The FLO/RACING Night in America Series came to the Karl Auto Group Marshalltown Speedway on Tuesday night, August 18th and Bobby Pierce was more than ready for the occasion. Despite the fact that there were twenty nine other top Late Model teams on hand, Pierce dominated the fifty lap Late Model feature race, taking the lead on lap fifteen and then driving away from the field with his lead never challenged.
The support classes for this night were the IMCA Stock Cars and the IMCA Modifieds. Both turned out with nice fields of drivers entered with their wins going to Austin Kaplan and Kyle Brown.
Despite a long spate of rain in the Hawkeye State and even a threat for Tuesday, the weather turned out to be just fine and a gate busting crowd of race fans from near and far turned out to watch the Late Models put on a show at one of Iowa's raciest short tracks.
As is the case with Late Model racing these days for any kind of traveling series, time trials would start off the evening's program. Hudson O'Neal is in the Rumley entry this week and he turned the quickest lap of the night at 13.939 seconds as the third driver on the track. The track slowed by about four tenth of a second for the second group which saw Dan Ebert turn the fastest lap at 14.383 seconds, thus guaranteeing both front row starting spots for their heats of which there were four.
Quite honestly, the heat races were just as entertaining as the main event and when you're away from watching these drivers for awhile and then catch back up with them, you forget just how hard they drive these cars and just how talented they are to put them in the tight holes they do. I had the chance to talk to a veteran driver with much success who has had the opportunity to drive a Late Model for the first time this year.
I asked him what was the toughest part of the transition and surprisingly, he told me that it is just seeing where you are going. You sit so low in these cars and they are so wide and blocky, it's almost impossible to see to your left and right front, only being able to see right in front of you. Imagine then, with that kind of handicap how skilled these drivers are to put their cars within inches of each other at the speeds that they race. Definitely not something for the meek of heart.
Four heats and one B Feature set the twenty four driver starting field with Billy Moyer Sr and Brent Larson added to the field. Nick Hoffman got the jump on Dan Ebert to lead the opening lap with Pierce, who started fourth, quickly moving into position number two and then beginning the process of finding Hoffman's weakness and exploiting it.
He made several preliminary attempts to get past and then, on lap fifteen, slid past Hoffman to take over the lead and once in front, there would be no more battles for first, it was Pierce's. Drivers right behind him early though, had bad luck as first Ebert suffered a flat tire and then Hoffman triggered yellow number two just a lap later when his steering gave him fits and he slapped the back stretch guardrail with both eventually calling it a night early.
Brandon Sheppard moved into second following Hoffman's difficulties and he stayed relatively close to Pierce but not close enough to really challenge. Devin Moran moved up also while it was fun watching O'Neal work his way forward after botching his heat race and having to run the B Feature which perhaps gave him some more insight on the track.
He started seventeenth and by the halfway point of the race was up to fifth, engaging in a nice battle with Tim McCreadie for position. Josh Rice spun with thirty thee laps completed, setting up the last slowdown of the race.
On the green, Sheppard made his biggest charge at Pierce, giving him grief for a few laps but when he couldn't make the lead pass, he began to gradually slip back. Pierce was sticking in the low groove, not using the banking at all but it seemed to serve him well as others searched around but weren't able to find a line that worked as well for them.
O'Neal continued his march to the front, getting past Sheppard for second at one point but then jumping the cushion in turn four and nearly losing it all but he made the save that he wasn't able to do in his heat.
Pierce continued to cruise after than and crossed the finish line comfortably in front with Sheppard holding off O'Neal, again charging to try and get second. Moran and a charging Ricky Thornton Jr completed the top five. Fourteen drivers finished the race with all on the lead lap. There were no wrecks of any sort but it seemed on this night that when drivers weren't making any progress, they just pulled off. I guess it is going to be a long week and everyone wants to save equipment and stay away from pointless laps.
The Late Model feature was run off first to salve the Late Model fans that wanted to head out early as well as the TV audience but most of the live crowd staying to watch their regular Friday night heroes in the Stock Cars and Modifieds.
No B Features were held so large fields took the green for both these feature races. Twenty six took the green for the Stock Car feature with Texas visitor Tommy Fain grabbing the early lead over Colorado traveler Hunter Smith. However, Austin Kaplan was on the move and raced up to second just as the red flag flew when Lincoln Vansickel took a nasty barrel roll in turn four when he got hung up on the cushion.
Fain continued to lead with Kaplan and Smith chasing him closely. Jimmy Gustin and Dallon Murty were both moving up be both eventually dropped out with troubles as Racer Hulin cracked the top five and was pushing for more.
As the race moved into its second half, Fain and Kaplan were able to separate themselves from the rest of the pack and it came down to a two car race for the win. Kaplan was really pushing Fain by this point with Tommy seemingly getting just a bit slower. Kaplan was on his rear bumper for several laps and then, just as the white flag was about to wave, Kaplan moved one lane up the track.
And at the exact time that Kaplan found an opening, Fain began to slow dramatically with some sort of mechanical problem as the field streamed past him. Kaplan drove on for the win with Jake McBurnie, who started seventeenth, racing into second on that last lap. Hulin, Smith and Johnny Spaw completed the top five with Fain dropping all the way back to tenth.
Twenty five Modified drivers would take the green flag from "The Foxman", Jeremy Fox to begin their twenty lap main event. Kyle Brown spends his racing time jumping back and forth from IMCA to open Modified racing these days but Tuesday, he was the master of the IMCA field, leading the entire twenty laps to take the win worth a grand.
This race was a smooth one, with just a single yellow flag on lap three to hold up the action and the long green flag stretches really helped Brown as he drove away from the field, eventually pulling to nearly a full straightaway over the pack. He did hit a group of slower drivers near the end of the race but they caused him no problem and he put four lapped cars between himself and second place finisher Izac Malllicoat at the checkers.
Mallicoat had held that position since lap two and while he was able to hold off those chasing him, including Joel Rust, Cody Laney and Jenae Gustin for position, he could offer nothing in the way of a challenge to Brown. Only three drivers dropped out of this race.
The show got off to kind of a slow start with time trials and considerable track prep delaying the first green flag until almost 8 pm which couldn't have made the East Coast viewers pleased, but once it got rolling, the show move along at a very quick pace with the final checkers of the night waving just after 10:30 pm.
Marshalltown doesn't have the best setup for track officials with timing and scoring done in the infield, a throw back to the old days while the announcers are high above the grandstand on the front chute in a sort of deer hunting type perch. However, that hasn't worked well for the tv broadcast and for the second straight year, FLO announcers Dustin Jarrett and Ben Shelton broadcast the race remotely from an RV studio parked behind the grandstand, calling the race while watching it on tv.
Everyone got a chuckle when we noted that the infield tech area was sponsored by the Wollam family Dairy Queen in Marshalltown with a huge DQ sign hovering over the activities going on in that area.
As always, a fine show put on by the folks at M'Town with thanks going out to JVan and the rest of the crew at "America's Bucket List Track."
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