Following two straight weeks of putting too much moisture into the track Mother Nature switched course and did everything she could to take it out of the Lee County Speedway during the 2011 season opener in Donnellson Friday night. A stiff east wind continued after sunset keeping the surface dry and dusty for the huge field of 130 cars in six divisions and several drivers struggled with the conditions. A couple of well-timed watering sessions by promoter Terry Hoenig made for multi-grooved action though and the racing was good between the cautions.
The Sport Mod feature was the first on the list and they did not set a good tone for the evening with four cautions in the first three-laps for the twenty-two car starting field. When they were racing eventual front row starters Jeff Mueller and Dylan Book did battle for the lead with Book taking the win after the checkered flag waved following the sixth caution and eight completed laps. The young driver told the crowd from victory lane that he planned to make the long trip down from Adel to compete here every Friday night and for Mueller it was an impressive debut in the 3D roofing ride that Jason Cook drove to a track championship here last year. Dean Kratzer finished in the third spot, Mike Shelton was fourth and Rick Barlow Jr. took fifth.
Dan Wenig started from the inside of row three for the Hobby Stock feature and when the drivers in front of him slipped up the track in turns one and two on the opening lap the veteran driver said "thanks guys" and drove to the lead down the back stretch. Four cautions would keep the field bunched together and the last of those occurred when a three-wide battle for second between Dane Fenton, Rob Wilsey and Matt Gavin went bad with Gavin and Wilsey smacking the guardrail in turn one as Gavin tried to split the other two and ran out of room. On the restart Fenton applied some pressure over the final laps, but he could not keep Wenig from taking the win on opening night. Jim Lynch came from row five to finish third followed by Nick Fenton and Ray Raker. Nathan Anders who was the cause of the first caution, restarted seventeenth and came back to finish sixth.
The IMCA Late Models were making a special appearance tonight with 24 drivers on hand looking for the $1,000 top prize and with Mark Burgtorf and Ray Guss Jr. drawing the front row for the twenty-five-lap feature it was a pretty good bet that your winner would be one of those two. This race went green to checkers with Burgtorf chasing Guss and on a couple of occasions Mark was able to stick his nose under the leader, but there was no stopping the defending champion of everything in the IMCA Late Model division as Guss took the win. Burgtorf had to fight off a few challenges from Jason Perry as well to finish second, Perry was third followed by Justin Reed while Jeff Aikey took fifth. Charlie McKenna, Rob Toland, Jason Frankel, Boone McLaughlin and Tom Bowling Jr. filled out the top ten.
A solid field of thirty IMCA Modifieds were on hand for opening night and that included three or four drivers who will normally race at the Davenport Speedway, a track that had another type of event going on this Friday night. One of those visitors, Kevin Goben raced to the early lead in the twenty-lap finale only to have former track champion Josh Foster go blasting by on lap five. Foster had started seventh and appeared to be the class of the field only to have Dennis LaVeine mount a challenge late in the event. LaVeine was able to pull up to Foster's rear bumper a couple of times, but could not find a way around him as Josh earned the opening night trophy. Brandon Rothzen nearly stole second away from LaVeine at the checkers as he finished third followed by Tyler Cale and Jim Roach. Jeff Waterman had to win the B-Main to start this one from row nine and he raced his way up to sixth.
The IMCA Stock Cars were up next and after celebrating the birth of his first child this past week, it seemed unlikely that the rest of the field would be able to keep Jeff Mueller from going to victory lane tonight. Mueller started on the inside of row two and blew past Jeremy Pundt and Jason Cook on the opening lap. He then walked away from the competition and won going away putting that first trophy in his little girl's nursery. Jim Redman and Kevin Tomlinson were racing door-to-door for second on the final lap until contact in turn two saw Tomlinson hop a wheel and slap the guardrail losing several positions. Redman started eighth and finished second, Jason Cook settled in for third, Matt Greiner moved from tenth to fourth and Cale Samberg wound up fifth.
With Christine scheduled to work early on Saturday we headed for the car as the four cylinder Wild Things came on the track for the final feature of the night and I was amazed that the wind was still blowing strong at a sustained twenty miles per hour or more at this time of night. Thank goodness it was blowing from the east, from turn one to turn three, as it kept the grandstand and likely most of the pit area dust free but it sure did create challenging conditions for all involved on this night. Expect the track to be back to its normal sticky self, weather-willing, as action continues next Friday night at the Lee County Speedway.
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