I had never been to a Malvern Bank Super Late Model Racing (SLMR) series event before, so when Joe Kosiski and Toby Kruse agreed to bring them as far east as they had ever been before, I just had to make the trip to the Marshalltown Speedway Friday night. An added bonus was that I was able to get my son Morgan to make the trip up from West Des Moines as well and we joined our Positively Racing colleagues Joyce and Dick Eisele in the top row for an entertaining night of action on the high-banked quarter-mile oval.
With this being a long trip for the SLMR regulars I had set my car count expectations low, but with the series' rules that essentially allow several "types" of Late Models to race against each other on common ground, not only did a solid group of around eighteen series regulars make the tow, but the area's IMCA Late Models came out in force as well to add up to an impressive field of thirty-nine Late Models! Add that to the weekly racing series opener for the Modifieds, Stock Cars, Sport Mods, Hobby Stocks and Mod-Lites it made for a long, full night of racing.
The night got off to a rough start for one of the series' best when Tad Pospisil barrel rolled off the top of turns three and four during qualifying in an accident that looked pretty bad in the brief second that I was able to see the car twisting in the wind above the banking. Thankfully Pospisil was able to climb out of the car uninjured.
Qualifying times were used to set the four heat race lineups, and I assume that there was some level of invert as then the top fourteen in passing points were locked into the twenty-five lap main event. The top three from each of two B-Mains and then two SLMR provisionals would complete the field with the all-time winningest driver Kyle Berck on the pole and the current point leader after the first two nights of racing, series rookie Nick Deal on the outside of row one.
Deal who won twice on the opening weekend at the I-80 Speedway in early April would take the early lead with third starting Tyler Bruening quickly taking up the challenge. Earlier in the night Bruening had blown away the field in his heat race winning by more than half a lap and he was now sticking his nose to the inside of Deal looking for the lead. On lap seven Bruening was able to pull even with Deal only to have the young driver from Harlan come back on the outside to hold the point.
After scoring lap nine Bruening again mounted a challenge driving to the inside in turn one, but Deal was there as well and contact would send the leader for a spin as Bruening was able to drive away. During the caution it first appeared like both drivers would be allowed to restart up front, or perhaps Deal was just not heeding the call on the Raceceiver to go to the rear because he finally stopped on the front stretch to discuss the decision with Race Director Bill Baldwin. Baldwin who was a pretty good Late Model driver in his day as well was obviously convincing as Deal would then take his place at the back to get the race back to action.
Bruening would assume the lead, but Richie Gustin would now pick up the challenge using his knowledge of the track to go high, then low to take the lead from Bruening on lap fourteen. Tyler would come right back two laps later though to get back to the front and from there we would see that same domination as we did earlier in the evening driving away for the victory. Gustin would post a solid runner-up finish while the battle for third went right down to the stripe with Billy Leighton nipping Berck by a nose. Andy Eckrich finish fifth in his SLMR debut, Ryan Dolan was sixth, central Nebraska driver Josh Leonard was seventh with Joel Callahan, Andrew Kosiski and Darrel DeFrance filling out the top ten.
The first point that Bruening wanted to make in his victory lane interview was that he felt bad for getting into the leader stating that he was making the move into turn one and did everything that he could to stay off of him as he had come down the track. Deal was not able to make up much ground following the restart as he finished sixteenth. With some solid bonus money on the line for the first four SLMR races in Iowa this year it will now be interesting to see if Bruening makes the trip to Denison and Corning on May 3rd and 4th.
In weekly racing action Jake McBirnie started sixth and passed Austin Schrage on lap five before driving away for a convincing win in the 18-lap Northern Sport Mod main event. The division drew an impressive count of thirty-one cars as Thomas Egenberger finished second, Austin Kaplan was third, fourth went to Cory Rose and Cory Van Zante rounded out the top five.
The IMCA Stock Car feature had an entertaining three car battle for the front involving Jeff Mueller, Steve Meyer and Ricky Thornton Jr. who had left his Modified at home for the evening. Meyer would lead the first five laps of the eighteen lap distance before Mueller would dig his way around the bottom to the point on lap six, getting a bit of assistance from a lapped car that got a bit sideways in front of Meyer. On lap fourteen that same lapper would do a 360-degree spin in turn four and when Mueller had to check up momentarily to see how that would play out, both Meyer and Thornton would drive around him on the outside.
With three laps to go Thornton would throw a big slider at Meyer in three and four only to have the veteran drive back under him and as the white flag waved Thornton would again throw a "White Castle" (courtesy of flamboyant announcer Jerry Van Sickle) at the leader in turns one and two. Meyer again pulled off the perfect crossover so this time Thornton would try to stick it to the bottom in the final set of turns to no avail as Meyer would take the win. Mueller would be right behind Thornton at the checkers for third as Jay Schmidt and Damon Murty completed the top five.
Shannon Anderson was notably absent when I was here for the Frostbuster two weeks ago, but on this night it was back to normal in the Hobby Stock ranks as the two-time defending and six-time overall All Iowa Points champion picked his way to the front on lap six after starting eighth to take the win. David Rieks started next to Anderson in row four and finished second, early race leader Mike Kincaid settled for third, young Kaden Reynolds was fourth and Gary Pfantz finished in fifth.
Mike Morrill was another familiar face in victory lane taking the win over a ten car field of Mod Lites and with a long drive home ahead of me I left before the Modified feature that was won by Tim Ward.
I needed to get home for at least a few hours sleep before sharing the microphone tonight with MLRA announcer Billy Rock at the 11th Annual Slocum 50 at 34 Raceway west of Burlington. With other Late Model events to the east rained out for tonight, what was already set to be a stellar field of Super Late Models could go off the chart for the $10,555-to-win event in memory of Brent Slocum who tragically lost his life at the track fourteen years ago in a pit area accident. IMCA Stock Cars and 34 Raceway's 305 Winged Sprint Cars will be in action with big money on the line for them as well.
Hope to see you there!
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