I have touted young Colton Fisher as a driver to watch in the years to come and he has been fast all season, but has not been delivering the results that you would see from that level of speed. Twice this year Colton has raced his way to the lead in Sprint Invader action only to crash in spectacular fashion with even him telling you that it was due to his own impatience. On this night Fisher started fourth and after trading sliders with another young prospect Cam Sorrels while racing for second, Colton was able to chase down leader Cody Wehrle in traffic and take the point at the mid-race mark in traffic. 
Lappers would continue to be a factor and this time Fisher was able to avoid calamity, but perhaps with his patience he also allowed Sorrels to make a late run and they would exit turn four side-by-side coming to the checkers. Fisher would deny Sorrels from winning his first Sprint Car feature by just a car length while he doubled up on his own win total with the Sprint Invaders, Colton's first victory also coming here at the Lee County Speedway in September of 2021. For the full story and results from this exciting evening in Donnellson, click over to Bill Wright's story here.
This past Sunday night the Sprint Invaders made the trip over to the Spoon River Speedway in central Illinois and while I was unable to make the trip due to other commitments, I was able to watch the main event on FloRacing and again Fisher had a great night holding the lead until a late restart when National Sprint Car Hall of Fame inductee Terry McCarl slipped by him to take the win. Again, I encourage you to take a read of Bill Wright's story and results from Spoon River by clicking this link.
Two events remain on the 2025 schedule for the Mohrfeld Solar Sprint Invaders with the annual Fall Haul at 34 Raceway on Saturday September 27th, and then the following Saturday October 4th the Invaders will headline "Open Wheel Night" during week number two of "Dirt At The Downs" where the quarter-mile pavement at Hawkeye Downs in Cedar Rapids will be covered with dirt to celebrate one hundred years of racing at the storied facility.
Following that fun show at Donnellson I took my brother-in-law Kent and my niece Phoebe to 34 Raceway for the Season Championships that was also a $5 Fan Appreciation Night courtesy of Burlington Pepsi. It would be Kent's first dirt track race while Phoebe joined me for a trip to Vinton earlier this year and it was a great night to bring some potential race fans to the track. The breeze was light and coming from behind us, so even if there was any dust from the well prepared surface it wouldn't have been a factor and there was a good car count on hand with some of the other Saturday night tracks in the area having the night off.
Normally I am not a fan of a seven division show, but on this night the nice mix of classes gave my new fans an opportunity to experience Late Models, Winged Sprint Cars, Modifieds (had fun distinguishing between the two divisions), Stock Cars, Four Cylinders and Trucks. Heat races clicked off in fine fashion then during intermission a vast majority of the cars and drivers came to the front stretch for an autograph session. and while Kent opted to stay in the stands, Phoebe had a great time meeting some of my all-time favorites, such as Gary Webb and Ron Boyse, and collecting some autograph cards from other drivers. She loves to ride her dirt bike, so I know that she has some "motorized adventure" within her and I could see her interest as we spoke briefly with young Rebekah Cevela who had towed in from Darlington, Indiana, to race her Sprint Car on this night. All of the drivers were friendly and outgoing making for a great time not only for my niece and her proud uncle, but also for the many race fans who took advantage of the autograph session. Well done 34 Raceway!
Kyler Girard did his best to hold off Dylan VanWyk and they would swap the lead mid-race before VanWyk went on to win the Sport Mod feature. Tim Schnathorst went flag to flag to top the five cars that started the Sport Compact feature, Trenton Witt held off a fast closing John Oliver Jr. to score the Stock Car win and Nate Parks enjoyed winning his first career Sprint Car feature the week before so much that he decided to do it again on this night before Logan Anderson paced the field throughout the Modified main event.
Of course with seven divisions and an extended intermission that resulted in a long night as well, so when I sensed that my newbie race fans had seen enough for the evening we made the call to leave before the completion of the features for the trucks and the Late Models, but it was a great night at 34 Raceway and hopefully Kent and Phoebe will accept my invite to return on September 27th for the Fall Haul. For a full report on 34's Season Championship event check out "Racin' Down The Road" with my colleague Danny Rosencrans.
I am impressed by the abilities of the Darkside Promotions Team, headed up by Timmy Current and Ryan Duhme, to pull together a special event in a short period of time. A few years ago when the weather forecast for the first weekend in November was well above normal, they pulled together an event at the Davenport Speedway in just three days that would tie in with the long scheduled Turkey Dash at the CJ Speedway, and it went off in fine fashion.
The 2025 edition of The Yankee Dirt Track Classic at the 300 Raceway in Farley was first teased publicly on August 4th before being announced on August 5th and just twenty-three days later more than 120 cars packed the pits and a fair sized crowd filed in for the 48th running of this legendary event. Despite the fact that this was the first, and eventually only night of racing on this track, Ricky Kay and Al Dlouhy had it in great shape and the action was very entertaining. Jason Roth was able to pass race-long leader Cole Stichter on the final lap to win the Sport Mod feature. Curt Lund, who was the hero of last year's Stock Car Rampage qualifying night here at 300 Raceway, went flag-to-flag on this night for the Stock Car win and Nathan Ballard made a late race pass to take the Hobby Stock victory.
Ethan Braaksma would pass Jeff Larson on lap ten and then cruise to victory in Timmy Current's #12TC Modified and, while I was entertained by the large field of Crown Vic's, I would have much rather seen the Late Model feature before them as there was a two hour plus drive home with an early start to work ahead of me on Friday. Part of making the track nice and racey was a lengthy rework session during intermission so when Eric Pollard completed the twentieth and final lap to win that Late Model feature, it was now half past eleven. For a full report from night one of the 48th YDC check out Danny's story and unfortunately some persistent afternoon rain wiped out the second night of the event. Look for the 49th Yankee Dirt Track Classic to be included on our Special Events Calendar much earlier in 2026 and I will once again be looking forward to being there to celebrate this traditional event.
After watching the ever changing weather forecast over the weekend, Barry, Danny, Johnny V and I decided to spend our Labor Day Monday at the IMCA Super Nationals in Boone and what a great day, and night, that we had! While Barry spent most of his time in the infield with his camera, the rest of us enjoyed nearly ten hours of racing peppered by the entertaining comments and conversation with good friends Paul Vetter and David Schlise.
The manner in which the IMCA team and the Boone Speedway staff present this absolutely huge event is amazing and can only be fully appreciated by seeing it in person, so mark that on your bucket list if you have never been to the Super Nationals before. All totaled we saw more than 440 cars compete in sixty-one events starting right on time at 1 p.m. until we left following the completion of the Late Model feature around 10:40 p.m. and there was still several more events to be completed in our absence.
The first qualifying feature for the Sport Mods was my highlight of the evening as thirty cars waged war for twenty-five laps with the top eight finishers locking themselves in to Saturday's "Big Dance". Drivers were racing three and four wide throughout the pack, yet only two caution flags were needed, and after eight lead changes among six drivers it would be Ottumwa's Tyler Heckart taking the thrilling victory. This would be just his second win of 2025 and his first IMCA sanctioned victory of the the season as he also won the fair race in Memphis, Missouri, in July, but on this night he was the star on a huge stage!
The Late Model feature was well worth the nine hour wait with front row starters Zach Zeitner and Jesse Bodin swapping the lead in the first three laps before the fourth starting Jesse Sobbing sailed by and to the front on lap four of fifty. Cody Thompson in just his seventh start in a Late Model gave us quite a show racing up from a seventh row starting spot to put the pressure on Sobbing and would even lead briefly as the two traded sliders and crossovers late. After the white flag waved Sobbing was forced to go to the bottom entering turn one due to a lapper and it looked like Thompson might be able to diamond off the cushion and make one final run down the back stretch, but his car stumbled briefly, perhaps with the powerplant getting hot, and instead Cody would give back the runner-up spot to Zeitner at the checkers. C.J. Horn was in the hunt as well in the closing laps as he started sixth and finished fourth while Logan Veloz showed that the success of his rookie season in a Late Model has not been a fluke as he finished in fifth.
Far be it for me to even make a suggestion as to how to make this epic event any "better", but it sure would be nice for the Late Model contingent to be able to be on their way home by ten o'clock in their one and only appearance of the week and, to do that, only some minor adjustments would need to be made in the running order of Monday's program.
I love chatting with Paul and David about the state of racing and some of their "off the cuff" comments as the day and night played out were "roll on the floor" funny. Several of those came during the quick victory lane interviews and that is the reason I am pulling back up the Back Stretch entry from January of 2022 where we remind our interviewees the importance of the word "Enough" if they are going to rattle off their thank-yous, or non-thank-yous as is the case if they leave out that one VERY important word.
At one point Paul, who is a long-time IMCA official from California, asked why East Moline closed and David's response was that they didn't listen to Jeff. Believe me, there were so many more factors than this, with perhaps the late start to signing on as the promoter being the most important that lead to a shortened season at the Quad Cities track, but one of the things that we all agreed upon is that if you just go in and do what was done before, the results will likely be the same.
We talked about the number of classes being presented at tracks throughout the country where the average car counts are less than ten per division and how it will take one bold promoter to take the lead, review his or her stats, and then make the bold move to cut back to four or even three classes and find success. The common response to this is "you can't do that, you need that back gate money to pay the purse!" As a promoter, if that is your driving factor to having seven classes with fifty cars in the pits, then perhaps you need to check your math again. Paul was also impressed with the thinking behind suggestion #5 in that post that goes a little something like this....
#5 - Pay Less To Win; More To Start
While we are pissing off the studs, let's continue to do so with a restructuring of your weekly purse. The driver that tries to be there each and every week, but for whatever reason is not a front runner at this point needs that extra money in the purse check in order to return the following week. Let's say that you are currently paying $750-to-win, $500 for second and $75 to start likely from twelfth on back. If you changed that to $500-to-win and $400 for second that would give you $350 that you could then put at the back of the purse and pay $100 to start.
So now, let's give something back to the studs since we are abiding by suggestion #4 and running our races using an invert. I have always thought that it would be good to offer a bonus to the winner depending upon where that driver started the feature from. Sticking with the example above, if my winner comes from the second row there is a $50 bonus. A winner that starts from the third row earns a $100 bonus. Start from the fourth row and a win adds $150 to the purse check while a win from the fifth row gets a $200 bonus. In an invert system, that's where your top point driver is going to start if there are seventeen or fewer cars and if this new purse structure helps you grow your car count to eighteen or more, then the $250 bonus to win from the sixth row on back takes you right back to the $750 top prize that your studs were already looking at in the first place.
Plus, one of the complaints of using a points invert for weekly shows is that a driver who might just want to drop in for a week knows that he or she will have to start from the back of the invert. Now that comes with an incentive.
Yes, we are just three old guys that have been around the sport for more than fifty years each, and our thoughts and ideas might be just as worthless as all of the others that are shared on the internet. But what if they're not? And, with the recent announcement that a new promoter will be needed at the Lee County Speedway in Donnellson for 2026, if you consider yourself a candidate I want to talk to you in person about what I believe needs to be done to be successful in southeast Iowa.
I doubt that my phone will be ringing anytime soon though!
Thanks for spending some time on the Back Stretch, up next for us will be a four race road trip that will hopefully add two new tracks to my list. Hope to see you here again soon!
1 comment:
Jeff, you hit the nail on the head about Boone on Monday...they need to get the late models done earlier. They used to get done at a decent hour but the last few years it's getting later and later. You are right it would be so easy to just tweak the schedule a bit to get the boys of summer done by 10 or earlier. Tim Plantikow (Fast Eddie 95)
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