Simmons Promotions staged three Open Late Model Shootouts this weekend to serve as an appetizer for the $15,000-to-win Yankee Dirt Track Classic coming up in less than two weeks at the Farley Speedway. Jeremiah Hurst picked up the $2,000 top prize at Farley on Friday night and Darren Miller returned to "open" Late Model racing style by winning at the West Liberty Raceway on Saturday night. On Sunday night, at the Dubuque Speedway, it was a race of attrition as Hurst picked up his second win of the weekend.
Dubuque is one of my favorite tracks in the Midwest and I always wish that it was about an hour closer to home so that I could catch more of its Sunday night action. So with the alarm clock turned off for Labor Day I made the two hour plus drive north for the Late Models that were on the card along with the season championship events in the support divisions. As I started my drive I noted a huge thunderhead to the north and east that sure enough dropped a bit of rain at the speedway causing the show to start about an hour later than originally planned. And with the extra moisture the high-banked surface was tacky and ultra-fast throughout the night.
The B-Mods were first up in the feature order and their ten-lap run was plagued by cautions along with "the fourth place curse." On lap six 2010 point champion Jed Freiburger shucked his driveshaft on the back stretch while running fourth. A lap later John Campbell spun his car in turn two while running fourth and on lap eight Jeff Willis went for a spin in two turn. Where was he running at the time? You guessed it, in fourth. Finally, like an elevator in a high-rise hotel handles the thirteenth floor, scorer Kevin Feller stopped writing down the fourth-place car and the checkers finally flew over Matt Gansen who lead the race the entire distance. Jarrett Franzen started thirteenth and finished second while Jason Buss, who was the track champion this year at both Freeport and Darlington, came from the back of the seventeen-car field to finish third. Dustin Wilwert was scored as fifth, but was paid for the cursed position while John Campbell returned to finish behind Wilwert and was paid for fifth.
The Stock Car feature was up next and it did not take long for Jerry Miles to charge from his sixth starting position to the front as he drove by Austin Heacock on lap two. There was a fair share of cautions in this one as well, but there was no denying Miles who celebrated a track championship in victory lane during his 25th season of action. Timmy Current drove a new car from row eight up to second. Andy Hedrick ran a solid race in third, Terry Rittmer finished in fourth and David Brandies came from row seven to take fifth.
The Limited Stocks saw Jeff Baker go flag-to-flag for his second straight feature win at Dubuque. Troy Baurer started ninth and ran second ahead of Jeremy Campbell, Steve Miller and Nick Widmeier. Tim Schneider collected the track point championship for the division. Lenny Ollendick left the rest of the Flyer feature field in his wake as he cruised to his first win at the facility. Pat Quinn, "a big man in a little car" as announcer Eric Huenefeld calls him, rounded out a championship season in style by running second followed by Kile Vohringer, Derek McBee and Tyler Kelly.
There was plenty of drama building up to the Modified headliner as Ron Barker and Tony VonDresky came into the race tied atop the point standings and whoever finished ahead of the other would be crowned as champion for 2010. Barker earned the pole position in the feature by winning the fast heat from row three earlier in the evening and he left no doubt tonight as he drove away to convincing victory in the twenty-lap feature. Jason Schueller did his best to keep pace, but ended up as a distant second. Mike Burbridge passed Pete Bonin late to take third while VonDresky settled for fifth.
The fifty-lap Late Model feature would complete the program and 2010 season at Dubuque in front of a solid crowd that could now see lightning well of in the distance to the west. Darren Miller charged to the lead from the pole with Jeremiah Hurst and Jeff Larson in hot pursuit. The first caution waved on lap two when Russ Adams stalled on the back stretch and on the restart the lead trio went three-wide in true Dubuque Speedway fashion with Miller retaining the lead by rocketing off the cushion of turn two. My attention was on Jason Rauen who was once again putting on an amazing display of driving in "Hammer Down" style. Rauen was late to the track in his heat race, so started ninth and was up to second before breaking on lap seven. So here in the feature he again started dead last, seventeenth, and was already up to sixth in five laps, but he was trailing smoke from his #98 and it would soon be the end of his evening as he pulled to the pits during a caution. Top contenders Ron Klein and Brian Harris also left the track during that caution.
Miller jumped the cushion in turn four on lap eleven and that allowed Hurst to go storming past with Mike Murphy Jr. right behind him. As Miller recovered to make it a three-car battle up front the caution waved again on lap nineteen as Nick Marolf slowed to a stop. The Hurst, Miller, Murphy battle was interrupted again on lap twenty-four as Jon Rogers spun in turn four and it was shortly after that when Miller pulled to the infield with mechanical issues. Jeff Larson stepped up again to join Hurst and Murphy in the race for the lead and it looked like Murphy’s high-line around the speedway was about to earn him the lead on several occasions only to have Hurst fight back. On lap thirty-six though Murphy went too high into turn one and slapped the wall knocking the spoiler off of his #14 and causing a caution for the debris. Murphy restarted the race in second, but without the spoiler he quickly faded to the back and pulled to the infield a few laps later.
Jake Meier was now in second and trying to keep pace with Hurst, while the race to watch was for third where Ace Ihm and Jeff Larson were doing battle. Nobody had anything for Hurst through the final laps though as he claimed his second big win of the weekend. Meier would come home in the runner-up spot while Ihm took third. Larson dropped out of the event just four laps from the finish so it was Becky Roth who took fourth-place money following a consistent drive and Rogers recovered from his spin to finish fifth.
While a bit disappointing in count, the seventeen-car field of Late Models was intriguing to me as I saw one driver that I don’t get to see often, Jason O’Brien from Atlantic, and two drivers that I had never even heard of before. Jim Rychtik of Port Washington, Wisconsin, was challenging Rogers for fifth at the finish and Todd Alexander of Fair Haven, Illinois, was the seventh and final car on the track at the checkers.
Simmons Promotions now gears up for a big week of action at the annual Yankee Dirt Track Classic in Farley. It should be great week of racing on the track and fun in the Palace Ballroom.
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