For the first time in years I was all excited about the NBA and I even had my Tivo set up to record the season opener between the Celtics and the Cavaliers. Then, just a few minutes into the game, one of the new Celtics stars Gordon Heyward went for an alley-oop in traffic. Let's just say that when Gordon came down I suddenly lost my interest in the NBA again. If you haven't seen his ankle injury, don't go looking for it, I just hope that this fine young man who previously played for coach Brad Stevens at Butler can recover and once again play basketball at a high level in the future.
Last week was an interesting one as the weather played a big role and decisions had to be made. Up in Minnesota the Granite City Speedway made an early call and cancelled its two-day show bringing about all kinds of Facebook fury with people even accusing the track of canceling in order to help sponsor Don Shaw win a points battle. The comments were relentless and I hope that each and every one of the idiots who made them realize how foolish they looked when IT ACTUALLY RAINED! That is the great thing about Facebook over what we used to have when only the AWP's (Anonymous Weasel Posters) were roaming the forums is that at least now you can identify who is stupid and who is not. So just remember that the next time that you want to get nasty on Facebook. :)
The Darkside boys had a rough weekend up in Tipton with the Fall Bash and obviously they wished that they had made a different call on the Thursday night show where more than 200 drivers had signed in before it was determined that the track would not be able to be rolled into a safe condition for racing. Then on Friday night they were clipped by a fast moving storm that eventually caused them to stop the show short of a finish as well. Perhaps the folks around here are now wising up because I did not see much for negativity on either Facebook or the Iowastockcars forum where in the past any promoter who had this happen would have been mercilessly skewered. So do you want to see the difference?
If Timmy and Ryan had been beaten up on social media they likely would not continue to consider a possible one week tour for Modifieds and Sport Mods in 2018 that would run seven nights straight at six different tracks both starting and ending at the same track. They would try to keep the shows within a two hour driving distance and they are looking at running in the early spring or during the Fall when track points would not be an issue. Given the popularity of the North Dakota Tour that runs in July I am not so sure that they need to worry about that as something in June might work better than racing weeknights during the school year. Anyway, the point is that if you don't drive a promoter in the ground when things don't go well, they will remain motivated and excited about putting on events in the future. Good job eastern Iowa race fans!
Hopefully the weather will not be as challenging this weekend when the Darkside goes Topless for two nights at the Farley Speedway.
I had much earlier made plans to be in northwest Missouri on Thursday for the opening night of the Summit Racing Equipment USRA Nationals and it was great to see several drivers in action that I usually only read about.We took a walk through the pits just before hot laps and I was disappointed that I could not find Steve Holthaus and his gang from northeast Iowa. Steve was a champion on my NKF Tour for Hobby Stocks several years ago and is truly one of the good guys in the sport. It has been a long time since I have seen the "Old Dirty Rat" #70 in action and it would have been good to talk with him face to face. Any chance of doing that after the racing went out the window when the show ran up to the one o'clock hour leading me to think about how a promoter can sometimes be blamed for a late running show when it was really no fault of his own.
The drivers have to take the blame on this one as there was no "down time" between each race and, after a short delay to get the moisture rolled in, the track was in good racing condition. Perhaps too good as it may have been the speeds or the simple fact that many of the drivers were unfamiliar with the I-35 Speedway that has long fast straights and then sharp hairpin turns as several spinouts and even a couple of rollovers made it a long and frustrating night. The delays did give us a chance to talk racing with Trenton Berry, Stick and Jeff Nun though and that was a treat. Now if only somebody who can actually make a difference will listen to us! All kidding aside the one thing that I can say with confidence after that night is that you MUST have the tenderloin sandwich at I-35. I never thought that anybody could compete with the tenderloins that SPI used to serve up, but this one just might have taken the lead!
On Friday I pulled into the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa around 6:30 p.m. and it was an eerie sight with the sun setting behind an overcast sky and the lights not yet up to full song for the Musco Lighting Fall Challenge. It reminded me of going to Speedweek events in Florida when it would be dark when you would arrive at the race track, but yet hot laps had not even started. Of course the lack of sunshine leads to another thing that I like about Fall racing around here and that is you seldom, if ever see a dry slick race track. Extra laps were needed after each race on Friday night to keep it rolled in and wide and the drivers did a nice job putting on an excellent show.
Of course the big question now is what will 2018 look like in Oskaloosa? Will the track continue to provide us lucky race fans with something that only a few in the nation get to experience with a weekly Wednesday night program? Or will it be another more "traditional" race night for the weekly program or perhaps even specials only for 2018? A few people that I consider to be experts have told me that this is going to be an interesting offseason with several tracks making changes for next year and this just might be one of them. I hope not though as Wednesdays in Osky are much more than just another race night for several of us who gather near the top of the grandstands just to the east of the flagstand, it is a weekly reunion of friends.
The future of the Longdale Speedway in Oklahoma is up in the air right now as Jessie Hoskins posted on the track's Facebook page this week that he is considering his options after a tough 2017 season. This is one of those interesting scenarios where Longdale was built after the track in Enid shut down a few years ago, however with Enid coming back to life for special events this past season it has obviously put the hurt on Longdale. Regular readers of the Back Stretch know that it often seems like when one track closes another opens and this is just an example of when the track that closes opens back up it makes the new track that opened up because of the closing have to close. Try reading that sentence fast three times in a row.
Longdale looks like a great new facility and it would be a shame to see it shut down completely so perhaps both tracks can succeed by running partial schedules. I know that it was odd to drive past the Outlaw Speedway just south of Muskogee when we drove down to Dallas on Labor Day weekend and think of what a waste of a nice facility it is to not have races, so hopefully Longdale won't come by the same fate.
One of the other things that I love about Fall racing is the fact that you just never know who might show up at a Special event. There were a couple of names that caught my eye in the results from the I-80 Speedway this past weekend as Sam Halstead made the six hour pull from New London, Iowa, to southeast Nebraska to finish second on Friday night and sixth on Sunday while the Modified feature winner on Sunday was Jeff Taylor from Arkansas.
Who will make the long tow this weekend? I have other commitments on Friday and Saturday but I am hoping to go racing somewhere on Sunday, perhaps at the Quincy Raceways, another road trip to the Dells or an event that might get delayed by weather. Check the Calendar at Positively Racing and map out your destination to see some great Fall racing down the Back Stretch!
No comments:
Post a Comment