The USMTS troops moved just twenty six miles up the highway from Princeton Minnesota to Saturday night's race scene, the Ogilvie Raceway in Ogilvie Minnesota. For the Chisholm family from Iowa, it was just another chance to show their dominance over the rest of the Modified racers on hand. However, is the spirt of playing fair and taking turns, it was Joe Chisholm's turn to grab the victory and he did so, leading all but two laps of the forty lap Modified feature that was night two of Mod Wars in Minnesota.
It was a very big night of racing and an expensive one to for the management of Ogilvie and not only did they host the USMTS, the Structural Buildings WISSOTA Challenge Series for Late Models was also in action on Saturday and their forty lap, five thousand dollar to win main event went to Josh Zimpel.
WISSOTA sanctioned Midwest Modifieds and Mod Fours rounded out the evening's racing action with Joey Jensen, who used to run frequently with USMTS back in the day, topping a forty plus car field of Midwest Modifieds while Keith Thell, out of retirement after about four years on the sidelines, went to victory lane in the Mod Four in only his second time back behind the wheel of one of the four cylinder Modifieds.
Thirty six Modifieds signed in to race on Saturday with that requiring four heats and a pair of B Features to set the field for the forty lap feature race which on this night started twenty six drivers. WISSOTA drivers shown well early with Jody Bellefeuille and Ryan Gierke setting the quickest times in the two groups with Gierke quickest overall at 16.990 seconds, he being the only driver under seventeen seconds. The redraw number was five on Saturday, setting the lineups for the heat races.
The redraw for the main event found Joe Chisholm on the outside pole with Clayton Wagamon starting right next to him. Chisholm got the jump and took the early lead. However, Wagamon got up on the wheel and moved to the cushion and on lap five he slid past Chisholm to take over the lead on what looked to be a promising move.
However, on the next lap he clobbered the back stretch wall which caused him to fall all the way back to fifth and turn the lead back over to Chisholm. Wagamon would eventually leave the race with his car never again being the same after the concrete impact.
The first of seven yellow flags waved with nine laps complete when Shane Sabraski, who started in the top three rows, slowed with a flat tire and called it a night. Landon Atkinson had moved into second at this point and it was his turn to put the heat on Chisholm as several slide jobs broke out and Atkinson was even able to grab the lead for a single lap on lap twelve before Chisholm crossed him over and then retook the top spot.
However, Chisholm's biggest was Tyler Peterson who started third, rode with the leaders during the first part of the race and then replaced Atkinson as the challenger to Chisholm. Through several yellow flags, one of which saw Kyle Strickler move into the top five and then hammer the concrete to end his night, Peterson continued to stalk Chisholm
Through the mid portion of the race, it was highly entertaining as on nearly every lap, Peterson would slide Chisholm for the top spot, only to see Joe cross Peterson back over and retake the lead. Quietly, Rodney Sanders had moved up into third by the halfway point of the race and going into the last ten laps, it looked like it would remain a two car shootout.
However, that all changed when with just eight laps to go, Peterson pushed too hard in turn one and caught the concrete and ground to a halt, his race completed. Sanders then had the final chance to pull the upset and he did get close, running off the bottom in the corners to pressure the leader.
However, Chisholm did not slip up and he drove home for the win with Sanders, Tanner Mullens, Bellefeuille and Atkinson completing the top five.
Bellefeuille had quite the journey as he was disqualified after his heat. He then had to come from twelfth to just make the feature and then drove up from twenty second to finish fourth and he was still moving forward when the checkers flew. It was a grueling race and nearly half the field ended up being DNF's.
The WISSOTA Challenge Series, the traveling series for WISSOTA Late Models, brought a strong field of thirty drivers to the track and their format also includes qualifying, heat races running for passing points that set up the starting field for the main events.
This marked the first time in quite some time that I had to endure qualifying for two different classes on the same night and for a brief moment I thought I might have been transported East and was at some mysterious UMP race somewhere. But when they didn't qualify the water truck and motor grader I realized this wasn't the case!
Cole Searing, Peterson and Zimpel were the quickest qualifiers in their groups with Peterson quickest overall at 16.354 seconds so the Late Models, even running on a more used up track than the Modifieds, proved that they are indeed the faster class. The Late Models ran three heats and a B Feature to set what would be their twenty five car field for their forty lap main. Tough luck hit Canadian driver Shane Edginton when he had to scratch out of the main event with motor problems.
Zimpel started on the pole and took the early lead from Sabraski, who ran closely behind him during the early laps. Peterson came charging up to third but then, shockingly, on lap nine he spun by himself in turn two and had to go to the tail of the big pack. This cost him dearly as he was only able to race back to mid pack by the end of the contest.
For much of this race, it was a two car battle between Zimpel and Cole Searing who stalked Zimpel. Zimpel was running the "gambler's line", right up against the concrete while Searing run a more conservative line low off the corners.
Things got tough for the leader when he caught a series of slower cars and the traffic saw him have to check up a couple times. breaking his momentum and allowing both Searing and Jeff Massingill to close up on him. Zimpel got caught in traffic badly and on lap thirty three, Searing was able to drive under him and take over the lead, after which Cole was able to put several car lengths on Zimpel.
It looked like Searing was going to steal a win until the yellow flew with just four laps to go for a slowing car. While Searing elected to protect the low side on the restart, Zimpel went for broke, rolling hard into the corners and going back to his original strategy of allowing his car to run up against the concrete. It worked for Josh as he immediately regained the lead and held off Searing the final three laps to take his first ever Challenge Series win and only his second feature win of 2025. He uses a Victory chassis by Moyer, somewhat of a dinosaur in the world of Late Model racing, but Zimpel is a budget racer who makes that combination work, on this night to the tune of five grand!
Massingill had a strong run to finish third with Dave Mass and Joel Bennett, having his best run of the year, completing the top five. Despite six yellows for various spins, only four drivers failed to complete the race and all but two were on the lead lap.
With a twenty five grand to win race just next week at Ogilvie for the Midwest Mods, a large number of them were on hand Saturday to prep for that event with over forty signing in to race. Five heats and a pair of B Features set the running order but it was Jensen who dominated this race.
He started on the inside of row two and quickly moved to second behind early leader Will Moelter, stalking him lap after lap. Finally, on lap nine, Jensen got to the inside of Moelter in turn two and made what turned out to be a winning pass.
The track had been freshly groomed for the MidMods and they were flying around the oval but no one could stay with Jensen and his big Ford power as he pulled out to a nearly full straightaway lead over the field. David Swearingen, who always runs good at Ogilvie, moved into the second spot but he had nothing for Jensen on this night as Joey stayed strong, despite three yellows all near the halfway portion of the race.
After each showdown, he again pulled away for a comfortable lead with the last eight laps running off nonstop. Behind Swearingen, Paul Ripley topped a three car battle for third with Parker Anderson and Jason VandeKamp completing the top five. It was a smooth race overall with only four drivers not finishing the event.
In the wee hours of the morning, Keith Thell led from start to finish to win the Mod Four feature. Thell was one of the best around in this class until he called it a career four years ago but with the offer to drive a top notch car, he has returned and will obviously make things tough for the current hot shots in this class as he won on only his second time out.
He started on the pole and held off Rowan Tramm through a series of yellow flags that saw the action stopped five times during the first half of the race. Each time, Thell pulled away and at the end, Tramm had to fight off Blake Hawker to claim the second spot. Tyler Larson and Bob Holtquist completed the top five after apparent third place finisher Dustin Holtquist had some issues in tech post race.
The grandstands, by the way, were packed for this event so there is apparently a desire to see combination big specials featuring fender and open wheel cars racing on the same show. You can bet the Wagamon family that own Ogilvie took notice of this fact and despite the fact they were paying out quite a large purse, they came out just fine, thank you.
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