One week prior to the 5th Annual Turkey Dash the weather forecast called for cloudy skies with a high in the upper 40's. CJ Speedway promoter Larry Richardson made the decision to wait it out and see what actually happened with the weather and sure enough by race day it was a gorgeous sunny sky with a south breeze blowing in temperatures topping sixty degrees. It was a beautiful November day for racing in southeast Iowa, in fact was perhaps too nice for an event that would get started with hot laps at 2 p.m. for the 129 entries as it was not long before a well watered surface soon became dry and dusty. Track conditions that bring the best drivers to the front, but make it even more challenging for newcomers and those who haven't yet mastered a slick surface and that along with the chosen race format made for a show that extended past eight o'clock.
More on that later, but first let's get to the five feature events that might have just closed out the 2021 racing season in Iowa.
Prior to feature racing Richardson and his crew strategically watered and packed down the dust on the top side of both sets of turns and he also watered the apron all the way around. With the sun now setting and some of the moisture coming back up on the blackened racing surface the track was now in great shape for racing.
The Hobby Stocks would be up first for twenty laps with pole-sitter John Watson jumping out to an early lead. A caution waved on lap five for the Safety Crew to hustle over to the pit area beyond turns three and four as Billy Stanford's car had an engine fire after he exited the track on the back stretch. Once back to green Watson left the field in his wake, but the battle for position behind him was entertaining with five drivers slugging it out for second. One of them was Solomon Bennett who had started from fourteenth after giving up the lead in his heat race as the white flag waved with an overheating engine. Mike Kincaid, Travis Bunnell, Cody Staley and Dustin Griffiths were also involved and when the caution waved for a track tire that had been punted onto the surface after most of the field had taken the white flag, that entire group would have one last shot at Watson.
The veteran from Des Moines was just too strong though as he cruised the final two laps to take the win with Griffiths coming from seventh to finish second, Staley took third, Bennett fourth and Kincaid was fifth. After destroying his car in a front stretch grinder during the Pole Dash, Andrew Burk climbed aboard Brandon Schneider's #10, started last in the sixteen car field and drove to a sixth place finish.
For me and perhaps a few other people, today's race had a little extra meaning as the next two features would likely determine the All Iowa Points champions for 2021 in two divisions. The top two Sport Mod drivers in the state of Iowa, Tyler Soppe and Logan Anderson had earned the front row for the twenty lap feature and they would look like the top two drivers in the state as they pulled away from the rest of the field. The race only saw one caution when the lapped car of Cole Quam spun exiting turn four on lap thirteen and while Soppe was able to draw within a couple of car lengths in traffic, he was not able to mount a challenge as Anderson scored the win. On October 16th the finish was reversed as Soppe won on the final night of the Iowa Dirt Nationals in Dubuque to take a one point lead on Anderson and today's Turkey Dash would now make it a tie with the rescheduled Shiverfest still on the schedule for November 20th.
Austin Paul raced his way forward from thirteenth to finish a distant third, Tom Bowling Jr. was solid all day long taking fourth and Nick Aupperle finished where he started in fifth.
In the Sport Compacts western Iowa driver Caine Mahlberg and Blue Grass driver Cyle Hawkins were tied at the top of the All Iowa Points and while Mahlberg did not make the trip, Hawkins had to borrow an IMCA legal car from Cristian Grady to see if he could break the tie with a top five finish. If you clicked the link you will see that Grady himself ranks sixth in the standings so it was a pretty solid ride, but after starting eight in his heat race Hawkins could only get to sixth landing him in one of the two B-Mains. He would win that to start fourteenth in the fifteen lap feature and since the race was completely dominated by pole-sitter Chuck Fullenkamp, my attention was on the progress of Hawkins.
Cyle quickly advanced to seventh as lap one was scored and then to sixth on lap three only to drop to seventh again one lap later. He would regain that position on lap five and two laps later the red flag would fly when Dustin Munn clipped an infield tire and went for a roll in turn three. As the field was reset for the restart Hawkins gained a position when Nathan Chandler was unable to get his car to go into gear and he was now racing in the fifth spot, enough to get him that one point to break the tie.
Corey Crispin who had started next to Hawkins on the seventh row was on the move though and closing in as the laps wound down and as they raced into turn three on the final lap the two cars just ahead of them, Jason Staley and Barry Taft made contact putting Taft all the way sideways in front of Hawkins. A two-time All Iowa Points champion in his own right, Taft made the save but gave up two spots in doing so with the final finish scored as Fullenkamp the winner, Cody Van Dusen in second, Staley was third, Hawkins fourth and Crispin in fifth. So unless the IMCA National Champion Mahlberg makes the pull to Donnellson on November 20th, the All Iowa Points title will be Hawkins' by just two markers.
The twenty-lap Modified feature was up next and while it would be the most entertaining race of the night, it was also the most frustrating as the caution waved six times through the first fifteen laps. If you have not been to the track in Columbus Junction, there is a tall dirt levee that runs from the outside of turns one and two and then all the way down the back stretch to keep the Iowa River from invading the fairgrounds during flood season. It is like a man made retaining wall of dirt and over the years the drivers that race here regularly have figured out a way to make it the largest cushion in dirt motorsports. Kurt Kile is one of the best at entering turn one high, kicking off the levee and then aiming at the bottom to exit turn two for an amazing amount of momentum down the back stretch.
Kile would start from the pole position and while he would lead all twenty laps to take the win there was no shortage of excitement, especially on all of those restarts. On three of them the drivers in the row behind him would go low through one and two leaving just enough space between them for Kile to rocket through the middle as they entered he back stretch. During green flag stretches both Dylan Thornton and Jarrett Brown would make runs at the leader only to have Kile go jetting by them exiting turn two either on the inside or outside depending upon where the challenger was at on the track.
Brown would take the runner-up position at the checkers with Thornton in third. Dakota Simmons was impressive advancing from seventh to fourth and, after causing the third caution of the race when he spun while racing in fourth on lap four, Jeff Aikey battled his way back register fifth.
The Stock Cars would close out the evening for twenty laps with pole sitter Jason See leading the way early. Dylan Thornton had started to his outside on row one and after watching Kile use the levee to beat him in the Modified main, the kid from California decided to try it with his Stock Car and it worked. On lap six Thornton would get a big run off turn two and would squeeze under See before entering turn three to take the lead.
Just after the lap was scored the caution would wave for Jeff Wollam who had spun in turn two and following the restart Thornton would pull away from the field. With five laps remaining and it now being just past eight o'clock I made the run for the parking lot still hoping to catch some of the Sprint Invader banquet forty-five minutes away in Burlington figuring that Thornton had this well in hand. But a check of Facebook later revealed this picture of Johnny Spaw and his team celebrating the victory.
Apparently Thornton had mechanical issues in the closing laps while being challenged by the ninth starting Spaw and for the details you will need to check in on my Positively Racing colleagues Danny Rosencrans and Ed Reichert. Jason See would finish in second, Dustin Griffiths moved from seventh to third, Adam Bell raced from eleventh to fourth and Jason Cook moved from twelfth to fifth.
The summary of that finish will tell you just how good of a track this was at the end of the night, and even in the dusty daylight it was still a multi-grooved surface especially with drivers using the levee in turn one. There is no doubt that Richardson is one of the best that we know when it comes to preparing his race track. Larry and I are friends and I have often bragged about his success here on the Back Stretch, so my hope is that he will take what follows as constructive criticism from someone that he respects. (Note: As I was finishing up this blog I received a text from Larry saying that he was sorry that he missed me yesterday and that it was too long of a show. I then called him and I read to him what I had written and he agreed 100%. While he would never say it I also confirmed my notion that the format was not entirely his decision as he does work for the Fair Board, but our conversation also confirmed to me what a Class Act this promoter is. He had already made the decision to change the format for 2022 because he too saw what will be described in the following paragraphs)
When you present a race that is scheduled for the first weekend in November in Iowa you want to look for ways to condense the program rather than stretching it out. It looks like adding the Pole Dash in all five classes was motivated by some great sponsors who put up the money for the winners, but I would have hoped that those sponsors would have been just fine with having that cash applied to the feature winners' purse instead. The top six finishing drivers from the heats would make the Dash in each division and the way that they finished the six lap race would start them straight up in the first three rows of the feature. As soon as I heard the format I told Rosencrans that all five feature winners would come from the front row and it sounds like if Thornton's Stock Car motor would have held up that prediction would have been true.
Andrew Burk's crash started the five Dashes off in a tough manner and despite it being the top six drivers from each class running them, as I recall there was at least one caution in each on the dry slick track at the time so these five races added nearly an hour to the program. In his victory lane interview after the Hobby Stock feature John Watson mentioned that he was concerned that he didn't have enough tires when he found out that he would be running the Dash and it is possible that Jeff Wollam chose to not run the Stock Car Dash knowing that he would just start sixth in the feature instead of putting in six more laps on the track at that time of day.
In concept the Dashes were a great idea and I am sure that the winning drivers appreciated the extra cash, but you can't always count on a Turkey Dash being run in sixty degree weather so going forward let's save the time and the extra laps while hoping those sponsors will understand.
Also there is absolutely, positively no reason to run two B-Mains in a division where there are thirty and thirty-one entries. With six cars advancing out of each, seven cars finished each of the two Sport Mod B's and while eight of the ten scheduled to start the first Sport Compact B-Main came to the track, only six of the eight scheduled starters took the green in the second one making it nothing more than a race for their starting positions in the feature. Those of you who read the Back Stretch know that "two B-Mains" has been a pet peeve of mine for many years and if I can find the blog entry where I went more in depth as to why, I will link it here. (Found this one, see some of the final paragraphs)
Thirty-one cars.
Three heats with the top six advancing to the A-Main.
One B-main with fifteen cars scheduled. Top six to the A-Main.
'Nuff said.
I have been criticized in the past for "writing through rose colored glasses" and rightfully so at times because I always try to find the good things to write about in racing and, just like the Turkey Dash yesterday there were so many good things about that show. In fact real quick here I want to thank my friend announcer Jerry Mackey for how he always encourages the fans to visit Positively Racing to read about "the good things in our sport". Jerry also told the crowd of the All Iowa Points scenarios yesterday, something that I really appreciate. But Back Stretch readers also know that I actually do call out things that I feel need to be changed in order to improve the sport, I just usually do it in a much more subtle manner that it takes a regular read to fully understand. Something that my critics apparently can't find. In this case though I knew that I could be blunt, because I knew that Larry Richardson would understand. And that phone call confirmed what I had already concluded. He already knew that changes were needed as well.
Thank you CJ Speedway, the Louisa County Fair Board, promoter Larry Richardson and his entire staff for scheduling the Turkey Dash for the first Saturday in November each year and for running it if the weather conditions allow. It was a great show with a fantastic mix of drivers from throughout the region and there was a large crowd who also came from near and far to enjoy it. We can't wait to do it all again in November of 2022!
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