Round two of the 2021 USMTS season and the second half of the weekend doubleheader was run on Saturday night, March 6th at the RPM Speedway of Texas just out side of Crandall and for the second straight night it was another USMTS regular that fought off a stellar field of drivers to take home the ten thousand dollar top prize.
Dereck Ramirez has long been a strong supporter of the USMTS as both a driver and as a financial supporter of the series and in fact if you want to see him race you have to go to a USMTS event. He is one of the leading feature winners in USMTS history and he added to that total with a stirring victory after fighting off both Terry Phillips and Rodney Sanders for the fifty lap win.
Round two saw another full show of Modifieds along with Factory Stocks, Limited Modifieds, Eco Modifieds and Tuners in another full program of racing with one hundred and thirty six cars signing in to race on Saturday night. A few less Modifieds were in the house on Saturday but they still had sixty three to race with the biggest losses being in the support classes from Friday night. However the program for the featured class, the USMTS cars, was exactly the same as on Friday with qualifying, six heats and three B Features setting up the twenty seven car field for the main event. Interestingly, there was only one new entrant on Saturday night with that being Oklahoma's William Gould.
Qualifying went just a bit smoother than it did on Friday night but it still took extra time over just hot lapping with the show starting forty minutes late past the advertised time, and strictly because group qualifying of five or six cars at a time just takes longer than three or four sets of hot laps and going forward, promoters and officials are going to have to take that into consideration meaning that if they must start by a certain time, than all pre race activities will have to be started earlier.
As I listened to people talking around me in the grandstand before the races and reviewing last night's show, many commented that they were surprised to see time trials and were not highly appreciative of that addition to the show. For the record, Lucas Lee was quick qualifier at 15.799 seconds which earned him the fourth starting spot in the third heat race. Not able to garner enough passing points out of the heat, he was forced to win a B Feature to make the main. With five of the six heats won right off the front row, drivers are going to have to learn how to "sandbag" just enough to make the invert but not so fast that they have to start in the second row.
A new addition for 2021 is the national point leader carrying the brightly colored spoiler indicating that he is the national point leader. Phillips carried it into Saturday's show but Ramirez would go home with it at the end of the night. Something I noticed this weekend procedurally wise that USMTS seems to have changed this year is how they call fault for yellow flag slowdowns. In the past, if you were stopped when the yellow waved, you went to the back whether the fault was yours or someone else's that might have turned you. The only exception was on a blatant "take out" where both would go to the back.
Now, however, they rule on yellows the way that they do it in my territory and that is that whoever triggered the yellow must go to the back and innocent victims, stopped or not, will be allowed to retain their position. This is a much more fair way of doing things but it also requires an official to make a judgement call, something that most tracks don't want to take on, fairer or not. I applaud USMTS to making this change while also understanding that no official in any sport is always correct and there will inevitably be a few missed calls where the wrong person goes to the back. Overall though, this is still a much more fair way of doing things.
Kale Westover would start on the pole and take the early lead in the Modified fifty lap main. Phillips was on the move early as he drove up from the third row to take second and then tried to pass Westover. T.P. tried the high side but couldn't quite get the run he needed to get past the strong running Westover so he ducked back to the lower groove. However, Ramirez wasn't afraid to try the higher line and when he pulled up on Phillips to take second, a fortuitous yellow saved him and allowed him to hold on to second. He knew he had to get past Westover so he took the high side for the double file restart and after a couple of hard fought laps, he was able to take over the lead.
Westover proved to be strong though, and while Ramirez got by for second, Westover hung right with the leaders. Also on the move were Rodney Sanders and Tyler Wolff as quickly the top four swarmed together and provided the best Modified racing of the weekend with the track coming around for them.
Ramirez was all over Phillips as they swapped lanes fighting with each other as Phillips countered each move until finally he just couldn't get off the corners fast enough to hold off Ramirez with Dereck taking over the lead. Phillips then began a progressive drop back into the field, ending up eighth in the final order.
It was then left for Ramirez to fight off the advances of Sanders who provided a stiff challenge. In fact, he very nearly made the winning move with about a half dozen laps left as he dove hard and low into turn three where the leaders banged wheels. Ramirez recovered first and maintained the lead while Sanders lost significant momentum and Wolff got by for second.
The last few laps saw Ramirez strengthen his lead while Wolff held off Sanders for second. Johnny Scott also made a strong late charge as he grabbed fourth while Westover's strong run allowed him to complete the top five.
Support class winners included Cody King of Fanshawe Ok in the Limited Mods, Dustin Choate of Forney in the Eco Mods, Chris Davis of Wills Point in the Factory Stocks and David Thompson of Mesquite in the Tuners.
Racing was much improved on Saturday as the track prep crew made some nice adjustments over the evening. As much as I hate mid program track prep, it was done twice on this night with the results being overwhelmingly positive. After the heats they ripped and watered the high side which then progressively turned the track from a low groove to a high groove dominant track but a complete watering before the feature, top to bottom, made all the difference as drivers were able to use both a strong top and low groove for the main. Give them a track to race on, and most times they will put on a show. And that goes for every track on the schedule.
Another good crowd was on hand for Saturday's show although perhaps not quite as big as the Friday crowd. Speaking of the crowd, we worry in our area about the crowd being such an old one, and it is a legitimate concern. But you talk about old crowds, the crowd here in Texas looked like a ten year reunion from the "old folks" home!
The USMTS will next be in action the end of this month with the famed "King of America" at the famed "Hummer", Humboldt Speedway in Kansas.
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