I have not been to a race now for nine days and counting. With all of the rain from last weekend many of you are probably in the same situation, but my absence from the track was due to a trip that my wife and I, along with several other friends and family made to Princeton, New Jersey, for my son's wedding.
Those of you who know me either personally or through just reading the Back Stretch know just how proud I am of all of my children, but my youngest Morgan is the only one of the three that I successfully groomed to be a race fan. Growing up he was nearly always with me whenever I went to the track, perhaps to a fault as he never did establish the close relationships that other teenagers do by having a "best friend".Instead he was mine, and I was his and I have always loved how my friends in racing have been so friendly and interested in him as well. Morgan was one of the Positively Racing bloggers for a short stint with his Open Wheel News and Notes that unfortunately can't even be found with a Google search any longer. Currently though you can find his work writing the regular press releases for TKS Motorsports and Austin McCarl, Josh Schneiderman and Carson McCarl.
If you clicked on either of the McCarl links you will notice that the Date line now reads Dallas, Texas, as Morgan and his new wife as of this past Saturday, Emily, just moved there in mid-May. Even though he is a devout open wheel fan, Morgan would still go to a few Late Model and Modified shows with me from time to time and in fact the last two race nights that we went to together before the move south did not have Sprint Cars at all. The trip to Marshalltown included a stop at Pagliai's Pizza in Grinnell as well as a big hug from Dick and Joyce Eisele and our trip to Stuart featured a great run from one of his favorite drivers Bobby Pierce.
I am confident that he has found the right girl in Emily and that is very comforting to both his mother and I. How do I know that? Well first of all she went "all in" two years ago by making the move from New York City to West Des Moines to be with him and then she too fell in love with Sprint Car racing joining us at the last two Knoxville Nationals. Due to her new job Em won't be able to make it back for the Nationals this year, but leave it to my son to negotiate in one specific day of vacation on August 9th with his new job so that he can fly back for the final two nights of the Nationals where once again he can enjoy the weekend with Barry, Stephanie and Aidan Johnson as well as the entire Nachbor clan. There was no way that Morgan wanted to miss this weekend with his Knoxville Nationals family!Congratulations to Morgan and Emily Broeg!
I hope to return to racing tomorrow night in Oskaloosa as they will induct BOTH of my favorite drivers from my youth into the Southern Iowa Speedway Hall of Fame. Mel Morris was my absolute favorite when I was just an elementary school kid who couldn't wait for the weekend to come so that my parents and, or grandparents would take me to the races in either Columbus Junction or West Liberty. "Give 'em Hell Mel" definitely wasn't everybody's favorite as he was often booed more than he was cheered, but for some reason I latched on to him big time. So much so that my favorite color is purple and when playing middle school and high school basketball I always did my best to grab that #32 jersey.
By the time that I secured my driver's license in 1979 Mel's career was winding down so my new favorite driver to follow was the #9 of Curt Hansen. Talk about a diverse change in crowd reaction to "my favorite"! Hansen had a driving style that was smooth and clean yet still aggressive and I was thrilled to watch him win a bunch of features and several track championships over the years. By then I was writing the Back Stretch in Hawkeye Racing News and while I did my best to not show any favoritism, I would bet that you could tell who I was rooting for. The cool thing about Curt is that he knows that he has been my guy now for 40 years and I will look forward to shaking his hand tomorrow night!
Morris and Hansen will be joined in the Class of 2019 by hometown driver Jeff Haines who has shown his talent and versatility over the years with success in the Stock Cars, Modifieds and Sprint Cars. As of right now the forecast looks good for what should be a memorable night at the Southern Iowa Speedway. Hope to see you there!
With another weekend that saw more rainouts than not I wanted to update the statistics that I first shared with you on May 20th. At that time in looking at the tracks where drivers can earn All Iowa Points only 99 out of 219 scheduled race nights had been able to be completed, a success rate of 45%. Since then the overall numbers have been better with 136 out of 211 scheduled race nights being run, or 64% which brings the total for 2019 now up to 235 of 430 for 55%. Some tracks will not agree with that assessment of how things have "improved" over the past 34 days though such as 34 Raceway that is just one for five, and the CJ Speedway who is two for five showing how tough it has been to race in southeast Iowa recently. The Knoxville Raceway, even with its paved pits and "never say die" attitude is only six for thirteen this season and one of those was the World of Outlaws show that would have been rained out if it had been anywhere else, but Knoxville got it started after none o'clock and had it completed just after 1 a.m. The saddest story of them all though is the reopening of the I-90 Speedway in Hartford, South Dakota, where they are now no wins and seven losses on the season. Oh well, here's hoping that these numbers continue to improve as we head into the second half of the season.
| Alta IA | 3 | for | 4 |
| Oskaloosa IA | 5 | for | 11 |
| Stuart IA | 9 | for | 12 |
| Algona IA | 6 | for | 8 |
| Britt IA | 7 | for | 10 |
| Chateau MN | 7 | for | 9 |
| Columbus Jct. IA | 5 | for | 11 |
| Darlington/Lancaster WI | 5 | for | 10 |
| Davenport IA | 6 | for | 11 |
| Denison IA | 8 | for | 10 |
| Donnellson IA | 8 | for | 12 |
| Farley IA | 2 | for | 2 |
| Hawkeye Downs IA | 5 | for | 8 |
| I-80 Speedway NE | 8 | for | 13 |
| Jackson MN | 3 | for | 6 |
| Marshalltown IA | 8 | for | 17 |
| Rock Rapids IA | 4 | for | 8 |
| West Union IA | 5 | for | 9 |
| 34 Raceway IA | 5 | for | 13 |
| Eldon | 2 | for | 5 |
| Boone IA | 9 | for | 12 |
| Corning IA | 6 | for | 13 |
| Decorah IA | 4 | for | 9 |
| Deer Creek MN | 6 | for | 11 |
| Eagle NE | 8 | for | 13 |
| Fairmont MN | 3 | for | 5 |
| Harlan IA | 6 | for | 9 |
| I-90 Speedway | 0 | for | 7 |
| Independence IA | 4 | for | 9 |
| Knoxville IA | 6 | for | 13 |
| Maquoketa IA | 8 | for | 12 |
| Park Jefferson SD | 6 | for | 14 |
| Webster City IA | 7 | for | 17 |
| West Liberty IA | 1 | for | 2 |
| Worthington MN | 1 | for | 5 |
| Bethany MO | 4 | for | 6 |
| Dubuque IA | 5 | for | 11 |
| East Moline IL | 7 | for | 12 |
| Fort Dodge IA | 4 | for | 11 |
| Mason City IA | 0 | for | 0 |
| Quincy IL | 5 | for | 12 |
| Interstate Speedway | 4 | for | 4 |
| Spencer IA | 4 | for | 7 |
| Vinton IA | 6 | for | 12 |
| Cresco IA | 3 | for | 3 |
| Memphis MO | 2 | for | 6 |
| Tipton | 1 | for | 1 |
| Warren County | 4 | for | 5 |
| Totals: | 235 | for | 430 |
| 55% |
Okay, so I wasn't even going to give this any mention because I don't see a minimum of eighteen teams shelling out a $200,000 entry fee, but have you seen what the latest news out of Husets Speedway has been? If not, please take a moment to click on that link and tell me this. If you were a team owner, would you put up $200,000 to for a chance to win the Husets Speedway itself? I see now they have added the option that you could just take a $3.6 million winner's check instead, BUT keep this in mind as well. Second place will be paid $200,000, essentially getting your Entry Fee back but still paying all of the expenses to compete, while third and fourth will each be paid $100,000. Fifth on back, nothing but a loss of two hundred grand plus expenses.
Why did they add the $3.6 million option? If the winner takes that then the race fans of the area will still be in the same crappy situation that they are in now with a very nice race track that has too big of a price tag on it for anybody to make it work financially. When they first announced this event I figured that if they could somehow get the minimum number of entries, the winner would then take the track and sell it for a more reasonable price of $2 to $3 million to someone who would then actually run the place, but now even that possibility seems to be a fantasy as well.
As of right now there is one entry, the Rudeen Racing #26 with Cory Eliason behind the wheel and it would be a shocker if Tony Stewart Racing and Donny Schatz do not show up on the list soon. Beyond that who will find it a reasonable risk to file the entry? I guess that I have to admit that it will be fun to watch this as it develops!
Looking beyond Osky tomorrow I plan to make the trip to Vinton on Thursday night for the Deery Brothers Summer Series event at the Benton County Speedway and then on Saturday, with the Knoxville Raceway taking a rare night off for the two-day Outlaw show in Jackson, the Sprint Invaders have been added to what already was an impressive roster of classes at 34 Raceway in Burlington. And you get to see it all for just ten bucks!
Hope to see you on the Back Stretch!
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