Todd Shute used the outside line coming off of turn four to
squeeze between Scott Hogan and the front stretch guardrail to take the lead
and the eventual victory as the Karl Performance Hawkeye Dirt Tour for IMCA
Modifieds visited the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa Tuesday night. Five
other drivers also found victory lane on a busy night of racing that kicked off
the annual Southern Iowa Fair.
Two multi-car crashes early in the 25-lap Modified headliner
shortened the field from twenty-four to fourteen and likely created quite a
shakeup in the Tour’s point standings. Just after Scott Hogan lead the field
past the flagstand for lap number one Jacob Murray got sideways mid-pack in
turn one and collected tour regular Zach Less as well as northern Missouri visitor
Hunter Marriott. Then on the double-file restart, pole starter Casey Greubel
got sideways in front of the field on the low side of turn one and in the
scramble there were two tangles of cars, one high and one low once the dust
settled. Dirt Tour point contender Richie Gustin was eliminated in that mess
while Jimmy Gustin, Andrew Schroeder, Cayden Carter, Colt Mather and Tyler
Groenendyk were also involved. Mather stayed in motion, but then drove through
the center lane of the infield under caution so he was directed to restart at
the rear, a decision that he obviously disagreed with before retiring for the
evening. Carter, who scored two big money wins this past weekend, spent as much
time as he could in the work area to make repairs before returning to the track
well behind the field as the green flag waved for the restart.
Hogan continued to lead the depleted field until the caution
waved again on lap five when Brandon Banks lost a battle with the track tire
protecting the infield in turn two. From there the race went green for the
final twenty laps around the big half-mile with Todd Shute in hot pursuit of
Hogan. As the leaders were coming around to score lap number nine Shute went to
the cushion in turn four and found a nice bite that allowed him to pull even
with the leader down the front stretch. Hogan left him just enough room to
squeeze by and Shute took the lead as he entered turn one. As Shute pulled away
the rest of the front of the field spaced out as well and it was just a matter
of clicking off laps until the checkers waved with “Toddzilla” taking the win.
Hogan doesn’t race on half-miles often, but was impressive in second. Track
promoter and Hawkeye Dirt Tour point contender Mike VanGenderen was a solid
third, 2009 IMCA Modified National Champion Dylan Smith was fourth and Steve
Stewart rounded out the top five. The race for sixth had a thrilling finish as
Cayden Carter made a move on Mark Elliott similar to the one that Shute made
earlier for the lead and when they touched Elliott went for a spin allowing
Carter to take sixth while Elliott slid across the line backwards in seventh.
Mark Schulte, Nate Caruth and Kyle Brown completed the top ten.
Twenty-nine Modifieds were in attendance for tonight’s event
and among the non-qualifers was North Carolina driver Kyle Strickler who was
disqualified out of a transfer position in the B-Main when he came up
twenty-five pounds light at the scales. This allowed Greg Cox to make the show.
The last time that I saw Nate Caruth in action he was driving a Late Model on
the pavement at the Lucas Oil Raceway near Indianapolis. Tonight he was in
Strickler’s backup car and his top ten finish in the main event started from
the eleventh row. Kyle Brown and Hunter Marriott were the Tour’s provisional
starters and while Marriott was a late arrival for the first pileup, starting
in the twelfth row allowed Brown to take evasive action in both melees and
garner valuable points in tenth. Current HDT point leader Ronn Lauritzen
finished eleventh. The next event on the Hawkeye Dirt Tour will be on Monday
August 5th in support of the World of Outlaw Late Model show at the
Independence Motor Speedway.
Five more divisions were in action on Tuesday night and
their features ran off in this order. When the front row of Bill Livezy and
A.J. Johnson got a little ragged coming out of turn four for the start of the
16-lap Sport Mod main event third-starting Eric Flander took advantage and had
the lead crossing under the waving green flag. Current All Iowa Points leaderCarter VanDenBerg, and the driver that has been almost unstoppable in this
division here at Osky in 2013, Curtis VanDerWal took up the chase of Flander in
second and third. As the leader approached the now soon-to-be-lapped car of
Livezy in the final two laps, Flander chose the high line out of turn two while
VanDenBerg raced to the inside of Livezy and took the lead down the back
straightaway. Flander came charging right back though in turns three and four
to regain the advantage as the white flag waved and when VanDenBerg and
VanDerWal swapped the second spot back and forth on the final circuit that was
exactly what Flander wanted to see as he collected his first win of the season
here at the Southern Iowa Speedway. VanDenBerg and VanDerWal were close behind
in second and third, Brett Lowry was fast all night but could do no better than
fourth ahead of Tony Johnson.
Eight Mod Lites were on hand to compete tonight and there
was no stopping current All Iowa Points leader Josh May from sweeping the
division. Andy Hennigar and Mike Morrill both held the lead early in the 12-lap
main event, but they were well behind May at the checkers finishing second and
third respectively. Todd Shute made a guest appearance in the pink and silver
#DC5 car and finished in fourth while Dusty Masolini picked up the fifth-place
money.
With two of the top drivers in the state drawing the front
row for the 18-lap Stock Car feature it was no surprise when this one turned
out to be a two-car breakaway. Jason Cook stayed within no more than four
car-lengths behind leader Damon Murty throughout the distance and Cook actually
pulled even with Murty going down the back stretch on lap seven. Murty was
strong on the high line in turns three and four though to fight off that
challenge, and then on the final lap Cook made a strong run again on the bottom
of turns three and four. The two came off of four side-by-side, but the
momentum off the topside carried Murty back to the checkers first for his
seventeenth victory overall this season. Corey Stout made the short tow from across
the street to finish in the third spot, last week’s winner Brad Pinkerton was
fourth and Kris Walker took fifth.
Nick Murty paced the first two laps of the Hobby Stock
feature before fellow front row starter Dustin Griffiths moved past on lap
three. The caution waved mid-race and on the restart Bill Bonnett got a great
jump and passed Griffiths for the lead before the field reached the flagstand.
Griffiths would try to regain the top spot, but after staying with the veteran
driver for a few laps he watched him pull away as Bonnett posted the victory.
Griffiths was second, Eric Stanton returned to action at Osky with a
third-place finish, Murty would hold on for fourth and Justin Hook came from
the sixth row to take fifth.
Ten IMCA Late Models would take the green for the final
event of the night and, after establishing their positions on the opening lap,
nothing changed over the twenty-five lap distance as Nick Marolf picked up the
checkered flag. Tommy Elston was the runner-up, Justin Kay took third followed
by Todd Cooney and Chad Holladay.
The race track definitely had more than one racing groove on
the hot evening, but the luck of the draw/redraw format saw all twelve heat
races across the six divisions go without a lead change after the opening lap.
We do though look forward to returning again tonight (Wednesday) to see if the
luck of the draw goes the other way as Modifieds, Sport Mods, Stock Cars, Hobby
Stocks and Sport Compacts will be back in action at the Southern Iowa Speedway.
The Harris Clash at the Knoxville Raceway is on the Back Stretch schedule for
Thursday night and on Friday I look forward to a trip to the Jacksonville
Speedway for the Brockway Mechanical and Roofing Sprint Invaders. Maybe see you
there?
No comments:
Post a Comment