After enduring a terribly long winter, we were glad to get our first race of the season in at the Boone Frostbuster on Saturday. A good car count was on hand as I counted 165 running in the heats. No doubt the drivers were as anxious for racing season to get underway as us fans.
The popular IMCA SportMod class found Wisconsin driver Troy Jerovetz take the win over Boone regulars, Geoff Olson and Scott Davis. Cody Hennings held on for fourth place after starting from the pole, and rounding out the top five, was Jared Timmerman.
A large field of IMCA modifieds put a great show on for the fans. Mingled amongst many local drivers, was a good number of Wisconsin cars, anxious to get some racing in under their belts before their season starts. Starting from the pole position was one of those Wisconsin drivers, Dan "The Frog Station Flash" Ratajczak. He is also known as "Flipper" as many recall his spectacular flip across the finish line at the Supernationals a couple of years ago. Ratajczak maintained the top spot past the halfway point, but coming on strong from starting back in 12th spot, was local favorite Jimmy Gustin. Gustin took over the lead with just a handful of laps remaining. Following Gustin to the front was 13th starter, Josh "Happy" Gilman, and 16th starter, Jeff Stephens from Arion, Iowa. Gustin took the win, followed by Gilman, Stephens, Jon Snyder and Ratajczak held on for fifth. It was Gustin's second win already in this early race season as he had recently traveled to Texas and took top honors there.
The IMCA stock cars, the class called "Too Tough to Tame" were running for $500 to win and drew 37 competitors. A familiar name was back in Victory Lane as the #25 of Trent Murphy had little trouble in taking the win. Mike VanGenderen "The Flying Dutchman" ran a high line in turns three and four, and ran low in one and two, but try as he might, he was not able to make much of a threat to Murphy. Coming from back in 7th starting spot, was Damon Murty, who tried to make the opposite moves from VanGenderen and see if he could make a pass, but that didn't work, and he had to settle for third place at the finish line. Two brothers, Dustin and Donavon Smith finished fourth and fifth on the slick, dry track.
The final event of the night, was the feature for the IMCA hobby stocks. The JR99 car of Nick Murty started on the outside pole and pretty much dominated the entire race. Boone regular, Chris Hupp chased Murty the entire race, but had to settle for the runner-up spot. Nyle Godwin came from well back in the pack to take third, fourth went to John Watson and fifth to veteran driver, Donnie Gustoff.
As a note, there were drivers that we noticed changed classes this year. Clint Luellen ran hobby stock last year and was in both hobby and SportMod. Darren Huntley went from A mod to a SportMod, and Cody Cleghorn ran both hobby and SportMod. Joel Bushore jumped up a class from SportMod, into the A mod class, as did Fred Schimmel and Luke Wanninger. Daniel Hilsabeck went from hobby stock into the A mod class and it was nice to see young Dylan Book in a SportMod. Book had a successful season in the hobby stock class in 2009 and was the IMCA Rookie of the Year. He suffered pretty severe injuries over the winter when a tire or rim exploded. Alan VanGorp went from hobby stock into the stock car class, as did Kenny Hansen, and Keith Miner. Eric Flander who has been racing in the stock car class, was in a SportMod. I am sure there were probably others that we missed, but those are some that came to mind. Always fun to see how those changes work out.
We hope the weather will be cooperating now, as many tracks are scheduled to begin their regular season of racing this coming weekend. Get out and attend a race near you. Happy racing!
Complete results are posted below.
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