The 1/5th-mile high banked bowl at the Atchison County Raceway in northeast Kansas is known as the "The Cage" and when the United States Modified Touring Series comes to town once a year it is definitely a battle as the Modified stars wage war on the shortest track that they will see. Twenty-five drivers signed in on this sunny but cool Thursday evening and the fifty-lap feature event truly lived up to the billing as Ricky Thornton Jr. out dueled Johnny Scott in the closing laps to take the win.
Scott lined up on the pole position alongside his brother Stormy and it would be Stormy who would set a quick early pace. The first of six cautions waved on lap thirteen when Mike Densberger slowed on the back stretch and during that caution the leader would go to the pit area with apparent suspension issues. This would turn the lead over to Johnny Scott who would have his hands full with the winner of last year's Cage Match, Cade Dillard. Dillard had delivered a nasty slider on Josh Blumer earlier in the race to get to third and he was stalking Scott to perhaps do the same only to have a pair of cautions on lap 21 and lap 26 take away his opportunities.
When Dillard jumped the cushion following a restart Ricky Thornton Jr. pounced to take over the second spot and he would then apply the pressure on the leader, especially after a lap 36 restart. Scott had been riding the cushion like a pro since assuming the lead, but when he stumbled a bit on lap 45 that allowed Thornton to get a run on him and Ricky nosed ahead for the first time on lap 46. Scott came back to regain the lead on lap 47 only to have Thornton muscle past him again the following circuit, but before the white flag could wave the final caution would fly as Chase Junghans spun in turn four.
Scott would pull alongside Thornton under caution to express his thoughts on that last pass for the lead and when the green flag waved for the final two laps Thornton pulled away as Scott had to deal with Zack VanderBeek. If there would have been a few more laps it would have been interesting to see if VanderBeek's low line would have prevailed as Thornton would score the win after starting from the fourth row while VanderBeek moved from twelfth to second with most of those positions gained in the final fifteen laps. Scott fought off Joe Duvall to finish third while unofficially I had Darron Fuqua edging out Cade Dillard at the line for fifth. Duvall was impressive coming from the eighth row.
Talking with USMTS president Todd Staley briefly during the intermission I agreed with him that this facility was something special and while I have been to a couple of other tracks as short as this one, neither were as wide or as banked as the Atchison County Raceway. The layout of the facility is a good one and the public address system was better than 90% of the tracks that I attend. The track raced all the way through the month of October in 2016, so I will do my best to get back down here again later this season and you can bet that I will be back here when the USMTS returns in 2018.
The local E-Mod division ran in support with just ten cars on hand, but on this track you don't notice a short field near as much. Chris Mercer would lead the main event for the first seventeen laps of the twenty-lap feature only to be passed late by Josh Monson who would then take the win. Monson's car is apparently available to rent here at ACR as the car number itself was $130 and it had "Phil's Rent-a-Wreck" and "Rent Me" on the side, along with "AVIS" on the sun shield. Mercer finished second, Kory Myers was third followed by Billy Spillman and Ben Stockton.
The cars and stars of the USMTS now move to the Lakeside Speedway in KCK on Friday night before heading north a bit to the I-35 Speedway in Winston, Missouri on Saturday night. It was great to see the entire Staley family once again as well as PR man Jeff Nun and we thank them for their hospitality!
Next up, a night on the mic along with Dan Workman at the Lee County Speedway in Donnellson. Hope to see you there!
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