A late change of plans during the holiday weekend allowed me to make the trip up to Boone for the first of six straight days of racing during the annual IMCA Super Nationals on Labor Day Monday. A full program for the Deery Brothers Summer Series IMCA Late Models, the 499th event in the history of the series would crown the first champion of this year's extravaganza that draws racers and fans from near and far for what frankly is the most amazing event in short track racing.
I might be wrong, but somebody would need to show me where else you would see more cars and more racing in one event as you do here at Boone and every time that I am here I am amazed at how efficiently and well presented the entire program is. Yes, people will always find something to nit-pick about, but the growth of this event continues and since it has evolved here at this facility and with, for the most part the same crew from year to year, it just keeps getting better.
Anybody who would suggest that the Super Nationals needs to rotate locations has no concept of just what it takes to do this for what is essentially twenty-four hours a day and now, with the Prelude event on Saturday included, eight straight days.
IMCA, Boone Speedway and everybody who has a role in presenting this event, I tip my hat to you!
I will admit that I am a bit spoiled here by the VIP treatment allowing me to enjoy the racing even more with good friends Dick & Joyce Eisele, Paul & Vickie Vetter and David Schlise making each race even more entertaining plus we get an occasional visit from Batman & Robin, Jerry VanSickel and Ryan Clark who do a tremendous job on the microphone for the entire run.
On Monday, the day started right on time at 1 p.m. with hot laps and the first of fourteen Hobby Stock heat races took the green at two o'clock. Drivers were looking to race their way into one of two qualifying A-Mains today that would have eight drivers from each locking themselves in to Saturday night's "big dance" for the Hobby Stocks. Also in action today would be the IMCA Northern Sport Mods where twenty heats and one B-Main qualifier would set a field of thirty for tonight's chance to be the first eight drivers to make it to Saturday's Sport Mod Championship feature. Both divisions would also have B-Mains for points giving all 122 Hobby Stock and 144 Sport Mod drivers at least two opportunities to race today. Add to that the 35 Late Models that had signed in plus the countless Stock Cars, Modifieds and Sport Compacts that were each given one opportunity to hot lap and I would guess that I saw nearly 700 total race cars in my seven and a half hour stay, time that literally flew by with all of the action in front of me.
So many stories to tell, but I will stick with the two feature races that I saw before heading for home at 8:15 p.m.
The first Hobby Stock A-Main would start twenty-eight cars for twenty-five laps on the high-banked quarter-mile with the top eight locking in for Saturday's finale and the winner earning the pole position. Matt Brown would lead the first two circuits before Jacob Floyd squeezed past on the bottom to take the point on lap three. The action was fierce and surprisingly clean given what was at stake and on lap eleven the 2019 Hobby Stock track champion here at the Boone Speedway, Aaron Rudolph sailed around the top to take the lead from Floyd.
Green flag racing continued with drivers often going three and four wide until the first caution was needed on lap sixteen when Tony Fetterman slid off the back stretch entering turn three. Then reality set in as this would go from being a good clean race to what was essentially a demolition derby as drivers now realized that they only had nine laps remaining to crack the top eight.
The first casualty was fourteen-year-old Mike Smith who had made some progress after starting 28th only to end up being shoved into the back stretch wall and nearly getting upside down on lap nineteen. During the red flag period the third place car of IMCA National Rookie-of-the-Year point leader Kaden Reynolds had a fire erupt under the hood sending him scrambling out of the car and hustling to the infield for assistance.
On the restart Brady Larkins also caught the wall on the back stretch and he would end up on his top just before entering turn three calling for another red flag period. On this restart Matt Hanson, perhaps with a bit of help from behind, would spin out of the fourth position coming to green and early leaders Brown and Floyd tangled in turn one taking both of them out of the top eight, but the green light stayed on as all three quickly recovered.
The final caution would come just two laps shy of the finish when Jeremiah Wilson punted Josh VanCannon's used up car out the eighth position and perhaps from some of the debris from VanCannon's loose body work, top-five drivers Dylan Nelson and John Watson both had tires go flat sending them to the work area for a quick change.
Minnesota driver Trevor Holm would make one last bid for the win in the final two laps only to come up a car length short as Rudolph secured the win after starting sixth. Holm came from eighth for the runner-up spot, Jimmy Johnson started ninth and finished third, Brandon Nielsen finished where he started in fourth while New Mexico's Cory Stone started fifteenth and finished fifth. Also locking in for Saturday was Braxton Berry and Mike Kimm while Hanson recovered to take the final transfer in eighth.
After a round of track prep, a couple of Hobby Stock B-Mains and the B-Main qualifying race for the Sport Mods the fifty lap main event for the Deery Series Late Models came to a track that was in prefect shape for action with a beautiful sunset providing a backdrop. Terry Neal and Joe Zrostlik would sit on the front row following the Casey's Pizza redraw with Series newcomer Blair Kraus of Gretna, Nebraska, starting third. The young driver is a regular competitor at the Boone County Speedway in Albion, Nebraska, with his best feature finish there coming on August 16th when he was fourth, but in his first appearance ever with the Deery Series and on this big stage, Kraus had walked away with his heat race win this afternoon and was ready to back that up in the main event.
Zrostlik would race out to the lead at the drop of the green and looked smooth as he put some distance between himself and the competition that was now battling for position behind the leader. Ricky Thornton Jr. driving for Todd Cooney who is recovering from some health issues had started fifth and he was now picking off positions one at a time using some of the well timed slide jobs that fans here are used to seeing for "RT" when driving his Modified.
By lap eleven Thornton had moved to second and he would quickly reel in Zrostlik before driving under him in turns three and four to become the new pace setter on lap fifteen. Perhaps "pace setter" is not an accurate description though as Thornton would steadily pull away as the race to watch would now be for second as Zrostlik tried to fight off Neal, Nick Marolf, Justin Kay and a hard charging Tyler Bruening.
By the time that Kay cleared Marolf for second on lap thirty-nine Thornton was literally gone, a half-lap ahead of his contenders with count 'em eight lapped cars in between himself and Justin Kay. So with one eye watching Thornton negotiate traffic and another trying keep track of Bruening's bid for second, that would be how I watched the final ten laps with Thornton completing the dominating win for his first Late Model Super Nationals title and for the car's fourth after having been wheeled by owner Todd Cooney in the previous three victories here. The tenth starting Kay would hold off Bruening for second while Tyler posted a solid run coming from thirteenth to third. Nick Marolf would finish where he started in fourth while front row starters Neal and Zrostlik would go fifth and sixth. The Series point leader coming into the night, Andy Eckrich would finish in seventh just ahead of Jeff Aikey in eighth. John Emerson had a nice run up from the ninth row to finish ninth while the "Ironman" Darrel DeFrance filled out the top ten. Blair Kraus had his big night come to an end when he pulled to the infield mid-race while still running in the sixth position.
Next up for the Deery Brothers Summer Series will be the 500th event to be held since starting in 1987 and as luck would have it, given the multiple rainouts earlier in the 2019 schedule, that milestone event will be held where it all started at 34 Raceway in Burlington on Saturday September 21st. You can bet that the first race winner, Jay Johnson will be there and unless something changes in my schedule over the next eighteen days the guy who did the announcing of that first Summer Series race will be there as well!
A big thanks to Bill Martin, Tami and all of the staff at IMCA for the hospitality on Monday and I do hope that I can make it up for at least one day of the Super Nationals in the years ahead with a goal in retirement to find a camper and spend the whole week up here just once.
Next on the schedule for me will the Sprint Invaders return to the Quincy Raceways this coming Sunday night September 8th with perhaps a long awaited return to the Tom Knowles Memorial on Saturday at the Spoon River Speedway should the social calendar allow. The Special Events are upon us, so get out and enjoy as many as you can!
Hope to see you on the Back Stretch.
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