The big money is on the line across all four divisions, yet there were less than full fields that signed in to do battle on opening night of the 21st Annual Budweiser and Musco Lighting Stock Car Shootout at the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa. Perhaps it was due to a post Fourth of July slumber, or a greater than fifty percent chance of rain, or that drivers really don't want to race for more money, or any other number of reasons, but the car counts looked like this on Tuesday night.
$2,000-to-win Stock Cars - 18
$1,000-to-win Sport Mods - 16
$1,000-to-win Hobby Stocks - 14
$700-to-win Sport Compacts - 11
Fortunately the format was already established that additional drivers could come in on the final night (tonight) and still compete for the big paychecks knowing though that the best that they could start in the main event would be ninth. That is because Tuesday night's two sets of heat races would establish the eight drivers in each class who will run a Dash on Wednesday to determine how the first four rows of each main event will line up.
In Stock Car qualifying Damon Murty fought off the challenges from his own backup car that is being wheeled by Modified ace Kyle Brown to win the first heat while Jeff Mueller fought off the challenges from Mike Hughes to win heat two. Later in the evening it was Brown edging out Murty to win heat three while the top two drivers from the West Liberty Raceway, Johnny Spaw and David Brandies went one-two in heat four. By my unofficial calculations (all four classes will be "unofficial", but let's just say it now rather than having to repeat it for all four) the eight Dash drivers will be Brown, Murty, Hughes, Mueller, Spaw, Brandies, Jason See and Derrick Agee. Cayden Carter who is unbeaten during his weekly show appearances here this season was not in attendance on Tuesday perhaps because he is focused on running the Deery Brothers Summer show at the Independence Motor Speedway tonight since he is currently tenth in the Deery points standings. Another West Liberty regular, Adam Bell made the trip over and finished fifth in the first heat before being disqualified for an illegal carb spacer.
Four heats were also run in the Sport Mod division with Colton Livezy and Austin Paul taking wins in the first round while Eric Flander and Matthew Van Gelder were winners in round two. There was a scenario in the fourth and final heat of the night involving defending track champion and current point leader Curtis Van Der Wal that may have gone unnoticed by many. After starting at the back of heat one Van Der Wal battled his way up to third at the checkers and he would then start the fourth heat from the pole position where he quickly drove away from the field. Before the mid-race point though Curtis got completely sideways in turn two and somehow made the save, but dropped all the way back to sixth among the seven cars that were still running since Austin Paul had pulled to the pits after making contact with another competitor on the opening lap. Okay, so no problem, Van Der Wal was gaining positions when once again he got crossed up in turn two and this time he dropped all the way to the back with four laps to go. With two laps remaining he passed Arizona visitor Dennis Gates and it looked like he would finish in sixth, but on the final lap Tony Johnson went sailing off the back stretch and the race ended under yellow/checkers with Curtis being credited with the fifth position. Had Johnson not been dropped to seventh at the finish, Van Der Wal would have been in a tie for that eighth and final dash position with Austin Paul, but the tiebreaker would have gone to Paul due to his win in an earlier heat race. As it is tonight's Pole Dash will feature Livezy, Flander, Van Gelder, Van Der Wal, Tim Plummer, Dan Drury, Carter VanDenBerg and Danny Brau.
All fourteen Hobby Stocks started the first heat and, in hindsight, I am guessing that they wished they had split the field into two seven car heats instead. All was going well until the radiator let go on the car of one of the front runners Dane Blozovich sending him hard into the turn one guardrail. The impact careened him back down into oncoming traffic where he was drilled by Christian Huffman who was racing in tight formation with two other cars. Thankfully both drivers emerged from their cars uninjured, but the scramble resulted in only seven cars finishing with Dustin Griffiths taking the win. Nine cars would come back to compete in round two with Kelsie Spilman sitting on the pole position and you would have thought that the $1,000 that is to be paid out tonight was in a bag hanging from a pole in turn one as drivers went five-wide at the drop of the green. It was obvious that this was not going to work out well and after the melee only five cars remained for the restart. Griffiths would win again with August Bach posting his second runner-up finish of the night and I would guess that the remainder of the top eight would be Travis Bunnell, Matt Messamaker, Bill Bonnett, Danny Thrasher, T.J. Veenstra and Ron Downing.
All eleven Sport Compacts started both heats with Levi Heath winning the first one and Cody Van Dusen taking the second. Shaun Slaughter was a late arrival and finished fourth in the first race after starting in the back. He would then start from the front of the second qualifier and was running second when his rear axle broke entering turn one. Slaughter somehow kept the car from rolling over, but Dan Campbell was not as lucky as he veered hard right into the turn one guardrail and nearly got upside down. The top eight would be Heath, Van Dusen, Slaughter, Bill Whalen Jr., John Gill, John Whalen, Jason Breuklander and Shane Evans.
Drivers in all four classes are being encouraged to join the field for tonight's finale, plus the IMCA Modifieds will run a full program paying $500 to the feature winner.
Once again the weather may have an impact on Wednesday racing plans as I have three great options in the Stock Car Shootout at Osky, the Deery Brothers Summer Series at Independence and the UMP Summer Nationals at Peoria. I will check the radar consistently and make a decision by 4 p.m. and you will have to check back in on the Back Stretch tomorrow to see where I ended up!
Afternoon update: The second night of Osky's Stock Car Shootout has been postponed to Wednesday July 20th where it will be run inconjunctions with the Hawkeye Dirt Tour for IMCA Modifieds during the Southern Iowa Fair.
No comments:
Post a Comment