No one was quite sure if the show would go on at the Southern Iowa Speedway on Wednesday night, but all the rain somehow stayed away from the Monster Half-Mile. The weekly show plus the invasion of the Sprint Invader series made for a full night of racing.
Only five IMCA Sport Compacts were in attendance last evening. The 10-lap feature was lead start to finish by the #77 of John Whalen. Chuck Fullenkamp from Ft. Madison raced for the first time at Osky this year. He made it to the runner up spot with a lap to go, but had to settle for second place. Bill Whalen was third, fourth was the first two week's winner, Trent Orwig, and Curt Myers took the fifth place. John Whalen won for the second week in a row.
After the thrilling 3-wide stock car finish last week, there was no repeat of that excitement this time.
Donnie Pearson ran strong and was looking impressive in keeping his lead over heavy hitter's Zack VanderBeek and Brad Pinkerton. Pearson led through lap ten when he appeared to change his line a bit, and that was all VanderBeek needed as he flew to the lead. From there on out, VanderBeek was clean and free and took the win easily. At lap fourteen, the big battle was for second place as Brad Pinkerton and Todd Reitzler had cleared Pearson and were jousting for the runner up spot. A bit of contact on the final lap between Pinkerton and Reitzler allowed Pinkerton to cross the finish line in second, Mike Hughes slipped by a recovering Reitzler as they went third and fourth in that order. Cayden Carter, last week's winner and "Team Orange" driver, was fifth and early leader Pearson finished in sixth spot. This was VanderBeek's second win of the season.
The traveling Sprint Invader series was an added feature to the night's racing. Twenty-five of the winged sprint cars came for some fun. Twenty cars would start the feature after whittling the starting line up through a B Main that was won by Jon Agan.
Tony Shilling flew to the lead on the start of the 29-lap feature, as fellow Knoxville racer Jamie Ball settled into second. Ball closed in on Shilling when lap traffic played a part, and as they came out of turn four at lap nine, Ball and Shilling made contact as they came out of corner four, causing Shilling to go sideways. With that, Ball scooted to the lead. Somehow, Shilling was able to regain control, and kept going, but losing several positions. A yellow flew at lap thirteen for a car sitting on the apron, dead in the water. Ball was still holding the top spot, Nate VanHaaften was in second and veteran Terry "T-Mac" McCarl was riding in third. The race restarted but it would only get three laps in before another yellow flew when Jon Agan and Russ Hall, tangled and ended up high in corner one, only to have Dakota Hendrickson pile into them as well. When things got back underway, Ball was not letting this slip through his fingers, and motored home to his first checkers ever in the Sprint Invader's series and a $1,500 pay check. VanHaaften kept second, third was McCarl, fourth was Joe Beaver and Shilling completed the top five.
The 13-car field of IMCA Northern SportMods ran next. This one was over at the drop of the green flag as Jason McDaniel (who had mechanical issues last week and dropped out) grabbed the point position and would never look back. Curtis VanDerWal made it to second in the flag-to-flag race, but had to be content with the runner up spot. Third went to Brayton Carter, fourth was pole sitter Trent Brink, and last week's winner Brett Lowry, was fifth. This was McDaniel's first win at Osky this year.
The 15-lap Hobby Stocks saw a gaggle of cars bunched as they entered turn one on the start. Lap one had Aaron Martin scored as the leader, but as lap three went into the books, Bobby Greene had slipped under Martin as well as Dustin Griffiths. Griffiths made his move around Greene two laps later, and claimed the lead. Griffths would then pull away to a comfortable lead, and sealed his first win of the season. Greene held on to second place, third went to Danny Thrasher, Martin was fourth and Dale Porter was fifth.
The night's racing ended with 18-laps of IMCA Modified racing. Scott Dickey immediately took the lead from starting on the pole and would never relinquish it all the way to the checkers and the win, marking his first victory at the Southern Iowa Speedway in 2015. Tyler Groenendyk did his best to catch Dickey but could only garner a second place finish on this night. Third was Cayden Carter, fourth was Carter VandenBerg and last week's winner Andrew Schroeder was fifth.
Regular weekly racing resumes next Wednesday night, May 13 with racing in all five classes at the speedway. Hot laps at 7 and racing at 7:30.
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