Pardon the play on words in the title, but given that the UMP Summer Nationals now seems to be better known as the "Hell Tour" and the fact that the sky had a sense of Armageddon to it as we ran for our cars Monday night, I could not resist.
After taking another week off from racing to enjoy Burlington's Steamboat Days, topped off on Sunday night by spending over an hour being only about twenty feet from this young lady, I was ready to get back to racing with my original plan to make the drive over to Peoria on Tuesday night for my one and only chance to catch the "Hell Tour" this season. However, when wet grounds postponed Sunday's tour event at Quincy from Sunday to Monday, I decided to make the shorter trip to Quincy instead despite the fact that weather forecasts called for a possibility of strong thunderstorms later in the evening.
As I left Mount Pleasant shortly after 5 p.m. there were already tornado warnings being issued for the Albia area, but it appeared that these storms would stay north of Quincy so I continued on to the speedway where I found there to be a solid field of 33 UMP Late Models signed in along with 21 UMP Modifieds and 12 IMCA Sport Mods.. Included in both the Late Model and Modified rosters were drivers that I had only read about, but had never seen in action before such as Bowling Green Kentucky's Larry Greer and Clarksville Tennessee's Richard Frost in the Late Models, and Josh Harris of Utica Kentucky and Nick Hoffman from Mooresville North Carolina in the Mods, so already my night had some satisfaction.
It was obvious that Promoter Kenny Dobson and his crew had put in quite a bit of work just to make the facility ready for Monday night's show and a decent crowd was in the house despite the fact that the skies were starting to darken to the north and west. Hot laps and qualifying started right at the scheduled time and there was no wasted time as the heat races in all three divisions were completed. In the Modifieds it was David Wietholder, Michael Long and Josh Harris taking heat race wins. In that second heat, both Long and Nick Hoffman were pushed back to row two after a pair of "no starts" and Michael had to work his way around Kenny Schrader to score the win.
The four Late Model heats provided plenty of action even with the UMP format of timing in groups and starting straight up by qualifying times. Bobby Pierce fought off a late charge from Shannon Babb to win the first heat. Earlier in that one Babb waged war with Jason Perry, who was making his first appearance of the year, for position and just before a caution waved Babb had thrown a slider on Pierce resulting in some contact. They played nice though on the restart with the current Hell Tour point leader Pierce taking the win.
In the second heat Keith Pratt took advantage of the UMP "free restart rule" as he hopped the cushion in turn two on the opening lap and then parked it so that he could again restart on the front row and that quick thinking paid off as Pratt would later finish as the runner-up to Gordy Gundaker.
Front row starters Billy Moyer Jr. and Timothy Culp played a little cat and mouse with each other delaying the start of the third heat briefly and then as the first lap was being completed Culp slowed on the track with a flat left rear tire. With no courtesy laps during the heat races, the event went back to green and as lap four was being scored Culp returned to the track and parked his car on the topside of turn four to bring out another caution. He then drove around the track and again headed for the pits, likely being told by officials to do so in a scene that you would more likely see in a beginner class rather than a touring Late Model series. Moyer would then fight off the challenges of Dennis Erb Jr. to take the win while Frost finished third.
The much anticipated war between front row starters Jason Feger and Brandon Sheppard never materialized in the fourth and final heat race as Feger would lead the distance with Sheppard chasing, but it sure was interesting to watch Tyler Erb race his way into a qualifying spot. Running fifth mid-race and needing to get into the top four to transfer the Texas driver threw a massive slider on local driver Justin Reed in turns three and four to take over fourth and then in the closing laps Erb got even more aggressive with Ryan Unzicker to take away third. Yes, it would have been interesting to see if he would have continued to race this way in the feature, but by now you probably know how the night ended.
Two Sport Mod heats went off without a caution and despite the fact that the call had gone out for the Late Model B-Main to hustle into staging only two cars were there when the second Sport Mod heat took the checkers. As the drivers slowly made their way to the track a check of Brent Rosencrans' radar showed a big red blob headed right for Quincy and as soon as I heard track announcer Doug Mealy say "Ladies and gentleman" I grabbed my blanket and started running for the car. The sky to the northwest was dark blue and a shelf cloud was clearly visible. There was no way that I wanted to be sitting in this parking lot when the gust front went through!
I made it to Taco Bell and deliberately parked on the south side, or downwind side of the building and as I ran inside the restaurant I heard something metal hit the front of the Big Lots store across the parking lot. Before ordering my healthy meal I scoped out the best place to take cover in the building should things get worse and while eating I watched the wind whipped heavy rain and the lightning flashed while a steady stream of cars, many likely coming from Quincy Raceways, passed by.
So what now? A rainout of a touring series event after the heat races are completed is about the worst possible scenario that a promoter can face. The drivers expect to be paid since they raced and qualified for a feature, and then head on down the road with no expectation that they would have to return. The fans on the other hand expect to be able to come back at a later date and have the show completed without having to pay anything extra at the ticket gate. Obviously the two expectations don't match up!
If the drivers get paid for Monday's show, that purse comes from the ticket and pit pass revenue from last night. Therefore, any "rescheduled" date if in fact they could even find one, would likely be a completely new program where everybody would have to pay to get in again. "Not cool" says the fan who is not considering the entire situation.
If you don't pay the drivers for Monday night and you do find a date where you could simply complete the show with the Late Model B-Main and the three features where the fans could redeem their rain checks and their pit passes to get back in for free, it is likely that over half the field would not return and instead just have their "start money" mailed to them in Bowling Green and Utica Kentucky or Mooresville North Carolina. The drivers that do return, other than the locals, are mad that they had to spend the money to tow back here again and the fans are mad because not everybody came back.
So as you can see, no matter what direction this thing goes somebody is not going to be happy, and the sad thing is that for many that unhappiness will be directed at promoter Kenny Dobson and the Quincy Raceways rather than the true culprit, Mother Nature herself.
After all the work that they put forth in an effort to put on this show it is a fate that Dobson and his crew do not deserve.
No Peoria for me tonight, instead I will once again tempt Mother Nature and head to the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa Wednesday night where the IMCA Late Models will join the program racing for $1,000-to-win. Perhaps I will see you there!
No comments:
Post a Comment