For the second year in a row I was able to convince my wife Christine to go with me to the Falloween race at Dells Raceway Park this past Sunday. Last year, in order to get her to go with me, I told her that if we left early enough we could stop and do some sightseeing along the way not knowing that our route would take us right past The House On The Rock as well as Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin, not exactly the type of the length of sightseeing that I had in mind. So in other words, I was a bad husband and said "no" as we kep on driving past both attractions. So this year, instead of making it a one day up and back marathon I instead planned a two-day adventure that would see us visit Prairie Du Chien and dine at one of the best supper clubs that I have been to in years, then spend the night in Dodgeville before being up bright and early to start our tour of The House on The Rock promptly at 9 a.m.
The House On The Rock website says to plan on at least three hours if you are touring all three sections and while I thought that was probably more than we would need I could tell you that we were there for three and a half hours and that it was her who was saying, "don't we need to get going to the races?"
We arrived at Dells Raceway Park at 1:50 p.m. and I figured that we had already missed a Last Chance race or two, but was thankful that Doug Haack, Kevin Feller and Ed Reichert were saving us seats once again as it was obvious from the parking lot that this year's crowd was nearly twice as large as last year's debut of this late season event that features the Super Late Models on the scenic 1/3-mile paved oval. Once we made our way to the seats I learned that sometime during the week the track had moved the starting time of the actual racing until 2 p.m. due to the anticipation of a large car count and the time that it would take for qualifying earlier in the day. Forty-five Super Late Models were on hand along with a good showing in both the Midwest Truck Series and the TUNDRA Sportsman and the first green flag for racing fell just before 2:30.
It was a beautiful sunny day with a temperature that was higher than it would normally be for this time of the year, but a stiff wind blowing right in our faces as we sat high atop turn one definitely required a few more layers than what we had last year. The racing in the qualifiers and heats clipped right along for all three divisions and right around 3:30 the $1,000-to-win Non-Qualifiers race for the Super Late Models, or the "Scarecrow 40" was brought to the track for on track driver introductions. The race itself took the green just before four o'clock with Erik Darnell scoring the win, a nice paycheck given that he would have needed to get up into the top five of the 150-lap feature to earn even more money.
Minnesota driver Brent Kane fought off the double challenge from Jason Thoma and Brian Back to win an entertaining Sportsman feature and thankfully officials had the 150-lap main event for the Late Models next on the schedule.
On track introductions were made and then the drivers strapped in for 150 laps with a scheduled ten minute break at lap 75. Mike Litchfield would pace the field early, but it wasn't long before Ty Majeski found his way to the front with last year's winner Andrew Morrissey close behind. That would be how they were running at the halfway break and, since it was now 5:50 p.m. we decided to get an early start on our four and a half hour drive home more than satisfied with the racing action that we had seen. From watching video on the track's Facebook page on Monday I saw that we missed some great racing between Majeski and Morrissey late in the race before things got really intense after the white flag waved. Contact sent both cars spinning in turns one and two and that allowed Casey Johnson to assume the lead for the green-white-checkered restart and take the $3,000 victory with young Natalie Decker in second.
Yes, I wish I would have still been there to watch this wild finish in person, but I was told that the checkered flag for the Late Models did not wave until about 7 p.m. and I would have had hell to pay with Christine if we would have returned home just before midnight on a Sunday. I do it all the time, but for her that Monday morning workday starts pretty early after a fun weekend. With a full pit area, a large crowd and a feature finish that will create a buzz for sometime the come, I am sure that the last thing that the officials at Dells would consider right now would be some constructive criticism, but here goes anyway, especially since we were by far not the only ones to be leaving during that "halftime break". Please move the race time to 1:00 p.m. instead of pushing it out to 2:00 and then being nearly a half hour late. This is a pavement track, I thought they always started on time! And drop the on track introductions for the Non Qualifiers race, because if you do both of these that final checkered flag would have waved at 4:50 and we would have still been around to see 13-year-old Gabe Sommers win the Truck feature.
Hopefully these changes will be made for the 3rd Annual Falloween because I still have to take Christine to Taliesin, and if not, well I guess that I will always be able to save my money for the 4th annual event and just watch all of the videos online the next day. :)
By making this a two-day trip I was obviously unable to attend the second night of the Memphis Fall Nationals, but I was able to get the story by reading the blogs of both Danny Rosencrans and Brian Neal. Kevin Feller was the true road warrior this weekend as he spent both Friday and Saturday in Memphis before making the trip to the Dells in time for qualifying and he gave me the scoop on why I had seen Dustin Griffiths in the Stock Car results for Saturday night. According to Kevin, the former All Iowa Points Hobby Stock Champion approached car owner Roger Kelderman after Cayden Carter had driven his all orange #10cc Stock Car to victory on Friday night and made a deal with him to buy the car on the spot. So, on Saturday night Griffiths raced in both the Hobby Stock division and in his new Stock Car where he finished tenth in his debut in the division. Kelderman on the other hand brought out his second Stock Car and Cayden Carter showed that it is every bit as capable as well by parking it in victory lane. So it was an impressive sweep by Carter and Kelderman using two different cars and it will be good to see Dustin Griffiths in the Stock Car class in 2017.
The first ever OneDirt World Short Track Nationals was held this past weekend on the Dirt Track at the Charlotte Motor Speedway with more than 300 drivers competing in a variety divisions with the UMP Modifieds, the UMP/SECA Crate Late Models and the USCS 360 Sprint Cars taking top billing. Perhaps part of the title sponsorship included an exclusivity in reporting the results as, outside of the general summaries provided on OneDirt, I have been unable to locate the full results of the event from any other source. It looked like an interesting show though and at the very least it produced a new challenger to the most annoying sound ever. I know that I am old fashioned and that the announcers of today like to think of themselves as being every bit a part of the entertainment rather than just a provider of solid information, but as you watch these videos of each of the World Short Track Nationals main events you can't help but notice that a civil defense siren is played with the drop of the green flag for not only the start of the race, but on most restarts as well. I hope and pray that this trend does NOT catch on at any of the tracks that I frequent because at this point I would have to say that I would no longer attend that track if it did. Mackey, Paris, Clark, VanSickle, Fox, Kropf, Huenefeld, Berry, Bokhoven are you listening? Don't do this!!
Brandon Sheppard announced this week that he will leave the Best Motorsports team, skip this weekend's World Finals in Charlotte, and drive his family owned equipment in 2017. Talk about the ultimate mic drop, Sheppard's last race with the Best team was his $100,000 win at the Dirt Track World Championship on October 15th. The young Illinois driver will compete at the Gateway Nationals in December.
Jim Moon won the Late Model feature at the Heart O' Texas Speedway Saturday. I thought that at least Danny would find that interesting.
Can you believe it? NASCAR finally figured out that having Kyle Busch whoop up on the competition in the Xfinity series and the Trucks might not be selling tickets after all.
Major League Baseball has moved the scheduled time of tonight's first pitch for game two of the World Series up one hour due to the rain that is forecast to arrive in Cleveland sometime after 10 p.m. Isn't it great that MLB has the foresight to do this in an effort to get the game in for both the players and the fans? Two-year-olds everywhere are pleased.
Bret Sievertsen does a fantastic job of reporting results for Maquoketa, East Moline and Tipton and this week on Facebook he invited in a hornets nest by asking people for suggestions on how the sport of racing could be made better at local tracks. When I looked through the long list of comments yesterday there were the standards that essentially said "Pay more, charge less, get more sponsors," something that of course will truly be a revelation to a promoter, but when I checked again today most of those are gone. But the reason that I am bringing this up here today is because of the fact that the next post down in my news feed was this play on a Dr. Suess book cover that Eric Huenefeld had posted. This blew my mind, are the algorithms at Facebook really this good?? Bret's post actually did get a couple of good ideas that could be used going forward.More fun with photos. In today's story about the return of weekly racing to the Volusia Speedway Park you will see that the photo shows the Late Models of Steve Casebolt and Dale McDowell, two drivers who you will never find at a weekly show at Volusia Speedway Park. Yes, they do race there during the annual Speedweek events, but I had to chuckle when I saw this because it would be like the Mount Pleasant Chamber of Commerce including a picture of Luke Bryan when they are promoting one of their Rock Around the Block events. Sure, he's been in town before, but let's not give everyone the impression that he will be on stage in central park this Saturday night!
I was involved in the promotion of Shiverfest for fourteen years and I am proud that it continues to be a race that many drivers and fans mark on their calendars each year when the date is confirmed. And of course, this year's Shiverfest will be run this Saturday, October 29th at the Lee County Speedway in Donnellson. The fact that I am no longer directly involved in its promotion now puts this race into my "deal" with Christine where if we are invited to another event, unless I am announcing or it is the Knoxville Nationals, I go to the other event with her. Yea, yea, I know, but hey I am still going to more than sixty races a year so the "deal" keeps her pretty happy and works pretty well for me.
Except for this Saturday!
When I was still co-promoting this race it seemed like the last four or five years that I was involved we were always faced with threatening weather, but now that it falls within my "deal" that is not the case. Two years ago, when we were attending the wedding of our friends' daughter in Des Moines, it was bright, sunny and seventy-five degrees at Shiverfest. And, this year, where I will instead be at a Halloween party, the forecast is for bright, sunny skies and temperatures again in the mid-70's. I plan to at least spend the afternoon in Donnellson so that I can see who shows up to race as it is usually a very diverse field of drivers from throughout the region and then, just as hot laps hit the track at 5:00 p.m., I will head back home for my wife to dress me up in whatever costume she decides upon.
In all of the years that I have been tracking the All Iowa Points I have never seen a year where three different divisions "could" be decided at the final race of the year, that of course being Shiverfest. I use the quotations around "could" because it would take the participation of some drivers who do not normally compete at this event, but here are the scenarios:
Limited Modifieds - Tyler Soppe trails defending champion Tony Olson by just three points going into Shiverfest and the word is that Soppe will be on hand to compete. Olson is doubtful after he crashed hard during hot laps at Donnellson back on October 15th. A win or a second place finish at Shiverfest will give Soppe the 2016 title and a third-place finish will make them co-champions, but neither of the top two drivers in the IMCA Sport Mod National Points have had much luck racing against the strong group of drivers that compete at the specials in Memphis and Donnellson. Olson was shut out of the top five in two nights at Memphis as well as the first night at Donnellson before his crash and Soppe has two fifth-place finishes to his credit in four recent starts against this competition.
Stock Cars - Damon Murty leads Mike Nichols by four points and it would appear that Murty will earn his fourth straight AIP title. Nichols spent last weekend at the Junction Motor Speedway in Nebraska adding two more wins to his phenomenal 2016 total of more than sixty, but he would need to make a rare trip east from Harlan and finish first or second to be named the All Iowa Points champion for the first time in his stellar career. And of course that assumes that Murty, who has been absent from the October specials so far while farming, is not there.
Hobby Stocks - It is doubtful that either of these drivers will be at Shiverfest, but you never know. Cody Nielsen of Spencer leads four-time champion Shannon Anderson by two points.
Up until last weekend it looked as though the Four Cylinder division could still be undecided coming into Shiverfest, but Kimberly Abbott took care of that by finishing third on Friday night and then winning on Saturday in Memphis. Abbott becomes the first female driver ever to win an All Iowa Points title and, just as it says on the back of her car "If it weren't for me, this would be a sausage fest!" And while not exactly "official", Kimberly joins 2014 champion Austen Becerra to become the first boyfriend/girlfriend combo to be All Iowa Points champions. That one will probably never be equalled!
The bottom line is this. It is going to be a beautiful day for racing and Shiverfest is truly a Family Fun event that all race fans should see. Hope to see you there (early) on Saturday!
In addition to tracking the state points in nine states other than Iowa this year, I also kept up with the Late Models and Super Late Models on pavement as well as the Midgets on dirt throughout the Midwest. In the pavement Super Late Models Dalton Zehr is the champion with fourteen wins to his credit. While compiling the points I have seen Zehr's hometown listed as Boise, Idaho, and Port Orange, Florida, as well as Menomonie, Wisconsin, meaning that the guy moves around more than Doug Haack. Michael Bilderback is this year's champion in the Late Model division. A regular at both Rockford and Madison, Bilderback tallied eight feature wins in 2016. The Midwest Midget point chase started at the Chili Bowl in January and ended last Friday night at the Jason Leffler Memorial with Nevada native Tanner Thorson topping the list. Thorson, who was also named the National Midget Driver of the Year for 2016 was the winner of ten features here in the Midwest. The full listing for all three divisions follow.
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