One of the last outdoor mega night events of the 2024 racing season took off on Thursday night, November 14th as the eighteenth annual Turkey Bowl started at Jerry Hoffman's Springfield Raceway in Springfield Missouri.
This race has grown by leaps and bounds over the years. I remember being at the first Turkey Bowl which featured open wheel cars, perhaps Sprints or Midgets. I can't say off hand if I have been at all the Turkey Bowls or not but have been to the majority of them and each year, particularly so in the last few years, this race has gotten bigger and bigger.
This year there would be seven different divisions racing over the three nights of this show, and all seven would have raced at the track at some time over the year. Most would be local divisions but the Late Models are also on the ticket, with them arriving for their one night show on Saturday.
A large practice night was held on Wednesday for whoever wanted to get some laps, and the first night of actual competition would be on Thursday. The divisions are staggered so that not all seven classes race on each and every night, which is a good thing because with the large number of cars that show up, we would probably be racing until breakfast.
On Thursday, the Front Wheel Drive cars, new to the event this year, would run a complete program of heats, B Feature and feature race while the Midwest Modz B and Pure Stocks would run heat races only. The Legend Cars are also racing and they would also run just their heats on this night. Interspersed with the heat races would be more practice laps for those divisions that haven't raced as yet but chose to arrive early to get some extra practice.
Hoffman has made a number of improvements at this track in the last few years, one of the most noticeable is the large expansion of the pit area which is needed for a race of this magnitude. He even has access to a field beyond the tree line East of the current pit area that borders on Interstate 40 and that will also be filled before the weekend is over. Thursday night saw one hundred and twenty eight cars in the three racing classes on hand plus another forty seven Legend Cars so we are close to the two hundred figure already with the Midwest Mod A, B Mod, Mod and Late Model cars still to arrive.
One of the big challenges for a race like this being held in mid November is the weather, but this year it looks to be favorable all week with temps pushing sixty and sun although it does cool off quickly once the sun drops below the horizon. Such was the case on this night and Hoffman responded by offering, along with a friend sponsoring the activity, to offer free coffee and hot chocolate for those tough and dedicated fans that turned out for the Thursday night program.
Even though I'm eleven hours from home, I still manage to run into a few folks that I know. Jerry VanSickel was on hand and I had hoped he would be announcing but the was doing other duties on this night and we didn't get to hear him call any of the action, which was a bit disappointing. I also ran into a Legends Racing Team that is headquartered only twenty miles from where I live yet I had never heard of them or known them before this night. Strange how things happen some times.
Combination rules are used for this event in the hopes of drawing as many different racers from various sanctioning bodies as possible. The Front Wheel Drive class invited USRA, IMCA and other sanctioned cars to race. The Pure Stock class is made up of mostly regional drivers with some of the cars looking more like Stock Cars than Pure Stocks. Interestingly, Cody Williams, the Kansas racer who runs just about anywhere, was on hand with his IMCA Hobby Stock but "Meatloaf" found the Pure Stocks to be neither Pure nor Stock and he struggled in his heat race.
The third class on hand was the Midwest Modz B. This class is the lowest of the open wheel classes and was divided up by Hoffman a few years ago with the more experienced and perhaps higher budgeted teams running in the A division while the others run in the B class. The cars are identical and a nightmare for me to try and tell which is which so I usually have to end up bugging every team to ask if they are a B or an A car. And more than a few of the B class cars seem pretty healthy and have been in the B division for quite some time but that is none of my business. Frankly, I'm not even clear who makes the determination of whether a driver is an A or B, but again, not my department.
The evening began with a series of hot lap sessions for a few of the classes with those classes racing on Thursday going off first. Then there would be heat races for the Pure Stocks with their B and Feature race on Friday night. The Front Wheel Drive cars would be the only ones to run a full show on Thursday and then they would be done for the weekend. The Legend Cars would also run heats on Thursday but their B Features and feature races will be on Saturday night while the Midwest Modz B would run heats on Thursday with their main on Friday night. For the casual fan it must be some what confusing to see all these different Modified classes that look the same and then trying to figure out who goes with which.
The Pure Stocks feature three station wagons among their entries and they range, as I said, from basic looking race cars to cars that appear just as nice and perhaps as fast as any Stock Car class. The first heat race started with a bang when a couple of cars tangled on the first lap and slid into the infield with one then pulling back on the track and then deliberately parking to trigger a yellow. I thought this is not a good way to start as it will be a long night if they let that kind of nonsense take place.
Therefore I was pleasantly surprised when the rest of the evening didn't have a lot of yellow flags and they even dismissed a couple cars for triggering two yellow flags in their event. Still, an event of this magnitude begs for the one spin rule.
They did use passing points to determine who would qualify for the main event, something that some tracks sure could stand to go to for big specials like this. The top sixteen in passing points would make the feature with the rest going into B Features.
The last event of the night was for the Front Wheel Drive cars as they finished off with a twenty lap feature race. Again I was pleasantly surprised by these drivers. Twenty started the main and there was only a single yellow flag with the first fifteen laps going green. And there were three different leaders during the race also.
Dustin Akin started on the pole and led the opening three laps before he was overtaken by Blaize Thompson who would hold the top spot for a pair of laps. Then Gavin Crisler, who started on the outside pole but was shuffled back early, came charging to the front and took over the lead.
While he would pull out to a nice sized lead, there was a great battle for second with Tyrel Jones, who started seventeen, cracking the top five by the halfway point of the race. This charge was made without the help of a single yellow to bunch the field.
He continued to move forward while Tyler Dawson also picked up the pace, driving from fourth at the halfway point up into the runner up slot. Early leader Akin stalled with just five laps left which set up s shootout and took away Crisler's big lead.
He did get away good at the start with Jones moving into second but despite Tyrel pushing hard, Crisler was able to hold on and take the win. Dustin Reeves moved up at the end to take third ahead of Justin Day and Grayson McKiney. Only four cars failed to finish the race and all were on the lead lap in what was a very competitive event.
Racing was completed at 10 pm, after which more cars that had yet to race came to the track for additional practice laps. By this time it was forty one degrees and damp so I decided to call it a night.
Friday night will see the Midwest Modz A, the B Mods and the Modifieds all take to the track for the first time in an open wheel bonanza.
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