The World of Outlaws Late Models wrapped up their northern swing with a visit to the Red Cedar Speedway in Menomonie Wisconsin. Regular travelers with the World of Outlaws series have spent the last couple of weeks here in the northern climes where it has been very un northern like with very hot temperatures being the rule for this whole time. And they finished it off with another scorcher as it was a hot and sunny day in the Dunn County area of west central Wisconsin. The finish of this tour has been a tough one as teams had a relatively long overnight pull from Fergus Falls Minnesota here to Wisconsin and will surely be looking for a couple of days off and a nice long week break before the series starts for those teams not heading to Nebraska for more racing.
Along with the WoO Late Models, the night would feature a full racing program for open Modifieds and Limited Late Models running under USRA rules but not being sanctioned on this night. The choice of support classes for this event would seem to be a little suspect as running open Modified rules would seem to do nothing but punish the weekly racers who support the class and with the first appearance of the Limited Late Models not being sanctioned, the word was that many of the teams had decided not to participate and come race time, an embarrassingly low number of six were on hand to take the green. With this class set to be one of the featured classes in an upcoming Dunn County Fair race here this coming Thursday, this low car count was probably not a very great way to get people excited about that program. Frankly, featuring "slow Late Models" with open Late Models is not what I would call good promoting either.
The Outlaw car count was not suffering like the Limited cars were however. They actually topped the four race mini series on this night with thirty four cars signed in to race. The Outlaws owe a big gratitude of thanks to the spec engine WISSOTA cars who supported these four races even though they did so knowing that they would be facing a tough task, giving up a hundred or more horse to the open cars. Yet there were thirteen of them on hand Sunday plus about four more drivers that would be considered locals that beefed up with open motors for this invasion. A bonus for the highest finishing spec engine car would have been a nice additional promotional trick that failed to be used. The fact that this track is the home track for Jimmy Mars and that the MB shops are just miles away and that MB's dominate the numbers of racers in this area all probably helped the willingness of so many drivers to sign in and race on this night. Ironically, the spec engine cars did not fair nearly as well as they did at other races on this tour when at least a couple cracked the top ten each night. At Red Cedar, the best finishes were eleventh and twelfth by Pat Doar and John Kaanta.
Thomas Hunziker and Ashton Winger showed how tough a racers they are as after racing with the Summer Nationals tour last night in Ohio, both towed all the way to central Wisconsin to race on Sunday and perhaps a few other racers before that tour begines. Hunziker is , I believe, just trying to get as much racing as he can in while here in the Midwest while Winger likely will have a stop at Mars shop to patch up some equipment and perhaps even pick up a new car after trashing one in Illinois not so long ago.
This evening would not go swimmingly for Winger either as his motor would lock up and while scheduled to start seventh, he would jump in Sam Mars' spec engine car and start tail back and later finish sixteenth, one lap in arrears.
After Brandon Sheppard and Frankie Heckenast timed in quickest in their groups, four heats and a pair of B Features would set the twenty four car field for the main event. Ricky Weiss, still looking for a win and seemingly getting closer to that every event, would lead the first seven laps after drawing the pole. it took Sheppard that long to build up his momentum on the high side of the track but with that groove speeding up and Weiss still hugging the bottom, Sheppard blew past on the high side to take the lead.
Dillard was quick too and he moved up to second and the battle was on between him and Sheppard. Dillard would nose past on the inside to lead a single lap but Sheppard would then again overtake him for the top spot. Some times they were very close and then there were times when Sheppard would pull away by several car lengths but they were clearly the class of the field. There was quite a bit of lapped traffic that made things interesting but every time Sheppard seemed to prevail when this happened as he made all the right choices and a couple of times Dillard got pinned back by traffic and lost a little ground.
There were three yellows in the first nine laps but the last thirty one would go by nonstop and that was when the traffic started to accumulate. At the finish, Sheppard would have several car lengths and the lapped car of Doar between himself and Dillard as they lapped up to the eleventh place finisher. Chris Madden would finish a relatively quiet third while Mars would fall back to seventh but would rally late and pass Weiss on the last lap to get fourth.
For the four race mini series, there would be sixty three different drivers that would attempt qualifying efforts and twelve drivers that would make all four races. Perhaps most importantly, very large crowds would be on hand for all four events as promoters were graced by great weather all week.
The Modified feature would be led from start to finish by A.J. Diemel, a local driver who on this night was driving an open motor car that occasionally races with the USMTS. Matt Leer would stay with Diemel briefly but Diemel would pull away to the point that the only way he wasn't going to win was if he made a mistake. And running the very high groove, he would manage to put his outside tires on the concrete in turn two late in the race but would still soldier on for the win. John Doelle, a very infrequent racer at this track, would put together a strong third place run.
The Limited Late Model feature would be significant only by what happened after the race was over. Joe Provinzino drew the pole and ran away from the field in the nonstop feature, crossing the finish line a full straightaway in front in what was not a scintillating event. Afterward, in victory lane, Joe Provo's main comment was his complaint that his glasses kept steaming up during the race and he stated that he ran both his heat and feature having a very difficult time seeing where he was going, which should have given the rest of the field some pause.
However, that steamed up glasses issue apparently continued even after the victory lane ceremony as Joe drove right past the tech area and to the pits, which prompted an immediate disqualification of the driver as Joe went from hero to zero just that fast!
With the disqualification, second place finisher Brett Shafer was awarded the win and got the post event photo op but no interview.
After a one year break following the first Outlaw race here in 2019, this event was surely a success and will likely be on the schedule once again next year, with all racing done by 10 pm on this Sunday.
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