The final night of the first annual Quad Cities 150, held at the Davenport Speedway in Davenport Iowa, was held on Saturday night, August 28th and Devin Moran would take his second win of the weekend. Leading all but one lap, Moran would earn a tidy check for $30,000 for his efforts to go along with the ten thousand dollars he won for the opening night victory on Thursday night.
IMCA Modifieds and Sport Mods would also have their third straight full program of the weekend with their biggest checks of the weekend on the line also and the winners would be Jeff Aikey in the Modifieds and Tyler Soppe in the Sport Mods.
It was another explosively hot and humid day in the Heartland and the late afternoon provided a scare when a renegade pop up thundershower would build just to the West of the track, getting everyone just a bit nervous. However, after depositing about fifty drops of rain on the fairgrounds, it dissipated just as fast as it built up, the sun came burning back out and the steam bath returned. This area had been walking on a weather tightrope all weekend with large doses of rain falling to the North but the eastern Iowa region was spared any threat of this gigantic weekend of racing being threatened.
Having lost a couple more Late Models on Friday night to blown motors, a field of thirty one would fight it out for twenty four qualifying spots and a minimum of a grand to start the Late Model feature. Big fields of thirty eight Mods and thirty one Sport Mods would fight it out to get into their respective fields too with two thousand and fifteen hundred bucks to the winners coming for those two races.
Four heat races and a pair of B Features would set the the starting grid for the twenty four car World of Outlaw main event. In a refreshing change, there would be no time trials for the Late Models on this night as points accumulated in the first two nights of racing would set the grids for the heat races. However, there was a last minute development in the lineups when several drivers skipped the required autograph session earlier and their penalty was to go to the rear of their respective heat races. The most significant change saw Garrett Alberson not make the feature through his heat and have to run a B Feature but much later he might have been sorry that he made the main after he nosed into the berm in turn one and cart wheeled off the banking on lap ten of the feature. He would be unhurt and would get the award for tallest somersault of the weekend.
After two nights of some struggles with the racing surface to make it like it has been most of the year here at Davenport, they picked the right night to hit things correctly as Ricky Kay prepared a surface that allowed the drivers to race all over the track for seventy laps and also gave them a berm to race off of. After either not taking the time earlier in the week or not being allowed the time to hit the track one last time before feature racing, depending on who's telling the story, everything fell into place and the drivers were given the kind of track that they were looking for.
Moran was clearly the dominant driver, leading all but lap five when Brandon Sheppard was able to slip to his outside and lead one lap before Moran got past him but while Devin controlled most of the race, there were still some periods when his lead was under the gun and also much going on behind him.
Sheppard followed him for much of the early race with Bobby Pierce moving into third while Jimmy Mars, Boom Briggs, Ryan Gustin, Chris Madden and several others all fought a spirited battle behind them as they jockeyed for position. By the halfway point Mars had moved to fourth with Briggs and Gustin close behind.
Following a yellow when Shannon Babb slipped off the end of the track, Pierce got past Sheppard for second and put the pressure on Moran. Twice Pierce threw nasty sliders at the leader, taking the lead on one end of the track, only to see Moran return the favor and be scored the leader of that lap also.
Almost unnoticed was Brian Shirley who was slowly but methodically working his way to the front and after being scored eighth at the halfway point, he really started advancing as he used the low side of the track.
With Moran still in control, things got very testy for the second spot and on lap sixty five, Pierce and Madden, fighting for that spot, got together with it appearing the Pierce got the back of Madden and turned him on the back chute. The yellow flew and while Madden kept moving, he was forced to use the "blend in" rule of the Outlaws and he fell to sixth in the running order while Pierce was able to retain second, much to the majority of the crowd's displeasure.
The last ten laps saw Moran pull away again but many were pleased when Shirley drove under Pierce and took away the second spot. Those two also had several close misses on the back chute as they battled for second. Moran would drive on to take the win uncontested with Shirley second while Pierce jumped over the banking on the last corner in an effort to retake second and would lose two spots as Briggs and Sheppard would get past him in the last corner.
After the race, Madden and Pierce would exchange pleasantries while being careful not to touch each other which would have resulted in disqualifications. I suspect we have not heard the last between these two following this "dust up" and while he has some very loyal followers, Pierce seems to be fitting in very nicely as the Midwest "Bad Boy."
However, Moran was clearly the best in this race and he maintained that edge throughout the seventy laps of the feature, which went by very fast on this quarter mile.
Special mention should be made of the great run by Briggs who was very much a factor throughout the race while finishing a strong third and I must also mention the job that Mike Fryer did too. After racing two nights and being low in points, David Webster turned the seat of his #44w Late Model over to Mike Fryer who had driven the car previously and was on hand to race his Modified. Fryer then did the unthinkable as he came from the back in his heat to qualify for the feature race and though he dropped out early with a smoking engine, just the fact that he was able to qualify was quite remarkable. In fact, while he made the Late Model feature, he was edged out on the last corner of making the Modified feature in a B.
The top twenty four Modifieds would start their twenty lap main event and with a tremendous opening lap charge, Jeff Aikey would come from the outside of row two to take the lead on the opening lap. He would surrender that lead for one lap to Mitch Morris on lap five but then pick up the pace and retake the top spot just a lap later. He would then lead the rest of the way, gradually pulling away in what would be a nonstop main event.
Shane Devolder and Morris would battle for much of the race for second before Devolder would yield his position to the hard charges of Ethan Braaksma and Cayden Carter who would come up from the fourth and fifth rows respectively.
Aikey, who has been known to gamble on starts and restarts, using them to gain an edge with the often being positive and once in a while being set back when he misjudged those starts, seemed to get a great one on this night that allowed him to shoot into the lead on the first lap. However, Jim Sandusky, who was starting in front of Aikey in row one didn't seem to agree, and following the checkered he rammed into the front end of Aikey's car, breaking the right front suspension so that Aikey had to limp to victory lane.
Even though Sandusky got lapped in the twenty lap feature, he apparently thought the initial start was his downfall, not the eighteen positions he lost during the race and the after event contact cost him a disqualification from the event.
The Sport Mods got off to the same rocky start that they have had the last couple of nights with two yellow flags in the first four laps but then they settled down and ran the rest of the race green to checkered. I'm not sure just exactly how many laps they did run as it was announced that there would be a deduction in laps for every yellow that was thrown in this race, as the previous night's mains for this class had their "moments".
Apparently Tyler Soppe showed Aikey how to get to the front quickly as he too came from the second row outside to lead before one lap was completed and then would lead the rest of the way in the Sport Mod feature. While he didn't get rammed following the race, his route to victory was much like the one that Aikey would later take.
Cole Suckow would chase Soppe all the way after moving up from the third row and Ben Chapman would come all the way up from the fifth row to get third as for the third straight night the /Sport Mods all raced right in the "ditch" with no one having any success at trying a higher line.
It turned out to be a great three days for this initial event. There were large crowds on hand all three nights and from my perspective it was a very successful event. The crowds seemed enthusiastic and excited to see the Late Models particularly and there were certainly a lot of out of town and out of state fans that drove in to watch this event. Just as a suggestion for the next year, I think they could have gotten by nicely with just one support class which would have allowed them the time to do some extra things and also more time for track prep if needed. The Late Models really needed just one class for a break and it seemed like the whole program was just a bit rushed with the three classes to try and get done before curfew. The Mods put on a good show and they are pretty dependable at racing without a lot of yellows while the Sport Mods struggled all week in that regard. Otherwise, the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds is a great facility for such an event and I see this race as just getting bigger each year.
Thanks to the folks from the Outlaws and K Promotions for allowing me to be a part of this race.
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