provided the most spectacular accident of the night when "Porketta" Paul Wrazaidlo from Duluth would pound the wall in turn four in a heat race and then barrel roll down the front chute, nearly joining Brian Reidemann in the flagstand before falling to the track below. But Paul never says die and after borrowing parts and piecing the car back together and despite the fact he was on "rubber legs" after the crash, he returned to run the feature! Paul later told me that this was the fourth time he has been on his roof this year! I think it time to try a different class. 

I was disappointed that there were no victory lane interviews on this night as it would have been fun to hear the drivers one last time before we call a halt to this racing season but it is a long walk from the tower down to the track and for some reason, they never seem to be able to find a second body to do the victory lane interviews here. 

It was quite the weekend of racing and a good way to send everyone off into the sunset on another racing season. Now the plans begin for 2024 and the changes that are inevitably a part of the sport as drivers change classes, some retire with new ones replacing them, tracks change promoters and classes and the off season swirl begins. 

Thanks to Nate Fischer, the Wagamon family and all the workers at the Big O for a job well done this weekend. 

Topless Nationals Kicks Off at "The Big O"

 Friday night, October 20th, the thirteenth annual Topless Nationals kicked off at the Ogilvie Raceway near Ogilvie Minnesota. 

Started on a whim those thirteen years ago, this race was first conceived as a fund raiser during Breast Cancer Awareness month and also as a fun time for race crews and fans alike to bid a fond farewell to the racing season with a fun event. To make it different, the classes were all required to remove the roofs from their race cars and run them topless. This certainly gives them a different look and there are a number of events like this across the country when the tops come off for a week to produce something different for the fans. 

With three different sanctioning bodies operating within a reasonable travel distance of this track, the Topless race has always been run under more open rules with cars from each sanctioning body running their own rules and tires and for the most part this has worked out all right. There was a bit of a rub when it came to running Stock Cars against Street Stocks one year and that rub may reappear again before this weekend is over as after a lull of many years, Stock Cars were again allowed to run with the Street Stocks. More on that later. 

For the first time, this race even had a sponsor as the local vocational school, Pine Technical and Community College, came on board to sponsor the race this year. The track gets in the spirit of this event as all the walls surrounding the race track are painted bright pink for this weekend along with all the "dreaded infield tractor tires" so there can be no excuse for hitting them this weekend. 

There are costume contests for both kids and adults, trick or treating in the pits before the races on Saturday and even a contest for the best decorated race car. This year the racing teams went all out on this and at least half the field had some kind of decoration on their cars whether it be lights, skeletons riding along or all sorts of ghostly monsters sharing the cockpit with the drivers. There was even a first this year when starter Brian Reidemann was forced to trigger a yellow flag during a heat race when some ghostly monster fell out of a race car and laid in turn one. Fortunately no one ran over the beast but that was a  first for me. 

Apparently there are still a lot of race teams and fans that aren't ready to pack it in for the 2023 racing season. Blessed by spectacular weather on Friday, a huge car count was on hand for the opening night of this event. A total of two hundred and eighty nine cars signed in to race in the seven classes presented on Friday. All classes except the Mod Fours showed increased car counts from last year's event and with both the Hornets and Late Models returned to the show after being absent from this event for several years, that put an additional fifty cars in the pits just between those two classes. The Hornets, by the way, are the only class that doesn't have to remove the roofs as their roofs are part of the integrity of the vehicles and to remove their roofs would make them too dangerous to drive. 

The largest class on hand was the B Mods which are a combination of the WISSOTA Midwest Mods, the USRA B Mods and the IMCA Sport Mods and there were a mind numbing eighty three of them on hand. Cars from all three of the sanctioning bodies were also seen in the Mods, Hornets and Street Stocks while the Super Stocks and Mod Fours are classes unique to WISSOTA and no other Late Models other than WISSOTA cars tried to race on this night. 

This is that time of the year when race cars are bought and sold and there were evidences of a number of drivers racing in different classes with newly purchased equipment and quite a variety of drivers on hand that had never raced at Ogilvie before. Ogilvie is one of the few tracks that could pull in such a big field of race cars even though in all their pre race advertising there was never one mention of just exactly what the purse was and what the various finishing positions would pay. Ogilvie can get by with that while a lot of tracks could not. At this point of the year, there are still a bunch of drivers that want one more race and with such beautiful weather promised for the weekend,  they came out in droves. Consider that for a race where no one knew what they were racing for, drivers from five states and two Canadian provinces were on hand in the pits Friday night!

It was a surprise to me when the race format for the evening featured the old school draw/redraw method of qualifying when this race just begs to be a passing points show. I was particularly surprised at this as they are familiar with passing points in this area, having used that format for several races here this year and with such a big field of drivers, passing points are so much more fair. As an example, soon to be crowned WISSOTA national champion in both the Modifieds and Super Stocks, Shane Sabraski,drew badly for both classes and failed to make the feature in either class, despite the fact he moved up several positions but not just far enough to make the cut off. It will be interesting to see what the sixty time feature winner can do, racing through B Features on Saturday. 

The program was a monster sized one on Friday with thirty four heat races in all to set the field for B Features and main events on Saturday night. The drivers were pretty well disciplined on Friday with there not being an over abundance of yellow flags, despite the unfamiliarity of many drivers with the track and a number driving new or different equipment. That is, however, except in the B Mods. There were six yellows in the first lap of the first B Mod heat and things got so bad that Reidemann sent the whole field to the infield for a "time out." 

The next heat was brought on the track and they raced their event and then the first heat returned from the infield to finish out their race. It seemed to work and the first heat only produced one more yellow before they finally finished things off. 

The track was super slick, as you can imagine with that many races but it never did take rubber and drivers were still running multiple grooves right to the end. Best of all, once they threw the green flag for the first heat, they never touched the track after that, even to mist it or do other quick touch ups and it remained fine with very little dust also. 

No hot laps were held on Friday as Thursday was reserved as the practice night for this event with over one hundred and forty cars on hand for that alone. Racing would start just a few minutes late on Friday as the track was just a little bit too slick to start without  a bit of wheel packing. However, after that it was nonstop racing and this was important as they had live music waiting to hit the stage. All racing was done before 11:30 pm which was very good I thought, considering the number of races to be held. 

They will start two hours earlier on Saturday with B Features and main events in all classes on the schedule. 

My only complaint is with them letting the Stock Cars race with the Street Stocks as the Stock Cars have a clear competitive advantage and it amounts to  a slap in the face for your weekly competitors that have supported you all year to force them to race the final event of the year at a disadvantage. The USRA Modifieds also have a big motor advantage over the WISSOTA and IMCA cars but the area drivers always seen to be able to overcome that, so we will see what Saturday brings for the Stock Cars and Street Stocks. 

There was much talk in the pits on Friday with the announcement that the Wagamon family, the owners of Ogilvie Raceway, have obtained a five year contract to take over the promoting of the nearby Princeton Speedway, a track that races on Friday nights. The Princeton Speedway was primarily an IMCA track with only WISSOTA Super Stocks and Mod Fours racing there and all other classes under the IMCA banner. With Ogilvie being a full WISSOTA track, there was much talk about just what classes would be racing there next year. Wagamons have been very successful promoters at Ogilvie after they purchased the track several years ago from the original owners and they are expected to be just as successful with their new venture at Princeton. I am told they are anxious to bring in their equipment and get to work with some reshaping of the track and possible widening of the corners of the quarter mile among their first tasks.