Wood and Some New Faces In Victory Lane at Oskaloosa

Despite a short field of cars in the two top divisions the racing was definitely worth the price of admission Wednesday night at the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa as some new faces appeared in victory lane.

Seven evenly matched USRA Stock Cars went to battle for 15-laps with newcomer Damon Murty gaining the early advantage. Shane Weller applied the pressure working the low side of the leader during the early laps while the third-place car of Nathan Wood searched out the prospects on the high line through the corners. The trio went three-wide on lap five entering turn three and when they came off of four it was Wood who now had the advantage. As the new leader put some distance on the field, Weller continued to work on Murty until he finally made the pass with just four laps to go. Weller was then able to cut into Wood’s lead, but he could not quite catch him before the checkers waved for the driver who currently ranks second in the Stock Car All Iowa Points. Murty chased Wood and Weller in for third, Mike VanGenderen looked to make it a four-car battle for the front early before settling for fourth and Rich Vogt came home fifth. It was good to see Brian Sterling back in action tonight along with Kyle Harwood.

The USRA Modified field started with eight, but we lost Josh Truman when he shucked a rear end during hot laps. Ron VerBeek and Scott Dickey put on a good show for the bulk of the twenty-lap feature for the division as VerBeek led early before Dickey applied a nifty high-to-low move exiting turn two on lap four. Not to be denied “RVB” charged right back by Dickey two laps later in turn one and then the two actually swapped the lead in turns three and four on lap seven. During that exchange Dickey had to check up a bit and VerBeek opened up about a ten-car-length advantage that he was able to maintain for the rest of the race on his way to victory. Dickey would settle for the runner-up honors with Steven Blattler a distant third. Brandon Banks, Greg Cox and John Fellman were a lap down in fourth, fifth and sixth respectively while David Ott retired early with a flat tire and would finish seventh.

There was no shortage of USRA Hobby Stocks as twenty-four cars were in action tonight and there were two more cars, I believe that it was Justin and Jamie Bevill from Bethel, Missouri, sitting on their trailers out in the parking lot behind the grandstands. I never did find out what the deal was there, but those Hobby Stocks that were racing did so in exciting fashion going two and three-wide near the front for the entire fifteen-lap feature. “The Ladies’ Man” Andrew Hustead was at the point of the pack for the first two laps before Dale Porter took over on lap three. With the field racing wildly just behind him it looked as though Porter would be able to hold on for the win, but his race came to an end three laps shy of the finish when his engine expired in turn three. Steve Allen would inherit the advantage for the restart and when Matt Messamaker and Kris Walker made contact while racing for second that was all that Allen needed to earn his first-ever victory after six years of racing on his hometown track. Danny Thrasher started eighth and finished second, Messamaker recovered to finish third ahead of Todd Reitzler, Derek Kirkland and Walker.

A few notes from the Hobby Stocks….Donovan Nunnikhoven was running third, but pulled to the infield just prior to the final restart…..Messamaker started twelfth…..Dustin Griffiths appeared to have finished third in his heat race, but something must have been amiss in the tech area as he tagged the back of the field for the feature. Dustin had worked his way well toward the front of the field before his motor let go on lap seven…..I’m always on the lookout for interesting sponsors (such as Larry Herring’s classic “Kurt’s Used Caskets”) and on the side of Todd Reitzler’s car is “Two Old Bags”. I couldn’t read what was under it from the top of the grandstand, but the possibilities of what kind of a business this could be are endless. If somebody could get back to me with details I would appreciate it!…..It was good to see the ol’ orange and white #558 back in action with Jim Hughes behind the wheel.

Twenty USRA B-Mods took the green for fifteen-laps to close out the evening with Bill Gibson moving to the lead from his outside row one starting spot. Kent Kositzky of Cedar Rapids was making the most of his first-ever visit to Osky putting the heat on Gibson during the early laps looking to back up his heat race victory earlier in the night with a feature win as well. Gibson kept Kositzky at bay and then the newcomer had to deal with defending track champion Tyler Groenendyk who was now looking for that second spot. It took several laps for Groenendyk to complete the pass of Kositzky and that was exactly what Gibson needed to complete the non-stop event with a trophy in hand. Groenendyk was in striking distance at the end in second, Kositzky had a very impressive debut in third, Cayden Carter came from tenth to finish fourth and Mike Shelton filled out the list of the top five.

Even after some track maintenance to keep the track racy after receiving nearly eight inches of rain in the past week, the final checkered flag fell at 9:53 p.m. sending drivers, crews and fans home for a decent night of sleep before a Thursday workday. Is the Southern Iowa Speedway in a bit of a down cycle right now in regard to car counts? In a couple of classes, yes, but you still can’t beat having the option to attend a quality weekly Wednesday night race program. I hope to see you there sometime soon!

And a big thanks to announcer Tony Paris for the PostivelyRacing.com plug!!!