It was a beautiful Friday night for racing at the Marshalltown Speedway. There was a good crowd on hand to witness the evening's events that provided thrilling action all night long. Todd Cooney won a run away IMCA Late Model feature, Joel Rust took the IMCA Modified main event, and Todd Reitzler took the high road to victory lane in the IMCA Stock Cars. Johnathon Logue went to the winner's circle in the IMCA Northern SportMod A main, Shannon Anderson took the checkers in the IMCA Hobby Stocks, and Travis Stensland flew to the win in the Mod Lite class.
Travis Stensland started tenth in the Mod Lite 15-lap main event, and by lap three, had the lead. He never relinquished it from there on and took the easy win. Ninth place starter, Jason Masengarb finished in the runner up position, Joe Glick came from eighth spot to finish third, and Jeol Huggins and Mike Morrill were fourth and fifth respectively. This was Stensland's first win at Marshalltown this year, after numerous trips to victory lane last year.
The IMCA Hobby Stocks ran their 15-lap feature next. David Rieks lead the early portion of the race, but had lots of company in Dylan Nelson, Shannon Anderson and Gene Nicklas. A yellow at lap six proved to be his downfall as it was Shannon Anderson making his move on the restart, and overtaking Rieks on the backstretch to grab the top spot. Anderson was able to throw off the challenges of his competition, and held the lead to the checkers and the win. Dylan Nelson took second, third went to eleventh place starter, Eric Knutson, fourth was David Rieks, and Gene Nicklas rounded out the top five. This was Anderson's second time in victory lane at Marshalltown this season after his win at the High Banks Hustle. In his post-race interview, Anderson stated that he was trying to sell his two cars, and he would like to move up to the Stock Car class. There may be Hobby Stock drivers pooling their money to buy him out, just to get him out of the division that he dominates.
The IMCA Northern SportMods ran 18-laps for their main event. Curt Hilmer had the lead at lap one but it was Johnathon Logue who rose from sixth starting spot, to tag onto his bumper immediately. Logue gained the lead at lap five but didn't have it easy. He had to keep throwing off the challenges of Thomas Egenberger, Joey Schaefer and Tyler Inman, after Hilmer dropped out of the running. Logue managed to hold off those challengers, and swept his way to victory. Joey Schaefer finished as the runner up after starting eleventh, Tyler Inman, the young man who has shown great strides in improvement this year, came from ninth to finish third, Sam Wieben made the high side work as he went from twentieth, to take fourth, and Thomas Egenberger finished fifth from his tenth place starting position. In his victory lane interview with announcer Jerry Vansickel, Logue said he was glad to finally get the monkey off his back at the track.
The IMCA Stock Car feature showed just why they are known as, "The Class Too Tough To Tame". It was one of the best ever Stock Car races we have witnessed! The race up front was a thriller the entire 18-lap distance. With a handful of laps remaining, Paul Shepard had just managed to snatch the lead from Michael Jaennette with Scott Rice lurking close at hand, but suddenly it was the 22R of Todd Reitzler on the top shelf making a thrilling run and up to fourth. The closing laps were a shuffle of positions with those top runners as they looked to the checkers...three different leaders on the final go around. Coming out of corner four, it was anybody's race to win, but Todd Reitzler was the man gaining the advantage with his topside momentum, and beating them to the finish line. Paul Shepard finished second, just eking out third place Michael Jaennette at the stripe. Scott Rice had his best run of the year and finished in fourth, and Scooter Dulin was fifth. The race went flag to flag and left the crowd buzzing afterwards.
Todd Cooney took the 20-lap IMCA Late Model feature by a good margin over Jeremiah Hurst. Cooney came from sixth starting spot to over take then leader Hurst and then pulled away to take the comfortable win. Hurst took a distant second, third went to Darrel DeFrance, visiting driver Andy Eckrich from Oxford, Iowa was fourth and Kyle Hinrichs took fifth place. The race went caution free.
The nightcap of the evening was the IMCA Modified feature. Joel Rust came out the victor in this action packed event. He ran down early leader Scott Simatovich and took command at lap seven. He never looked back from there, and finished a comfortable distance ahead of second place Ronn Lauritzen. Tim Ward made a late race charge through the field to finish third, early leader Simatovich took fourth and Racer Hulin ran at the front of the pack the entire race, and took fifth place. Rust returned to the Marshalltown Winner's Circle after taking the feature win at the High Banks Hustle back on April 26.
It was a much more comfortable night to be sitting at a race at Marshalltown last night, not only because of milder temperatures, but because we weren't fighting the winds.
Racing continues next Friday night at the Marshalltown Speedway, when the green flag drops at 7:30.
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