Friday night, July 16th, the World of Outlaws Late Models headed for the prairie and ended up at the "legendary bull ring", the River Cities Speedway in Grand Forks North Dakota where they would battle it out on the high banked quarter mile oval that provides action like perhaps no other track around, certainly in this area for sure.
Along with the Late Models, the 410 Sprints and WISSOTA Street Stocks would also be racing a full program as RCS maintains their tradition as one of the few tracks in the country that runs Late Models and 410 Sprints on a weekly basis. Even when one class or the other is running a premier program such as this, the other class is still always a part of the program as track management has determined that local fans' interests are pretty much split right down the middle and if one division is being featured, the other one better still be racing to get those fans to come out too as apparently both groups are rather narrow minded in their tastes. So even if the WoO Sprints are here, which is twice a year, the NLRA Late Models will also be racing along with one of the other support classes.
Thirty Late Models signed in to race on this night, a good field of cars supported by at least a dozen of the local, spec engine WISSOTA cars as pretty much the same situation occurs here as was the case at Gondik Law on Tuesday and will also be the case at I-94 Sure Step and Red Cedar the rest of this busy weekend. Without the local cars, there would hardly be enough cars to put on a respectable show but they cut the locals little slack, even requiring the crate engine cars to weigh the same as the other cars, even though they are carried much less horsepower.
But despite all this, it was certainly good that the local cars did participate and they did darn well. Brad Seng started fifth, ran third for quite awhile and even though he faded slightly at the end, he still finished seventh. Joey Pederson started sixth and finished right behind Seng and Cole Schill just got edged out by Chris Madden for tenth at the line. All this from steel block, 366 cubic inch motors.
It was good to see Cade Dillard back on the track after missing the Gondik Law show because of illness. He apparently was quite ill and it is believed that he got some kind of food poisoning that required his hospitalization. Local rookie driver Mike Greseth, winner of five feature races already this year, had terrible luck as his time trial effort was quick enough to put him on the second row for a heat but just as he crossed the line, his drive shaft ripped out of the car and he was done for the night. It would have been fun to see him race.
Brandon Sheppard and Dennis Erb were the quick qualifiers in their groups and Erb would win a heat also as this would be his night to shine. Sheppard was caught up in a bit of controversy as he was called for a jump start in his heat, set back a row and then finished second to Jimmy Mars in that heat. He was still not happy when he appeared for the redraw and when he redrew seventh he was even more irate. His feature run was nothing special on this night either as he just didn't have it and settled for fifth with a late pass of Frankie Heckenast to get that spot.
Four heats and a B Feature with some DNF and DNS cars allowed all seven who finished the B to get into the main event. Among the victims was Dan Dowling who flipped his car during the B when he got into a multi car tangle.
Erb would start on the pole for the main event and would lead thirty nine of forty laps to get the win. He would shock some as instead of running "the ditch" as he normally does, he was up on the cushion and rim riding throughout the event. This is a very unlikely spot to find him and even more so at this track which is highly banked yet has no outside wall and with the cars running dangerously close to the edge, one slip and a wild ride occurs off the banking with an uncertain outcome at best.
However, that was were Erb was fastest so he stayed out there. Mars came up to challenge on several occasions and actually appeared to be faster at a couple of junctures of the race, including leading lap twenty two, but each time Erb would get up on the wheel and take the lead back over. Mars' run was hampered too because the lapped cars of which there were about five, were all running right on the bottom and every time Jimmy would have to move up to get past them, he would lose time to Erb. At the finish of the race, Dennis would have two lapped cars between himself and Mars. Ryan Gustin and Dillard had a good battle for third until Gustin would finally drive by on the high side, which is right where you might expect him to run with Sheppard rounding out the top five with a rather quiet performance. There were only three yellows in the race and five cars that didn't finish.
Eighteen 410 Sprints would race their main event with Austin Pierce quickly getting to the lead after starting in the second row and he would fend off all challenges from Jake Hastings to get the win. Recently returned from injury Mark Dobmeier would finish third after starting tenth. There would be the almost one red flag for a tipping Josh Swangler but no injuries with Wade Nygaard and Brendan Mullen completing the top five.
Eighteen WISSOTA Street Stocks would also be on hand and this race would be a walk over for Tucker Pederson who would start on the pole, endure through four yellow flags and lead from start to finish for the win. Tucker, who's dad Joey would later take a top ten in the Late Model main, beat Ryan Johnson and Aaron Blacklance for the win. Blacklance has been very fast here lately but a poor starting position of ninth didn't allow him time to get to the front on the tiled and fast track.
All racing was done before 10:30 pm and a very large crowd was on hand to support the racers with all seemingly pleased with what they saw. This town is a racing hot bed in the upper Midwest and they support their events here as well as at other area tracks.
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