As I was pulling out of the Benton County Speedway Sunday night, at 8:25 p.m. no less, I called my Positively Racing colleague Barry Johnson and said, "anybody who thinks that you can only find good racing at big special events has obviously never been to a weekly show at Vinton!" A big part of the charm is the fact that the crowd is always vocal and while it wasn't filled to capacity on this night, the gaps in the grandstands were much, much smaller than what you would have seen at the day's NASCAR Sprint Cup race in Richmond. Plus at Vinton, except for the gathering just outside of the beer stand, nobody stands up during green flag racing so that means everybody can see all of the action. Take the hint NASCAR.
IMCA Late Models would join the track's regular five classes on this night as the opener of their Sunday Series that is shared with the Stuart Speedway and a solid field of fifteen signed in for action with the Late Model main serving as the finale for the evening. We will get to that later though as it was the Micro Mods that were on tap first for feature racing. Veteran driver Don Erger dropped to the inside from his third starting spot to take the lead at the wave of the green and he was never seriously challenged on his way to victory in the 12-lap race. Jeff Davis tried to keep pace early, but when he spun mid-race that really left Erger all alone. Young Dallon Murty made a nice run through the field after being caught up in an early incident to finish second while Cole McNeal made a final lap pass to take third.
The Hobby Stock count required three heats and it was Daniel Wauters and Justin Wacha starting from the front row of the 15-lap main event. A scramble near the back of the pack as the field took the green saw Jim Ball's car end up on its side to bring out the red and safety crews helped Ball climb out of the driver's side window opening unscathed. Once under green Wauters would lead the first two laps around the quarter-mile before yielding to Wacha on lap three. Nathan Ballard who started ninth was now at the front to challenge and he used the extreme low line to squeeze past Wacha in turn four on lap five. The caution would wave for Mike Kimm's spin in turn one on lap seven and following the restart August Bach found the high line around the speedway to his liking moving quickly from fifth to second. With Ballard still thinking that the bottom groove was the only way to go Bach surprised him by driving around him to the lead with five laps remaining. One of the best in this division in eastern Iowa though, Ballard fought back moving up the track himself and then using the lapped car of Kyle Dulin as a bit of a pick on Bach to regain the lead with two to go. Bach would make one last run at the leader, but there would be no stopping Ballard from taking the checkers. Wacha would finish behind Bach in third while Wauters and Brett Vanous were next in line.
The IMCA Sport Mod 16-lap feature was up next and as the field took the green Curt Hilmer and the defending All Iowa Points champion Tony Olson tangled with both drivers going off the top of turn one and into the grass. For Hilmer the damage was terminal as his car was towed back to the pit area while Olson scrambled back to the pits to change a flat tire. He returned to start at the rear of the now fourteen car field and as they worked through turns three and four Olson moved to the outside and passed four cars before the race went back to green. A four car spin in turn one required another caution that actually turned out to be a break for Olson who would have otherwise been docked at least those four positions at the pay window regardless of where he would have finished if the race would have went green.
Tony behaved on the next restart and the race stayed green with Dakoda Sellers leading the way until lap four when Olson's cousin, Kyle Olson took over the lead. When Matt Petrzelka sun in turn one on lap nine the restart saw a wild three-car race for the lead between the two Olson's and Dan Drury before Tony slipped over the top of turn four on lap ten. Drury would keep pace, but could not make a strong run at the leader in the closing laps as Kyle Olson visited victory lane for the second night in a row after Saturday's win in Independence. Drury would take the second spot ahead of Danny Dvorak who recovered nicely after having to change a tire from that early four car tangle. Mitch Manternach was consistent in fourth with thirteenth starter Joey Schaefer in fifth. Tony Olson scrambled back to seventh at the checkers.
Twenty IMCA Modifieds lined up for their 20-lap feature with a driver roster that included two from Texas who made the trip north for the weekend and a Medford, Oregon, driver who has taken up residence in Iowa for the racing season. Pole-sitter Zach Less would snare the early lead and hold it until lap six when Mike Burbridge went over the top of turn four to bring out the caution. On the restart Less was under attack as J.D. Auringer passed him low and the Oregon driver Tom Berry went around him on the high side with Auringer holding the lead by inches on lap seven. With Auringer digging down low and Berry riding the cushion up high it would be the scorer's choice as they crossed the line the next three laps until Burbridge again needed a caution when he parked in the grass outside of turn four.
Berry would lead lap eleven by half a car length before Less went off the top of turn four and the caution would wave again on lap thirteen when Austin, Texas, driver Jerry Frydrych also ran out of cushion in turn three. The Auringer/Berry battle of racing lines would continue for three more laps under green before both Less and Frydrych wanted to get a closer look at the pine trees well beyond the end of turns three and four and both drivers were sent to the pits for causing their second caution. Scott Hogan and Ronn Lauritzen looked like they might make it a four car race for the lead in the closing laps, but Berry handled that obviously treacherous cushion in turns three and four with care and held on to take his first win in the state of Iowa after racing here late in 2015 as well. Auringer was the runner-up with Hogan in third. Lauritzen finished fourth, Patrick Flanagan was fifth and Darin Duffy came from the eighth row to finish sixth. David Goode of Copperas Cove was the other Texas driver in action.
Stock Cars were up next for 18 laps with Scooter Dulin moving from third to first on the opening lap. Bob Ahrendsen, who started right behind Dulin in fifth, followed him to the front and then drove under him to take the lead on lap three. With Ahrendsen pulling away, the race for second provided plenty of entertainment as Dulin tried to fight off the challenges of Norman Chesmore and Jared Daggett. Ahrendsen would ease to victory in the non-stop event with Chesmore claiming second at the pay window. Daggett picked up the third spot with Dulin in fourth while Justin Stander completed the top five. Zach Spillman of Marble Falls, Texas, arrived late at the speedway after reportedly running an Enduro race at Stuart earlier in the day and raced at the back of the Stock Car A-Main.
The Late Model feature was set to close out the night and as the field assembled on the track prior to 25-laps of racing Ryan Dolan, who had dominated to win the second heat race, was lined up on the outside of row four, the position that he landed in during the redraw, and Jerry King who had finished sixth in that same heat race was lined up twelfth. Apparently the lineup card that the scorekeeper had did not have King's #70 on it and the drivers were told to swap positions. Dolan did not stop to contest the switch that was an obvious error and the field went to green with pole-sitter Todd Cooney sliding up in front of fellow front row starter John Emerson in turn two to take the lead. The top side was the fast way around for the Late Models and Emerson did his best to match Cooney's pace until the caution waved for Luke Pestka who had driven off the top side of turn two and was checking to see if the adjacent field would be planted with corn or beans this year.
The restart gave the fans a thrill as Emerson used a move similar to what Cooney threw at him on the opening lap to take the lead in turn two and as Cooney fought back in turns three and four both Joe Zrostlik and Darren Ackerman were in the mix making it a four car battle as Emerson crossed the line in the lead on lap eight. Cooney would get back around Emerson on the following lap and then proceed to open up a full straightaway lead before he closed in on three slower cars racing for position with eight laps remaining. Cooney would put a lap on Kip Siems, but then had to be very patient with Chris Snyder and Mark Hurst who were racing side-by-side with each other allowing Emerson and now a third running Ryan Dolan to quickly close the gap.
The leader caught a break when Hurst slipped over the top of turn four on lap nineteen, but came back to the track to keep it green, although Emerson now seemed to be ready to make a run at Cooney for the lead. That ended though with three laps remaining when the chaser, Emerson dropped a right rear off the track while going down the back stretch. As Cooney pulled away Dolan dove to the inside of turn three to take over second, but only briefly as Emerson crossed him over to regain the spot going down the front stretch with two to go. All Cooney had to do now was avoid a mistake and the veteran driver did just that to capture the win ahead of Emerson and Dolan. Joe Zrostlik would finish in the fourth position while Darren Ackerman took fifth.
The IMCA Late Models return to the Benton County Speedway on Sunday May 22nd.
A big thanks to promoter Mick Trier and race director Mike Van Genderen for another great night of action at the Benton County Speedway and it was also nice to visit with IMCA's Ryan Clark, a former writer with us here at Positively Racing. You will see that we keep his In Staging blog up on the home page in hope that our readers will still go back and see some of the great work that Ryan did there, and of course in hope that he will someday resume those efforts!
I also want to thank Jeff and Dean for holding a great seat for me around some friendly people as I was off visiting with others in the pits right up until race time. Hopefully the rainy week that is forecasted will have enough breaks in it to allow us to go racing on Wednesday night in Oskaloosa and then on Friday and Saturday it will be a different type of competition around the blue oval as I take in the Drake Relays for the first time. A Big 10 UMP Late Model series event at the Quincy Raceways is then my target on Sunday night.
Stay dry, stay warm and hopefully you can find some racing action to attend this week!
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