The Hawkeye Dirt Tour came to the Hancock County Speedway in Britt as a part of the pre holiday Salute to the Veterans night on Tuesday, June 28th. All five of the regular divisions that race at Hancock County were on hand to race with all five racing for significantly increased purses. I attended this night of racing last year and it was a big show and the anticipation was that it would be so again in 2016.
It was nearly a perfect night for auto racing in northern Iowa from both a temperature and wind standpoint. It was a big night for promoter Joe Ringsdorf with a full grandstand and a pit area jammed with one hundred and thirty nine race cars. The Modifieds topped the list with forty four entrants on hand but the other IMCA classes also had very good fields with the exception of the Sport Compacts who failed to field enough entrants for more than one heat.
The Modified field was strong indeed with the best from the local area, plus many travelers from the state and beyond. With drivers like Ricky Thornton Jr and Kyle Strickler on hand to duel with the area's best, everyone had their game face on and the heat races were spectacular in all divisions with several last lap passes and plenty of tin swapping. At least three drivers were "set down" for overly aggressive driving and it was not a night for the weak of heart.
B features were necessary for the Sport Mods, Stock Cars and Modifieds before the feature fields could be finalized. One of the drivers fighting to make the main in the Sport Mods was the #7G car. When I walked into the pits, I thought immediately that I recognized the car but felt I must be mistaken because I thought the car was one I saw in Arizona in January.
Turns out for once I was correct. The driver was Dennis Gates from the Tucson area of Arizona. When I first went out to the January race in Tucson, Dennis was racing a Modified but in the last couple years he has switched over to running a Sport Mod. He told me he is running in the top twenty in IMCA national points right now and would like to stay there if possible.
Dennis said that he came East to watch Ricky Thornton Jr in action and brought his race car along to have some fun. It has always been on his "bucket list" to come back and race in the Midwest and Boone for Super Nationals and since he is now retired, this was the year to do it. He plans to hang around Iowa through the middle of September when he will return to Arizona as their season restarts after taking off for the hot summer months. He said that he was racing at Central Arizona Speedway recently and when the races were completed, the temperature was still 111 degrees! Dennis will be starting his fortieth year of racing in 2017. Tuesday he suffered heartbreak as he missed qualifying for the main event by a single position in the B feature!
Thornton Jr drew the pole for the thirty lap modified feature and that seemed to have settled the issue before the race even started as Ricky looked very strong in his heat race. Sure enough, they dropped the green and after a brief battle with Jeremy Mills, Ricky started to check out on the field.
However, auto races are tough to predict, and just when it looked like the race was over, Thornton Jr suddenly slowed and dropped into the infield, his race done. Corey Dripps, who started eighth, inherited the lead and he proceeded to motor away from the field. There were plenty of laps remaining when he got the lead but no one was able to cut into his advantage, including drivers like Mills, Shryock Ruter and Noteboom. Corey was on a rail and no one would come close to him the rest of the way. The Modifieds put on a race as it should be run, with the main event going thirty laps nonstop and only five drivers not finishing the event. There also was only one lapped car in thirty laps, proof that everyone on the track was running pretty darn competitively.
While the Modified feature was interesting, the Stock Car and Sport Mod features were clearly the best races of the night with both of these main events being real dandies.
The Sport Mod feature saw Johnathan Logue, Colby Fett and Jared Boumeester race three wide for most of the race. It was a fantastic job by all three as Fett ran the high side, Logue hugged the tires like he did last week when he won the big money in the Sport Mod special and Boumeester refused to be left behind as lap after lap he would slide between the two front runners each time they braked for the corners.
The three went back and forth with Logue and Fett trading the lead and Boumeester refusing to back down. Near the end of the race, a third and final yellow flew and on the green Logue bobbled slightly. This allowed Boumeester to finally get in front of him and then he quickly drove past Fett to take over the lead. That was the finishing order. Let's not forget George Nordman who missed his heat after hot lap troubles, started twelfth in the B and qualified for the main and then came from twentieth to fifth at the finish. That's a lot of cars to pass in one night. It was an excellent race.
The Stock Car field was both big and talented and their feature race was especially good also. Damon Murty got to the front quickly from his second row starting spot and he did build up a decent sized lead.
However, a couple of yellows bunched the field and then suddenly it was Cayden Carter who was the man on the move. Carter, who has eight in a row and counting at Osky and someone I have seen dominate there, picked up the pace and started driving under car after car as he moved to the front. Carter is one very smooth driver, and his charge was so non flashy until suddenly, there he was knocking of Murty's rear bumper.
Carter made his winning pass as he made them all night, driving deep into the corners and racing up under drivers to take spots. Murty tried to stay with him after being passed but Carter gradually pulled away in the last few laps.
The track looked at busy during the Hobby Stock feature as the county road leaving the track did a little while later. Thirteen rows of cars took the green flag for only twelve laps and I expected the worst. However, the drivers surprised me as while there were four yellow flags for minor spins, there was not even a single grinding crash which is what I anticipated.
Cody Nielsen won the feature with a scenario that very much matched last Tuesday's race. He took the lead and appeared ready to pull away after dominated the preliminary action once again. However, just as last Tuesday, he would slip out of the groove and be passed, this time by Des Moines' John Watson. And again, just like last Tuesday, he would again pick up the pace and make a late race pass to reassert himself as the leader. Cory Probst also got by Watson at the end to finish second.
I saw Devin Jones lead from start to finish in the Sport Compact main event. However, the official press release from IMCA lists Jay DeVries, who crossed the line second, as the winner. Perhaps there was a disqualification that I am not aware of so I would advise that Sport Compact fans to further research on this question.
The race track was much improved from last Tuesday's show and allowed the cars to move much more around the track and use different grooves which in turn made the program so much the better. The program did get a bit long with the final checkered not waving until around 11:30 pm. The only complaint would be that we got started rather late as the hot laps for all those cars plus a long driver's meeting moved the first green flag back to 7:45 pm. After that though, it was nonstop racing with one race hardly receiving the checkered before the next race hit the track. Even the victory lane ceremonies were held until after all the races were completed to save time. Overall, it was an excellent night of racing.
Wednesday, June 29, 2016
Thursday, June 23, 2016
Carter, What Are You Doing, Carter?
Fans from the old TV series, "Hogan's Heroes" will remember that famous line. Kindhearted Sgt. Schultz would often utter those lines to Pvt. Carter, one of Hogan's men.
In the context of the Southern Iowa Speedway, the answer to that question is, "winning another feature race." Although they barely missed a clean sweep when Zack VanderBeek edged out Cayden in the Modified feature, Cayden still won yet another Stock Car feature race while Brayton won the Sport Mod feature in racing action Wednesday night at the Southern Iowa Raceway as the Carter name was the headline attraction.
Let's be perfectly honest here. Osky was not my first choice for Wednesday night racing. I came to Iowa this week hunting for some Late Model racing but the weather took care of that quickly on Wednesday as the Summer Nationals event scheduled for Wednesday at Farley was drowned out early in the day. Fortunately, there were some alternative options and after studying the weather and determining what I would prefer to see, it was off to the Mahaska County Fairgrounds for another taste of IMCA racing on the big half mile at Osky.
The program was a weekly, five division program but extra money was added to the purse in various positions and in various classes. Any Modified that would finish on the lead lap would be guaranteed $150. The top three in the Stock Car feature and the top two in the Hobby Stock feature would receive the same winning payoff and there was also a bounty issued on Carter in the Stock Cars with an extra $100 to the winner if he/she could beat Carter and Cayden would finish the race. If Carter wins four weeks in a row, he would receive the $100 for each week or a total of an extra $400. The event was called the Dave Lowry Memorial but if there was any explanation of who Dave was or the significance of the night, I missed it.
Drivers were inspecting the track before the show as the inside tires had been moved out about a car length all the way around the track. Apparently the Fair Board had done some measuring and they wanted the track to be an exact half mile oval, thus the moving of the tires. No one on hand could explain the significance of such a thing, but that's what the Fair Board wanted so promoter Mike VanGenderen just sat back, bit his tongue and let them do their thing.
It was a steamy, steamy night in southern Iowa Wednesday and my first real dose of Summer weather. However, I didn't seem to be the only one suffering as there were quite a few people commenting on the humid conditions. I believe it did also affect the attendance which was down from what I normally see at Osky.
Osky has been one of a number of tracks that have been suffering from short fields in some of their divisions, thus the innovative cash additions to the purse as a way to spur some different cars to show up on Wednesdays. Again on this Wednesday they weren't exactly overwhelming the vast confines of the Osky pit area as fifty seven cars signed in to race in the five IMCA classes offered.
However, the good news was that the drivers proved that it wasn't necessary to have a teeming pit of race cars to have some good racing. Actually, the Stock Car and Modified features were both excellent events with the Stock Car main especially being one of the best races seen by me in quite some time.
Zack VanderBeek, who was doing double duty driving a car from the Nathan Wood stable, led much of the early going in the Stock Car main. He had plenty of competition from Wood, Mike Hughes, Todd Reitzler and Damon Murty. Carter started ninth on the grid and it took him some time to work his way through traffic, as the race remained under the green from start to finish.
However, eventually Carter worked his way toward the front and the battle was on. Unlike most of the drivers, Carter was willing to go both high and low to pass cars as he showed great confidence in the ability of his race car to run all over the track. After some furious battling, he finally got to the front by getting past Murty and he drove on to his eighth straight win here, as he has been the only Stock Car to win at this track this season! That is quite a remarkable achievement.
Brother Brayton was just about as impressive in the Sport Mods and he actually got to the front even faster than his brother. Brayton also started ninth in the Sport Mod main but he found an opening early in the race and shot to the front like he was fired out of a cannon. Once in front, he pulled away in a race that was only stopped once, on the second lap, and after that ran green to checkered.
Cayden had a little more trouble getting to the front in the Modified feature but except for a strong running VanderBeek, he might have won that race too. Zack had his IROC chassis working well and despite several challenges from Carter and Colt Mather, he was strong enough to fight them off for the win. While VanderBeek's two race cars for the night arrived on open trailers, Zack also had his big doublestacker on hand as he was ready to roll out for a race in Minnesota on Thursday as soon as the show was over on Wednesday.
Dustin Griffiths and Cody VanDusen dominated the Hobby Stock and Sport Compact features respectively. The two races had a total of one yellow between them with the winners getting to the front early and driving away from the field.
The vintage Sprint Cars made an appearance on Wednesday also. There was a #88 yellow car that raced that was a dead ringer for a car I used to see race every week at home. The driver was Bob Hop from the Twin Cities and the car had the Justice Brothers sponsorship on it too. I wish I had made the trip over to the back pit before the races to find out just who was driving that car, as he was never identified on the track, even though he won the feature.
As usual, the program was a quickly run show as is the norm at Osky. Even with a break after the heats to hold some kid's rides, the final checkered waved before 10 pm and I walked in the back door at home at 4 am, another race in the books.
VanGenderen has some big special shows coming up, some on nights other than their regular Wednesday night shows. Check the speedway website and facebook page for more information.
In the context of the Southern Iowa Speedway, the answer to that question is, "winning another feature race." Although they barely missed a clean sweep when Zack VanderBeek edged out Cayden in the Modified feature, Cayden still won yet another Stock Car feature race while Brayton won the Sport Mod feature in racing action Wednesday night at the Southern Iowa Raceway as the Carter name was the headline attraction.
Let's be perfectly honest here. Osky was not my first choice for Wednesday night racing. I came to Iowa this week hunting for some Late Model racing but the weather took care of that quickly on Wednesday as the Summer Nationals event scheduled for Wednesday at Farley was drowned out early in the day. Fortunately, there were some alternative options and after studying the weather and determining what I would prefer to see, it was off to the Mahaska County Fairgrounds for another taste of IMCA racing on the big half mile at Osky.
The program was a weekly, five division program but extra money was added to the purse in various positions and in various classes. Any Modified that would finish on the lead lap would be guaranteed $150. The top three in the Stock Car feature and the top two in the Hobby Stock feature would receive the same winning payoff and there was also a bounty issued on Carter in the Stock Cars with an extra $100 to the winner if he/she could beat Carter and Cayden would finish the race. If Carter wins four weeks in a row, he would receive the $100 for each week or a total of an extra $400. The event was called the Dave Lowry Memorial but if there was any explanation of who Dave was or the significance of the night, I missed it.
Drivers were inspecting the track before the show as the inside tires had been moved out about a car length all the way around the track. Apparently the Fair Board had done some measuring and they wanted the track to be an exact half mile oval, thus the moving of the tires. No one on hand could explain the significance of such a thing, but that's what the Fair Board wanted so promoter Mike VanGenderen just sat back, bit his tongue and let them do their thing.
It was a steamy, steamy night in southern Iowa Wednesday and my first real dose of Summer weather. However, I didn't seem to be the only one suffering as there were quite a few people commenting on the humid conditions. I believe it did also affect the attendance which was down from what I normally see at Osky.
Osky has been one of a number of tracks that have been suffering from short fields in some of their divisions, thus the innovative cash additions to the purse as a way to spur some different cars to show up on Wednesdays. Again on this Wednesday they weren't exactly overwhelming the vast confines of the Osky pit area as fifty seven cars signed in to race in the five IMCA classes offered.
However, the good news was that the drivers proved that it wasn't necessary to have a teeming pit of race cars to have some good racing. Actually, the Stock Car and Modified features were both excellent events with the Stock Car main especially being one of the best races seen by me in quite some time.
Zack VanderBeek, who was doing double duty driving a car from the Nathan Wood stable, led much of the early going in the Stock Car main. He had plenty of competition from Wood, Mike Hughes, Todd Reitzler and Damon Murty. Carter started ninth on the grid and it took him some time to work his way through traffic, as the race remained under the green from start to finish.
However, eventually Carter worked his way toward the front and the battle was on. Unlike most of the drivers, Carter was willing to go both high and low to pass cars as he showed great confidence in the ability of his race car to run all over the track. After some furious battling, he finally got to the front by getting past Murty and he drove on to his eighth straight win here, as he has been the only Stock Car to win at this track this season! That is quite a remarkable achievement.
Brother Brayton was just about as impressive in the Sport Mods and he actually got to the front even faster than his brother. Brayton also started ninth in the Sport Mod main but he found an opening early in the race and shot to the front like he was fired out of a cannon. Once in front, he pulled away in a race that was only stopped once, on the second lap, and after that ran green to checkered.
Cayden had a little more trouble getting to the front in the Modified feature but except for a strong running VanderBeek, he might have won that race too. Zack had his IROC chassis working well and despite several challenges from Carter and Colt Mather, he was strong enough to fight them off for the win. While VanderBeek's two race cars for the night arrived on open trailers, Zack also had his big doublestacker on hand as he was ready to roll out for a race in Minnesota on Thursday as soon as the show was over on Wednesday.
Dustin Griffiths and Cody VanDusen dominated the Hobby Stock and Sport Compact features respectively. The two races had a total of one yellow between them with the winners getting to the front early and driving away from the field.
The vintage Sprint Cars made an appearance on Wednesday also. There was a #88 yellow car that raced that was a dead ringer for a car I used to see race every week at home. The driver was Bob Hop from the Twin Cities and the car had the Justice Brothers sponsorship on it too. I wish I had made the trip over to the back pit before the races to find out just who was driving that car, as he was never identified on the track, even though he won the feature.
As usual, the program was a quickly run show as is the norm at Osky. Even with a break after the heats to hold some kid's rides, the final checkered waved before 10 pm and I walked in the back door at home at 4 am, another race in the books.
VanGenderen has some big special shows coming up, some on nights other than their regular Wednesday night shows. Check the speedway website and facebook page for more information.
Wednesday, June 22, 2016
Logue-A-Motion at Britt
It was a steamy Tuesday night on June 21st at the Hancock County Speedway in Britt. Thunderstorms were in the forecast but the weather people promised that they wouldn't arrive until 11pm or so, and while it's a dangerous thing to rely upon the weather people to control your destiny, that's pretty much what we were doing.
No hobos were sighted in Britt, but lots of IMCA Sport Mods as the event we were on hand to see was the annual Northern SportMod Topless Nationals with somewhere between $2,500 and $4,000 on hand for the winner, based on bonuses that some of the drivers could qualify for.
Interestingly, while the event name includes a reference to Sport Mods racing topless, there were no topless cars on hand as a decree on facebook this week indicated that all cars must have roofs on them. There was no indication why this changed and no reference made to it at the track Tuesday, but I'm guessing it had something to do with the sanctioning of the event and the cars not complying to basis rules without roofs. I didn't hear a single reference to it on Tuesday, either in the pits or in the grandstands and I guess it was a nonissue for most.
Much was added to the evening when I ran into Paul Vetter in the pits. Paul in the West Coast Regional Director for IMCA and was making his annual pilgrimage back to the Midwest for a week or so of solid dirt track racing. Paul is an almost endless fount of knowledge of what is going on in the world of racing and it is always a pleasure to talk to him. My only regret is that we usually only run into each other once or twice a year and most times he is so busy it's hard to commandeer too much of his valuable time.
Another person I always run into when I visit a Joe Ringsdorf promotion is announcer Chad Meyer. Meyer does best what a good announcer should do and that is to make sure the basics are covered. That would include telling the crowd who the drivers are, where they are from and just as importantly, who qualifies for the main, how many from the heats etc. I was just reading a rant on some board recently by someone who was complaining about many announcers being so worried about mentioning all fifteen sponsors on every race car and all twenty eight billboard sponsors the track has that they have no time to give the fans the basic information they need to make their evening more pleasurable. Meyer is not guilty of that. Being as interested in the qualifying information as anyone, I was pleased to hear when he told us how many Sport Mods qualified out of the heats, how many from the B's etc, rather than constantly reminded us that the track has the best hot dogs North of the Mason-Dixon line!
Along with the Sport Mod Nationals, all the classes that normally race at Hancock County were also in action as tonight's program replaces their regular Saturday night show this week. Modifieds, Stock Cars, Hobby Stocks and Sport Compacts were all also on the card. However, the Sport Mods had more competitors than the other four classes combined with only the Hobby Stocks needed two heat races to set their order for the main events.
A one spin rule in the heats kept the program moving as the clouds started streaming in from the West and the Sport Mods could have probably also used the same rule for their B's, as these were the only qualifying races of the night that seemed to get bogged down in yellows.
But, before we knew it, it was feature time with the premier event of the evening, the Sport Mod main event, saved for last. Often times for a show like this, with one of the support classes having the special, there would be plenty of people who came to see other classes race "bail" before the final event but it seemed that just about everyone stayed around to watch the Sport Mods in the finale.
Twenty four of the forty three Sport Mods made the main, with thirty laps being the distance. It was an interesting main event with lots of twists and turns. The first two thirds of the race went by with only a single yellow. Then the yellow bunting started to wave with regularity with five yellows in a four lap period, all leading to a five lap sprint to the finish.
For most of the race, Jared Boumeester was the leader with Carter VandenBerg chasing him. Behind those two, there was a cluster of cars that traded positions back and forth. However, I was keeping an eye on B feature winner Johnathan Logue who had won that event by running the low side of the track. I'm thinking that his B feature run was very beneficial to him when it came to setting up his car for the main event.
All the previous feature races had been won by driving hugging the low side of the track. However, they brought out the unique water bus to prep the track before the last feature, and this changed the dynamic of the track, making it a high groove track for the start of the Sport Mod main. However, I was keeping an eye on the track, as I felt it might change as the race progressed and turn back into a low side track.
Logue was doing the same thing as he chose to run the low side of the track throughout the event. For awhile the progress was slow but then he started to pick up the pace and with most of the drivers racing high in the corners, he had an open lane to the front of the field. With a few wrecks and yellows, suddenly he found himself in a position to challenge for the win.
Three times Logue passed Boumeester for the lead, only to have the pass negated by another yellow flag. Jared was trying as hard as he could but he simply couldn't keep his car on the bottom of the track where he needed to be, and finally, on the fourth shot, Logue drove under him and the pass counted and Logue then drove away for the win.
Logue was more than pleased with the win, stating that it was the first feature race that he had ever won at a track other than Boone. Austin Luellen also got past Boumeester before he could get to the bottom lane of the track. Same Wieben and VandenBerg completed the top five.
The Modified feature had a crazy finish. Clint Wendel had led from the start but near the end of the race he was getting slower and slower with the rest of the top five runners all catching him but due to the one lane nature of the track, no one was able to pass him as he guarded the low side. Finally, Jesse Hoeft made a move in turn four as the field came for the white flag. The leaders got together with both catching a fair amount of air. Hoeft suffered a flat tire in the contact and he slid off turn four into the track drive way while Wendel was able to keep going and with the track clear, the starter showed the field the white flag and then the checkered and Wendel drove home for the win.
When you say "Smith" in Iowa, you say feature win and Tuesday it was David, the only Smith on hand who was the winner. He got to the front early in the Stock Car feature and withstood a strong challenge from Derek Green for the win. Kevin Opheim gave all those in the stands who love to boo him some thrills as he went flying off the end of the track during the heat and broke the front end, which pleased his detractors no end. However, he did come from the back of the feature field to salvage a third place in the main event.
Cody Nielsen has been dominating the Hobby Stock class here this year and he added another victory to his totals Tuesday. He got to the front quickly too but then slipped up and let Andrew Borchardt pass him. Nielsen had to get his elbows up and dig and after a restart he was able to get under Borchardt down the back chute and retake the lead which he then maintained to the finish.
Oliver Monson cruised to the Sport Compact win over a small field of competitors with many of the regulars missing on this night.
One noticeable observation about the track I can make is how much the surface seems to have changed in recent years. It used to be that Hancock County was one of those black dirt tracks in Iowa where I could almost guarantee that the surface would remain sticky all night and the motors would be pulling so hard that they would be groaning in pain. Walk across the track after the races and it would still just about suck your shoes right off your feet. Now days just the opposite is the case as it is usually slick and hard to get a hold of. Once the track was rolled in, you would never see any kind of equipment on the track after that. Now days, the misting truck spends as much time on the track as do most of the race cars. Has this change come as the result of the types of motors that many race now days, with the low horsepower crates certainly liking a slick track much more than a heavy one. I do not know the answer to this but it is certainly different than it used to be.
In his final year as promoter at Hancock County before he retires, Joe Ringsdorf as many big events still on the schedule. Next up is Tuesday, June 28th with his Salute to the Veterans race. All veterans and their wives get in for free, big money is on the line for all divisions and the Hawkeye Dirt Tour Modifieds will be racing also.
No hobos were sighted in Britt, but lots of IMCA Sport Mods as the event we were on hand to see was the annual Northern SportMod Topless Nationals with somewhere between $2,500 and $4,000 on hand for the winner, based on bonuses that some of the drivers could qualify for.
Interestingly, while the event name includes a reference to Sport Mods racing topless, there were no topless cars on hand as a decree on facebook this week indicated that all cars must have roofs on them. There was no indication why this changed and no reference made to it at the track Tuesday, but I'm guessing it had something to do with the sanctioning of the event and the cars not complying to basis rules without roofs. I didn't hear a single reference to it on Tuesday, either in the pits or in the grandstands and I guess it was a nonissue for most.
Much was added to the evening when I ran into Paul Vetter in the pits. Paul in the West Coast Regional Director for IMCA and was making his annual pilgrimage back to the Midwest for a week or so of solid dirt track racing. Paul is an almost endless fount of knowledge of what is going on in the world of racing and it is always a pleasure to talk to him. My only regret is that we usually only run into each other once or twice a year and most times he is so busy it's hard to commandeer too much of his valuable time.
Another person I always run into when I visit a Joe Ringsdorf promotion is announcer Chad Meyer. Meyer does best what a good announcer should do and that is to make sure the basics are covered. That would include telling the crowd who the drivers are, where they are from and just as importantly, who qualifies for the main, how many from the heats etc. I was just reading a rant on some board recently by someone who was complaining about many announcers being so worried about mentioning all fifteen sponsors on every race car and all twenty eight billboard sponsors the track has that they have no time to give the fans the basic information they need to make their evening more pleasurable. Meyer is not guilty of that. Being as interested in the qualifying information as anyone, I was pleased to hear when he told us how many Sport Mods qualified out of the heats, how many from the B's etc, rather than constantly reminded us that the track has the best hot dogs North of the Mason-Dixon line!
Along with the Sport Mod Nationals, all the classes that normally race at Hancock County were also in action as tonight's program replaces their regular Saturday night show this week. Modifieds, Stock Cars, Hobby Stocks and Sport Compacts were all also on the card. However, the Sport Mods had more competitors than the other four classes combined with only the Hobby Stocks needed two heat races to set their order for the main events.
A one spin rule in the heats kept the program moving as the clouds started streaming in from the West and the Sport Mods could have probably also used the same rule for their B's, as these were the only qualifying races of the night that seemed to get bogged down in yellows.
But, before we knew it, it was feature time with the premier event of the evening, the Sport Mod main event, saved for last. Often times for a show like this, with one of the support classes having the special, there would be plenty of people who came to see other classes race "bail" before the final event but it seemed that just about everyone stayed around to watch the Sport Mods in the finale.
Twenty four of the forty three Sport Mods made the main, with thirty laps being the distance. It was an interesting main event with lots of twists and turns. The first two thirds of the race went by with only a single yellow. Then the yellow bunting started to wave with regularity with five yellows in a four lap period, all leading to a five lap sprint to the finish.
For most of the race, Jared Boumeester was the leader with Carter VandenBerg chasing him. Behind those two, there was a cluster of cars that traded positions back and forth. However, I was keeping an eye on B feature winner Johnathan Logue who had won that event by running the low side of the track. I'm thinking that his B feature run was very beneficial to him when it came to setting up his car for the main event.
All the previous feature races had been won by driving hugging the low side of the track. However, they brought out the unique water bus to prep the track before the last feature, and this changed the dynamic of the track, making it a high groove track for the start of the Sport Mod main. However, I was keeping an eye on the track, as I felt it might change as the race progressed and turn back into a low side track.
Logue was doing the same thing as he chose to run the low side of the track throughout the event. For awhile the progress was slow but then he started to pick up the pace and with most of the drivers racing high in the corners, he had an open lane to the front of the field. With a few wrecks and yellows, suddenly he found himself in a position to challenge for the win.
Three times Logue passed Boumeester for the lead, only to have the pass negated by another yellow flag. Jared was trying as hard as he could but he simply couldn't keep his car on the bottom of the track where he needed to be, and finally, on the fourth shot, Logue drove under him and the pass counted and Logue then drove away for the win.
Logue was more than pleased with the win, stating that it was the first feature race that he had ever won at a track other than Boone. Austin Luellen also got past Boumeester before he could get to the bottom lane of the track. Same Wieben and VandenBerg completed the top five.
The Modified feature had a crazy finish. Clint Wendel had led from the start but near the end of the race he was getting slower and slower with the rest of the top five runners all catching him but due to the one lane nature of the track, no one was able to pass him as he guarded the low side. Finally, Jesse Hoeft made a move in turn four as the field came for the white flag. The leaders got together with both catching a fair amount of air. Hoeft suffered a flat tire in the contact and he slid off turn four into the track drive way while Wendel was able to keep going and with the track clear, the starter showed the field the white flag and then the checkered and Wendel drove home for the win.
When you say "Smith" in Iowa, you say feature win and Tuesday it was David, the only Smith on hand who was the winner. He got to the front early in the Stock Car feature and withstood a strong challenge from Derek Green for the win. Kevin Opheim gave all those in the stands who love to boo him some thrills as he went flying off the end of the track during the heat and broke the front end, which pleased his detractors no end. However, he did come from the back of the feature field to salvage a third place in the main event.
Cody Nielsen has been dominating the Hobby Stock class here this year and he added another victory to his totals Tuesday. He got to the front quickly too but then slipped up and let Andrew Borchardt pass him. Nielsen had to get his elbows up and dig and after a restart he was able to get under Borchardt down the back chute and retake the lead which he then maintained to the finish.
Oliver Monson cruised to the Sport Compact win over a small field of competitors with many of the regulars missing on this night.
One noticeable observation about the track I can make is how much the surface seems to have changed in recent years. It used to be that Hancock County was one of those black dirt tracks in Iowa where I could almost guarantee that the surface would remain sticky all night and the motors would be pulling so hard that they would be groaning in pain. Walk across the track after the races and it would still just about suck your shoes right off your feet. Now days just the opposite is the case as it is usually slick and hard to get a hold of. Once the track was rolled in, you would never see any kind of equipment on the track after that. Now days, the misting truck spends as much time on the track as do most of the race cars. Has this change come as the result of the types of motors that many race now days, with the low horsepower crates certainly liking a slick track much more than a heavy one. I do not know the answer to this but it is certainly different than it used to be.
In his final year as promoter at Hancock County before he retires, Joe Ringsdorf as many big events still on the schedule. Next up is Tuesday, June 28th with his Salute to the Veterans race. All veterans and their wives get in for free, big money is on the line for all divisions and the Hawkeye Dirt Tour Modifieds will be racing also.
Friday, June 17, 2016
Hughes Wins USMTS at KRA; What Really Happened?
The United States Modified Touring Series has been battling the weather a lot this year. Twice this week already they have been rained out of their scheduled events. As they move farther North for a show in Minnesota and then over into Wisconsin before they head to their second mega event of the 2016 racing racing season at the I-94 Speedway in Fergus Falls Mn next week, the weather has finally started to improve for them.
Thursday the cars were finally out of the trailers and racing took place at the KRA Speedway in Willmar Minnesota, for an appearance at this track for the second straight year. Last year's initial appearance here was a big hit so a follow up performance was in the cards. On a beautiful early Summer day, a nice crowd was on hand to watch the USMTS in action along with three WISSOTA sanctioned classes and the local Hobby Stocks.
KRA Speedway is a fairgrounds track, sitting smack dab in a residential, North side neighborhood in Willmar and virtually surrounded on all sides by lakes. The land the fairgrounds sits on is prime residential property and would be worth a mint to a developer. In fact, several times there have been pushes to move the fairgrounds out into the country North of town and turn the existing fairgrounds into a housing development. Trust me when I say that the some of the lakeside property on the fairgrounds would be worth millions to a realtor but so far, the move hasn't been accomplished. The fairgrounds is a historic one, and there are a group of people that have been fighting to keep it where it currently is. The racetrack actually sits in a low spot of the fairgrounds and was a water passage between two lakes that butt up against the fairgrounds. The track actually sits at a lower elevation than either of the lakes so when it rains, the track and pits get wet easily and are slow to dry. In fact, even on Thursday, with rain earlier in the week the pits were quite muddy as was the low groove on the race track and most of the day was spent dragging both so they would dry out.
KRA is a club run facility that has gone through both good and tough times, as most club run facilities have. They have had a pretty good relationship with the city of Willmar but that fluctuates with who is running the board that directs the track and with so many houses and businesses close to the track, there is always pressure on the city to shut down those infernal noisy, smoky, dust producing race cars that disturb the quiet Thursday nights. The track is on a tight curfew and because the that, they must start their race programs promptly at 6:30 p.m in order to ensure that they are done by curfew which I believe is now 10:30 p.m.
KRA has been embroiled in a battle this Spring with a driver that has brought nothing but negative publicity to the track and has led to some drivers informally boycotting the track. The battle has been waged against Tim Johnson of Brainerd Minnesota. Johnson, an accomplished racer and regular at the track the last couple of years, races cars in three classes at the track. He runs Modifieds, Super Stocks and Street Stocks. He is a big winner in all three classes and totaled over one hundred feature wins between the three cars last year, an impressive statistic that the national racing media completely missed.
Apparently there are some on the board, or are connected to members of the board, that didn't like him racing in three classes. They got the board to issue a rule that would not allow Johnson to race his Street Stock at the track. With all three classes being under WISSOTA sanctioning, this immediately got the sanctioning body involved. They ruled that while any track can refuse entry of a driver to their facility, they are not allowed to mandate what classes a driver can, or can not race in. It simply wasn't legal. KRA didn't like this and I understand that the sanctioning body and the track aren't on the best of terms because of this decision.
But the board at KRA wasn't done yet. They really didn't want Johnson to race his Street at their track so they tried a different way of banning him. What they did was come up with a ridiculously scaled entry fee for drivers racing in multiple classes. If you race in one class, it costs thirty dollars to entry the night's racing. Two classes costs ninety dollars and for Johnson, who routinely races in three classes at the track, the entry fee each night is three hundred and forty dollars! Where they came up with these figures, no one seems to know. Four classes costs five hundred and ninety dollars and five classes costs a whopping eight hundred and forty dollars, just to enter the cars for one night!
Well, what they thought they had done, turned around to back fire in their faces. Johnson's car owner, Ernie Wollak, a well heeled construction company owner in St. Cloud Minnesota and a bit of a rogue himself, accepted the challenge they threw at him. Johnson has been running three cars at KRA, including the most inflammatory of the three, the Street Stock, weekly. Wollak has stated that he is willing to pay the exorbitant entry fee, just to "rub it in the faces" of those that tried to arbitrarily ban his driver.
Johnson has been winning with regularity again this year. In fact, he won the Street feature on this night and is approaching twenty feature wins on the season already and led for the first half of the USMTS Modified main, with his WISSOTA legal Modified before settling for third, but that is another story.
KRA has gained some additional money from the Wollak Team, due to their high entry fees but has more than offset this by the amount of negative publicity the move has generated. And there are a high number of drivers in central Minnesota that race in multiple classes and many of them, former regulars at the track, have mostly stayed away from KRA this year due to their new ruling on entry fees.
Both Johnson and Wollak have lots of connections in central Minnesota and there has been talk that they might line up rides for Johnson in two of the other sanctioned classes at the track that Johnson doesn't currently have cars for, the Midwest Modifieds and the Mod Fours and show up some night to race in all five classes! Now if the board would accept that they made a mistake and promote an event like this correctly , I could see it being a huge attraction that would pack the place. "See if Tim Johnson Can Win All Five Feature Races This Thursday Night," could be a gigantic event but it will probably never happen because some people's stubbornness is only matched by their lack of creativity.
However, I digress and we should move on to the evening's main event, the USMTS Modifieds who on this night had issues of their own.
The aforementioned Johnson started on the pole for the USMTS Mod feature and took the early lead after a brief battle with Jake Timm. Johnson was flying and built up a big lead as Timm fought to hold off a charging Jason Hughes, who has started in row four. They were having an excellent battle for second but Johnson was getting away from both of them, as he worked through lapped traffic easily and extended his lead.
The first yellow flew on lap twenty for a stalled Jesse Sobbing, who had reported to me earlier in the evening that for one of the few times this year, he was not running a crate engine in his car on this night.
Johnson again built up a big lead on the restart while Timm and Hughes continued to battle for second. That's when things got sticky. Johnson had nearly a straightaway lead and without a yellow, I don't think there was a chance that anyone would have caught him. Hughes desperately needed another yellow but who could have guessed that he would trigger it and then use it to his advantage!
As Timm and Hughes battled for second, they raced hard into turn three. Timm had the advantage and as they raced hard into the corner, Hughes clipped the left rear of Timm and turned him around after which he spun up to the wall, triggering the yellow.
The cars idled around the track for several laps, after which the call was made to send Timm to the back while Hughes maintained second. This set off quite a series of "eye rolling" in the stands as most everyone had seen Hughes, while certainly not intentionally, but nevertheless he had clearly clipped Timm and Jake would not have spun except for "the help" he received from Hughes. Timm balked but reluctantly went to the tail,and soon pulled off after the green reappeared.
I don't think anyone in the crowd, knowing how USMTS realigns their races, would expect Timm to be restored to second. However, I have seen on many occasions when contact caused a yellow that both drivers would be sent to the tail and I fully felt that was the proper call in this case. But, for whatever reason, it wasn't done in this case. Of course, the conspiracy advocates will immediately look at the fact that Hughes is a USMTS regular and the region point leader and draw their own conclusion. I would prefer to believe that someone just missed the call, but I have to admit it was about as open and shut case as one could ever see, and I wonder.
Jake's father is Bob Timm, who owns and operates the Mississippi Thunder Speedway in Fountain City Wisconsin, a track that runs primarily USRA rules including USRA Modifieds. I would expect that he and Todd Staley probably had a long discussion on this call.
On the restart and with his big lead gone and perhaps his tires also, Johnson just couldn't keep up the pace running the cushion and after a few laps, Hughes drove under him for the lead and then gradually pulled away. On the last couple of laps, Rodney Sanders also got past Johnson for second. Area racer Jason Thoeness had a great run for fourth with southern Minnesota youngster Jacob Bleess rounding out the top five. Justin Oestreich, in another WISSOTA legal car, also finished in the top ten.
I did notice that the official press release for the event completely avoided the issue and just stated that Hughes moved from third to first following a lap twenty seven yellow. No explanation was made of what caused the yellow or any of the circumstances. It was a particularly puzzling event in what is usually a rock solid series.
Staley did note earlier that he is hoping for seventy cars for the first annual Summer Sota at I-94 next week, an event paying fifteen grand to the winner in what will be the biggest event so far at I-94 as this event replaces the typical midsummer special hosted by Deer Creek Speedway. Tickets are still available for this race.
Thursday the cars were finally out of the trailers and racing took place at the KRA Speedway in Willmar Minnesota, for an appearance at this track for the second straight year. Last year's initial appearance here was a big hit so a follow up performance was in the cards. On a beautiful early Summer day, a nice crowd was on hand to watch the USMTS in action along with three WISSOTA sanctioned classes and the local Hobby Stocks.
KRA Speedway is a fairgrounds track, sitting smack dab in a residential, North side neighborhood in Willmar and virtually surrounded on all sides by lakes. The land the fairgrounds sits on is prime residential property and would be worth a mint to a developer. In fact, several times there have been pushes to move the fairgrounds out into the country North of town and turn the existing fairgrounds into a housing development. Trust me when I say that the some of the lakeside property on the fairgrounds would be worth millions to a realtor but so far, the move hasn't been accomplished. The fairgrounds is a historic one, and there are a group of people that have been fighting to keep it where it currently is. The racetrack actually sits in a low spot of the fairgrounds and was a water passage between two lakes that butt up against the fairgrounds. The track actually sits at a lower elevation than either of the lakes so when it rains, the track and pits get wet easily and are slow to dry. In fact, even on Thursday, with rain earlier in the week the pits were quite muddy as was the low groove on the race track and most of the day was spent dragging both so they would dry out.
KRA is a club run facility that has gone through both good and tough times, as most club run facilities have. They have had a pretty good relationship with the city of Willmar but that fluctuates with who is running the board that directs the track and with so many houses and businesses close to the track, there is always pressure on the city to shut down those infernal noisy, smoky, dust producing race cars that disturb the quiet Thursday nights. The track is on a tight curfew and because the that, they must start their race programs promptly at 6:30 p.m in order to ensure that they are done by curfew which I believe is now 10:30 p.m.
KRA has been embroiled in a battle this Spring with a driver that has brought nothing but negative publicity to the track and has led to some drivers informally boycotting the track. The battle has been waged against Tim Johnson of Brainerd Minnesota. Johnson, an accomplished racer and regular at the track the last couple of years, races cars in three classes at the track. He runs Modifieds, Super Stocks and Street Stocks. He is a big winner in all three classes and totaled over one hundred feature wins between the three cars last year, an impressive statistic that the national racing media completely missed.
Apparently there are some on the board, or are connected to members of the board, that didn't like him racing in three classes. They got the board to issue a rule that would not allow Johnson to race his Street Stock at the track. With all three classes being under WISSOTA sanctioning, this immediately got the sanctioning body involved. They ruled that while any track can refuse entry of a driver to their facility, they are not allowed to mandate what classes a driver can, or can not race in. It simply wasn't legal. KRA didn't like this and I understand that the sanctioning body and the track aren't on the best of terms because of this decision.
But the board at KRA wasn't done yet. They really didn't want Johnson to race his Street at their track so they tried a different way of banning him. What they did was come up with a ridiculously scaled entry fee for drivers racing in multiple classes. If you race in one class, it costs thirty dollars to entry the night's racing. Two classes costs ninety dollars and for Johnson, who routinely races in three classes at the track, the entry fee each night is three hundred and forty dollars! Where they came up with these figures, no one seems to know. Four classes costs five hundred and ninety dollars and five classes costs a whopping eight hundred and forty dollars, just to enter the cars for one night!
Well, what they thought they had done, turned around to back fire in their faces. Johnson's car owner, Ernie Wollak, a well heeled construction company owner in St. Cloud Minnesota and a bit of a rogue himself, accepted the challenge they threw at him. Johnson has been running three cars at KRA, including the most inflammatory of the three, the Street Stock, weekly. Wollak has stated that he is willing to pay the exorbitant entry fee, just to "rub it in the faces" of those that tried to arbitrarily ban his driver.
Johnson has been winning with regularity again this year. In fact, he won the Street feature on this night and is approaching twenty feature wins on the season already and led for the first half of the USMTS Modified main, with his WISSOTA legal Modified before settling for third, but that is another story.
KRA has gained some additional money from the Wollak Team, due to their high entry fees but has more than offset this by the amount of negative publicity the move has generated. And there are a high number of drivers in central Minnesota that race in multiple classes and many of them, former regulars at the track, have mostly stayed away from KRA this year due to their new ruling on entry fees.
Both Johnson and Wollak have lots of connections in central Minnesota and there has been talk that they might line up rides for Johnson in two of the other sanctioned classes at the track that Johnson doesn't currently have cars for, the Midwest Modifieds and the Mod Fours and show up some night to race in all five classes! Now if the board would accept that they made a mistake and promote an event like this correctly , I could see it being a huge attraction that would pack the place. "See if Tim Johnson Can Win All Five Feature Races This Thursday Night," could be a gigantic event but it will probably never happen because some people's stubbornness is only matched by their lack of creativity.
However, I digress and we should move on to the evening's main event, the USMTS Modifieds who on this night had issues of their own.
The aforementioned Johnson started on the pole for the USMTS Mod feature and took the early lead after a brief battle with Jake Timm. Johnson was flying and built up a big lead as Timm fought to hold off a charging Jason Hughes, who has started in row four. They were having an excellent battle for second but Johnson was getting away from both of them, as he worked through lapped traffic easily and extended his lead.
The first yellow flew on lap twenty for a stalled Jesse Sobbing, who had reported to me earlier in the evening that for one of the few times this year, he was not running a crate engine in his car on this night.
Johnson again built up a big lead on the restart while Timm and Hughes continued to battle for second. That's when things got sticky. Johnson had nearly a straightaway lead and without a yellow, I don't think there was a chance that anyone would have caught him. Hughes desperately needed another yellow but who could have guessed that he would trigger it and then use it to his advantage!
As Timm and Hughes battled for second, they raced hard into turn three. Timm had the advantage and as they raced hard into the corner, Hughes clipped the left rear of Timm and turned him around after which he spun up to the wall, triggering the yellow.
The cars idled around the track for several laps, after which the call was made to send Timm to the back while Hughes maintained second. This set off quite a series of "eye rolling" in the stands as most everyone had seen Hughes, while certainly not intentionally, but nevertheless he had clearly clipped Timm and Jake would not have spun except for "the help" he received from Hughes. Timm balked but reluctantly went to the tail,and soon pulled off after the green reappeared.
I don't think anyone in the crowd, knowing how USMTS realigns their races, would expect Timm to be restored to second. However, I have seen on many occasions when contact caused a yellow that both drivers would be sent to the tail and I fully felt that was the proper call in this case. But, for whatever reason, it wasn't done in this case. Of course, the conspiracy advocates will immediately look at the fact that Hughes is a USMTS regular and the region point leader and draw their own conclusion. I would prefer to believe that someone just missed the call, but I have to admit it was about as open and shut case as one could ever see, and I wonder.
Jake's father is Bob Timm, who owns and operates the Mississippi Thunder Speedway in Fountain City Wisconsin, a track that runs primarily USRA rules including USRA Modifieds. I would expect that he and Todd Staley probably had a long discussion on this call.
On the restart and with his big lead gone and perhaps his tires also, Johnson just couldn't keep up the pace running the cushion and after a few laps, Hughes drove under him for the lead and then gradually pulled away. On the last couple of laps, Rodney Sanders also got past Johnson for second. Area racer Jason Thoeness had a great run for fourth with southern Minnesota youngster Jacob Bleess rounding out the top five. Justin Oestreich, in another WISSOTA legal car, also finished in the top ten.
I did notice that the official press release for the event completely avoided the issue and just stated that Hughes moved from third to first following a lap twenty seven yellow. No explanation was made of what caused the yellow or any of the circumstances. It was a particularly puzzling event in what is usually a rock solid series.
Staley did note earlier that he is hoping for seventy cars for the first annual Summer Sota at I-94 next week, an event paying fifteen grand to the winner in what will be the biggest event so far at I-94 as this event replaces the typical midsummer special hosted by Deer Creek Speedway. Tickets are still available for this race.
Thursday, June 16, 2016
WoO Sprints the Ticket on a Wet Wednesday
The month of June has been a scramble so far, with lots of bad weather knocking many events for a loop throughout the Midwest. It would seem that no part of the Central U.S. has been spared the wet and stormy weather and it is starting to take its toll on some of the racing events.
For me, it has been another wild and crazy week and even though it is barely half over, all the events I have tried to take in so far have either been scared by the weather or completely eliminated. After Tuesday's close luck out at West Liberty, things got even crazier on Wednesday when instead of Modifieds in southern Minnesota, I would up with Sprint Cars in central Minnesota.
The plan was to attend the USMTS Modified event at the Dodge County Speedway in Kasson Minnesota. I was looking forward to this race, as Kasson has been closed and opened several times the past few years as they've struggled to make a go of it in recent years after historically being one of the strongest tracks in southern Minnesota. But times change, and the past few years have not been kind to them.
New promoter Chris Abts, who is also the Race Director at the Mississippi Thunder Speedway in Wisconsin, had a dream to try and bring the historic Dodge County Speedway oval back to life. He ran a couple of shows last year that were very successful so in 2016 he has tried to put together a complete schedule that would find the track racing most Sunday nights. The weather has killed him so far this year with several shows lost to rain and he has been struggling to try and make the finances work.
After another set back last Sunday that saw a great field of nearly one hundred cars in the pits but not so good in the grandstands, he had to take a step back and reorganize things moving forward. He didn't feel he could handle the USMTS show's risk so at the last moment Todd Staley agreed to step forward and take on the show himself.
In retrospect, it didn't make any difference as the weather concurred all anyway, and truly, was the track really wet enough to not race or not is a moot point. The weather wasn't conducive to attracting a crowd anyway, and Staley didn't want to take a "bath" on the promotion any more than anyone else would.
So, with Kasson cancelled, it was time to move on to plan B. The World of Outlaws Sprint Cars were scheduled to race on Tuesday at the Granite City Speedway in Sauk Rapids Minnesota along with WISSOTA MidMods but that show got rained out and postponed to Wednesday. I do not see many Outlaws races, particularly the Sprints, but since it was the only show in town and was only two and a half hours away, off I went.
I have not been to Granite City yet this year, although I made it there several times in 2015. The track now runs, as it has for the second year, on Friday nights, having switched from Sundays last year. With the crowded Friday night schedule in our area, I have just not made it over there yet in 2016.
John Sletto is the new Track Manager at Granite City, having replaced Chris Stepan who moved on to focus more on his F.Y.E. Motorsports special events schedule.
Granite City is a quarter mile oval with low banking and the Outlaws were making it into nearly an oval, rolling low into the corners and exiting high. The track has a tendency to get black and slick and while it started out relatively heavy Wednesday due to all the recent rains, it did slick up as the evening progressed.
A very nice field of twenty nine Sprints was on hand for this show, more than I would have expected. All the regulars were joined by a few locals, some with 360 powerplants and some borrowing or buying big motors, along with a few regulars from the River Cities Speedway in Grand Forks where the Outlaws move next. Unfortunately, the River Cities car that I would most have liked on hand to take on the Outlaws, Mark Dobmeier, was no where to be found.
It was a cool, windy and dank day but the grandstand was nearly full, even for the rain dated show and the biggest crowd favorite seemed to be Donny Schatz, which is not surprising given the closeness of his home area. Unfortunately, for all those hoping to cheer him on to victory, he had about as bad an evening as I have seen Schatz have in a long time.
He qualified slow, didn't make the cut during his heat and had to win a B feature against cars he shouldn't really be racing against just to make the main. Frankly, he looked really slow for some odd reason, given that he won this event last year.
The feature race was even worse as he was running close to being lapped when he slowed down suddenly and Greg Wilson turned to avoid him and flipped on his side, triggering the only yellow of the race. Schatz was also done and the ugly pool of liquid under his car when he was pushed off the track seemed to tell the tale. If I'm correct, that is now already the second DNF for his this year after having gone an inordinate number of races with no mechanical breakdowns.
Thirty laps on this small oval flies by, and it hardly allows time for anyone to mount any kind of a challenge unless they are starting right in front. Kerry Madsen was the early leader and he exchanged slide jobs with Shane Stewart early in the race. Brad Sweet came up and joined them and things started to get interesting among the top three just when the red was triggered.
Madsen led on the restart until he got bogged down leaving turn two and Stewart got past him. Then the track started to narrow up and the rest of the event saw the top three pretty much in order after that. It was a smooth feature and a quick event and the whole show was completed before 10 p.m.
The MidMods had only fourteen cars on this off night and second year driver Eric Lamm won the main, fighting off the challenge of Jeremy Nelson, who came all the way from the back after triggering an early race tangle .
A special thanks goes out to Tony Veneziano for his big time help Wednesday. I have been e-mailing back and forth for several years with Tony, and I usually hear from him every year after the Superfan numbers come out in February. Tony used to work for the Outlaws and now works for SLS Promotions, who were putting on this race. I ran into Tony Wednesday working the back gate, got to meet him in person for the first time and he was very helpful getting me into the pits for some pictures and roaming around.
There aren't a lot of tracks capable of, and willing to take on the risk of presenting the Outlaws. It's a big feather in the hats of the folks at Granite City that they successfully accomplished this for the second straight year and especially with the added headaches of using a raindate.
For me, it has been another wild and crazy week and even though it is barely half over, all the events I have tried to take in so far have either been scared by the weather or completely eliminated. After Tuesday's close luck out at West Liberty, things got even crazier on Wednesday when instead of Modifieds in southern Minnesota, I would up with Sprint Cars in central Minnesota.
The plan was to attend the USMTS Modified event at the Dodge County Speedway in Kasson Minnesota. I was looking forward to this race, as Kasson has been closed and opened several times the past few years as they've struggled to make a go of it in recent years after historically being one of the strongest tracks in southern Minnesota. But times change, and the past few years have not been kind to them.
New promoter Chris Abts, who is also the Race Director at the Mississippi Thunder Speedway in Wisconsin, had a dream to try and bring the historic Dodge County Speedway oval back to life. He ran a couple of shows last year that were very successful so in 2016 he has tried to put together a complete schedule that would find the track racing most Sunday nights. The weather has killed him so far this year with several shows lost to rain and he has been struggling to try and make the finances work.
After another set back last Sunday that saw a great field of nearly one hundred cars in the pits but not so good in the grandstands, he had to take a step back and reorganize things moving forward. He didn't feel he could handle the USMTS show's risk so at the last moment Todd Staley agreed to step forward and take on the show himself.
In retrospect, it didn't make any difference as the weather concurred all anyway, and truly, was the track really wet enough to not race or not is a moot point. The weather wasn't conducive to attracting a crowd anyway, and Staley didn't want to take a "bath" on the promotion any more than anyone else would.
So, with Kasson cancelled, it was time to move on to plan B. The World of Outlaws Sprint Cars were scheduled to race on Tuesday at the Granite City Speedway in Sauk Rapids Minnesota along with WISSOTA MidMods but that show got rained out and postponed to Wednesday. I do not see many Outlaws races, particularly the Sprints, but since it was the only show in town and was only two and a half hours away, off I went.
I have not been to Granite City yet this year, although I made it there several times in 2015. The track now runs, as it has for the second year, on Friday nights, having switched from Sundays last year. With the crowded Friday night schedule in our area, I have just not made it over there yet in 2016.
John Sletto is the new Track Manager at Granite City, having replaced Chris Stepan who moved on to focus more on his F.Y.E. Motorsports special events schedule.
Granite City is a quarter mile oval with low banking and the Outlaws were making it into nearly an oval, rolling low into the corners and exiting high. The track has a tendency to get black and slick and while it started out relatively heavy Wednesday due to all the recent rains, it did slick up as the evening progressed.
A very nice field of twenty nine Sprints was on hand for this show, more than I would have expected. All the regulars were joined by a few locals, some with 360 powerplants and some borrowing or buying big motors, along with a few regulars from the River Cities Speedway in Grand Forks where the Outlaws move next. Unfortunately, the River Cities car that I would most have liked on hand to take on the Outlaws, Mark Dobmeier, was no where to be found.
It was a cool, windy and dank day but the grandstand was nearly full, even for the rain dated show and the biggest crowd favorite seemed to be Donny Schatz, which is not surprising given the closeness of his home area. Unfortunately, for all those hoping to cheer him on to victory, he had about as bad an evening as I have seen Schatz have in a long time.
He qualified slow, didn't make the cut during his heat and had to win a B feature against cars he shouldn't really be racing against just to make the main. Frankly, he looked really slow for some odd reason, given that he won this event last year.
The feature race was even worse as he was running close to being lapped when he slowed down suddenly and Greg Wilson turned to avoid him and flipped on his side, triggering the only yellow of the race. Schatz was also done and the ugly pool of liquid under his car when he was pushed off the track seemed to tell the tale. If I'm correct, that is now already the second DNF for his this year after having gone an inordinate number of races with no mechanical breakdowns.
Thirty laps on this small oval flies by, and it hardly allows time for anyone to mount any kind of a challenge unless they are starting right in front. Kerry Madsen was the early leader and he exchanged slide jobs with Shane Stewart early in the race. Brad Sweet came up and joined them and things started to get interesting among the top three just when the red was triggered.
Madsen led on the restart until he got bogged down leaving turn two and Stewart got past him. Then the track started to narrow up and the rest of the event saw the top three pretty much in order after that. It was a smooth feature and a quick event and the whole show was completed before 10 p.m.
The MidMods had only fourteen cars on this off night and second year driver Eric Lamm won the main, fighting off the challenge of Jeremy Nelson, who came all the way from the back after triggering an early race tangle .
A special thanks goes out to Tony Veneziano for his big time help Wednesday. I have been e-mailing back and forth for several years with Tony, and I usually hear from him every year after the Superfan numbers come out in February. Tony used to work for the Outlaws and now works for SLS Promotions, who were putting on this race. I ran into Tony Wednesday working the back gate, got to meet him in person for the first time and he was very helpful getting me into the pits for some pictures and roaming around.
There aren't a lot of tracks capable of, and willing to take on the risk of presenting the Outlaws. It's a big feather in the hats of the folks at Granite City that they successfully accomplished this for the second straight year and especially with the added headaches of using a raindate.
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
Kay Dominates at West Liberty; Nearly Pulls Off Double
After being away from Positively Racing for awhile as I have been busy doing some WISSOTA racing, I slipped quietly back into the Hawkeye State for a race on Tuesday, June 14th as both the Deery Brothers Summer Series and Hawkeye Dirt Tour played a visit to the West Liberty Raceway.
It was an incredibly steamy Tuesday night and ridiculously different than when I left home about six hours earlier. The forecast was grim but the sun was shining at West Liberty and the program was a go.
Of course, this was great news for the race fans but the worst possible scenario for event promoter Keith Simmons. Most causal fans are going to believe the weather forecast and if they don't want to get caught out in a storm, they stay home. Only the hardcore fans show on a night like this and that was later reflected in the size of the crowd, much smaller than one would imagine for the combination of two great racing series. By, like true troopers, the motto of the night was "the show must go on" and so the racers and track workers prepared for what was likely to be an entertaining and hopefully, quick show so as to beat the weather and get those fans nice enough to come out home early and ready for work on Wednesday morning.
The car counts were OK with twenty seven Late Models and twenty three Modifieds signing in to race but on a night like this, if you were some distance from the track and not locked up in a point battle, you might also consider leaving the car at home on the trailer rather than pull a distance, only to get wet. However, while the numbers might not have been overwhelming, the real race fans recognized that the quality of the field was top notch in both divisions.
The hoped for scintillating finishes were not to be in the cards on Tuesday either as dominating performances by Justin Kay and Chris Abelson made the question of who was going to win the feature races a mode point.
In the Late Models, Kay was very strong from start to finish and after dogging Denny Eckrich for seventeen laps, he made a dandy move as the two leaders were trying to skirt through lapped traffic. Catching Eckrich off turn two and temporarily out of the groove, Kay blasted past the former leader and then proceeded to march away from the field. Kay withstood a yellow shortly after and then, with the last twenty laps of the race going nonstop, he eased away from the rest of the pack. Kay was driving the car that Brian Birkhofer had driven during his brief return from retirement, a return that has apparently ended, perhaps this time for good. The car still sported the colors that Birkhofer ran and a "K" was simply taped over the "B" on the side of the car. No matter the number or color, the car was clearly the class of the field.
It was a one, two sweep for teammates as Scott Fitzpatrick finished a strong second. The best race during the last twenty laps was between Kevin Kile and Tyler Droste for fourth with Droste prevailing right at the end.
In fact, a double win was in the cards for Kay as he had a big lead in the Modified main and appeared to just be cruising until the motor starting "laying down" and he shut the car down to try and save the engine at the same time a pileup involving Kyle Brown and Derrick Walker brought out the yellow and then red flags as it took some time to separate the two.
After that, Abelson inherited the lead and drove away without much of a challenge from anyone in the last sixteen laps. Kelly Shyock was the man on the move as he drove up from sixteenth to finish third. Abelson deserved the win if for no other reason than showing the determination to tow all the way across the state with the grim forecast being blasted out from all media. As it turned out, the storms started to threaten the last half of the Late Model feature, with the wind quickening and the skies turning ominous. However, all action was completed and everyone should have been safely tucked in their vehicles before the rain hit West Liberty.
The evening got off to a shaky start for Andy Eckrich who hit a dip in turn one and tore the right rear wheel off his Late Model. However, he made the necessary repairs in time and ended up the evening finishing seventh in the Late Model main.
It was also a tough night for Deery Brothers points leader Jeff Aikey who just didn't seem to have the necessary speed on this night. Late in the race he suffered the indignity of being lapped and his seventeenth place finish was not at all what you would expect of him.
Also taking a hit was point contender in the HDT Series, Brian Irvine. Pulling down from Northeast Iowa, he was hoping for a good night to stay right with the point leaders, but his motor went South and he was the only Modified to scratch out of the main event.
SPI is known for their speedily run midweek shows and everyone was hoping for another on Tuesday. However, with a couple of time consuming wrecks that needed to be cleared, the show didn't feature the brevity of some. Still, the final checkered flag wave just before 10 p.m. which wasn't bad at all, and all were grateful to have beat the weather. At 4:10 a.m, I walked in the front door of the house, another night at the races completed.
It was an incredibly steamy Tuesday night and ridiculously different than when I left home about six hours earlier. The forecast was grim but the sun was shining at West Liberty and the program was a go.
Of course, this was great news for the race fans but the worst possible scenario for event promoter Keith Simmons. Most causal fans are going to believe the weather forecast and if they don't want to get caught out in a storm, they stay home. Only the hardcore fans show on a night like this and that was later reflected in the size of the crowd, much smaller than one would imagine for the combination of two great racing series. By, like true troopers, the motto of the night was "the show must go on" and so the racers and track workers prepared for what was likely to be an entertaining and hopefully, quick show so as to beat the weather and get those fans nice enough to come out home early and ready for work on Wednesday morning.
The car counts were OK with twenty seven Late Models and twenty three Modifieds signing in to race but on a night like this, if you were some distance from the track and not locked up in a point battle, you might also consider leaving the car at home on the trailer rather than pull a distance, only to get wet. However, while the numbers might not have been overwhelming, the real race fans recognized that the quality of the field was top notch in both divisions.
The hoped for scintillating finishes were not to be in the cards on Tuesday either as dominating performances by Justin Kay and Chris Abelson made the question of who was going to win the feature races a mode point.
In the Late Models, Kay was very strong from start to finish and after dogging Denny Eckrich for seventeen laps, he made a dandy move as the two leaders were trying to skirt through lapped traffic. Catching Eckrich off turn two and temporarily out of the groove, Kay blasted past the former leader and then proceeded to march away from the field. Kay withstood a yellow shortly after and then, with the last twenty laps of the race going nonstop, he eased away from the rest of the pack. Kay was driving the car that Brian Birkhofer had driven during his brief return from retirement, a return that has apparently ended, perhaps this time for good. The car still sported the colors that Birkhofer ran and a "K" was simply taped over the "B" on the side of the car. No matter the number or color, the car was clearly the class of the field.
It was a one, two sweep for teammates as Scott Fitzpatrick finished a strong second. The best race during the last twenty laps was between Kevin Kile and Tyler Droste for fourth with Droste prevailing right at the end.
In fact, a double win was in the cards for Kay as he had a big lead in the Modified main and appeared to just be cruising until the motor starting "laying down" and he shut the car down to try and save the engine at the same time a pileup involving Kyle Brown and Derrick Walker brought out the yellow and then red flags as it took some time to separate the two.
After that, Abelson inherited the lead and drove away without much of a challenge from anyone in the last sixteen laps. Kelly Shyock was the man on the move as he drove up from sixteenth to finish third. Abelson deserved the win if for no other reason than showing the determination to tow all the way across the state with the grim forecast being blasted out from all media. As it turned out, the storms started to threaten the last half of the Late Model feature, with the wind quickening and the skies turning ominous. However, all action was completed and everyone should have been safely tucked in their vehicles before the rain hit West Liberty.
The evening got off to a shaky start for Andy Eckrich who hit a dip in turn one and tore the right rear wheel off his Late Model. However, he made the necessary repairs in time and ended up the evening finishing seventh in the Late Model main.
It was also a tough night for Deery Brothers points leader Jeff Aikey who just didn't seem to have the necessary speed on this night. Late in the race he suffered the indignity of being lapped and his seventeenth place finish was not at all what you would expect of him.
Also taking a hit was point contender in the HDT Series, Brian Irvine. Pulling down from Northeast Iowa, he was hoping for a good night to stay right with the point leaders, but his motor went South and he was the only Modified to scratch out of the main event.
SPI is known for their speedily run midweek shows and everyone was hoping for another on Tuesday. However, with a couple of time consuming wrecks that needed to be cleared, the show didn't feature the brevity of some. Still, the final checkered flag wave just before 10 p.m. which wasn't bad at all, and all were grateful to have beat the weather. At 4:10 a.m, I walked in the front door of the house, another night at the races completed.
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