July 11, 2019
The Dale DeFrance and Bill Davis, Sr. memorial race was held at the Marshalltown Speedway on a rare Thursday night during the Central Iowa Fair. The two races were combined after earlier season weather outs. The drivers in all classes were running for bigger pay offs, huge trophies, plus many contingencies brought about by the hard work of both families to honor the two very special racers. It was a draw/redraw show and was not for track points.
The two drivers honored tonight were special indeed. Bill Davis, Sr. was a two time IMCA National Champion in the Modified division, but had raced in many classes spanning the 1960's through 2001. His racing career accumulated over 500 total wins. His son Bill Davis, Jr. carries on the racing tradition as does his grandson Bill Wears. Dale DeFrance was the patriarch of the racing DeFrance family...which is still strong into the racing scene. Daughter Judy DeFrance Gustin raced and is now married to another former racer, Rick Gustin. Their children carry on the tradition as well as, Jimmy, Richie, Ryan, and Jenae are hot shoes behind the wheel. Son Darrel DeFrance pilots the #99D Late Model and is a crowd favorite wherever he goes.
Jeff Aikey put on quite the show as he won two races back to back....the IMCA Modified feature and then the IMCA Late Model event. Todd Reitzler put it on the block in the winner's circle by taking the honors in the IMCA Stock Car event. It was Brayton Carter winning for the fifth time this year in the IMCA Northern SportMod class. Eric Stanton made a trip to the High Banks and went home with honors in the IMCA Hobby Stock division, and Dillon Raffurty made the long haul up from Independence, Missouri, and went home with a win in the Mod Lites on his first ever trip to the speedway.
Dillon Raffurty made the trip up from Independence, Missouri, and led all 15-lap to take the checkers in the Mod Lite feature. Mike Zemo from Davenport, Iowa chased the leader the entire way, to finish as the runner up. Mike Morrill took third place, fourth went to Joel Huggins, and Tanner Gannon completed the top five. This was Raffurty's first time ever at the track. He, along with Michael Raffurty took the opportunity to come and race at the High Banks on an off night at their local track.
Leah Wroten got out in front quickly in the IMCA Hobby Stock A main, but Eric Stanton had the lead at lap four. Stanton, who started sixth, never looked back from there on as he motored to the flying checkers. Wroten held the runner up position, Kayden Reynolds finished third, fourth was Jamie Coady and Zach Hovell was fifth. This was Stanton's first time at the track this season.
The IMCA Northern SportMods were up next for their 18-lap feature. Brayton Carter started in the second row, took command immediately and warded off the advances of Jenae Gustin, and then Jake McBirnie to take another win. Jake McBirnie came from eleventh to finish in the runner up spot, Jenae Gustin was third, fourth went to thirteenth place starter Travis Peterson, earning him a hard charger award, and Cam Reimers took fifth place. This marked the fifth win at the speedway for Carter this year which includes the Frostbuster special that opened the track's season.
Todd Reitzler went home $1,000 richer after taking the honors in the IMCA Stock Cars. Reitzler drew the pole and kept it out front the entire 18-laps to secure the win. It was a dog fight behind Reitzler however, as Jeff Wollam, David Brandies, Kyle Everts, and Jeff Mueller jockeyed for position. A yellow with just two laps remaining found Mueller stranded at the top of turn three with mechanical issues, thus resulting in a green-white-checkered shoot out. Reitzler held his lead and took the win. David Brandies crossed the line in second but was penalized for a last corner incident with then second running Jeff Wollam. Damon Murty started fifteenth and was then awarded second place after a terrific last minute surge, Steve Meyer came from eighteenth to finish third, and Shawn Ritter took his ride to fourth after starting twelfth and Kyle Everts was fifth. This was Reitzler's second appearance in Victory Lane this season.
$1,100 was up for grabs to the winner of the 20-lap IMCA Modified A main event. Jeff Aikey took a liking to the top of the track, and sailed home to the win. Ryan Gustin chased Aikey the distance but had to settle for second. Ethan Dotson took third, Richie Gustin started in twelfth spot and finished fourth, and Zack VanderBeek rounded out the top five. Aikey drew the outside pole for the start, tested the track and found he liked it "up top", one of few who did. The veteran racer made it look almost easy as he sailed to the win. This was Aikey's second Modified win, repeating from last week.
The finale of the night was 44 laps of IMCA Late Model racing, in honor of the late Dale DeFrance's car number. Fittingly, son Darrel DeFrance drew the pole starting position for the race. DeFrance led the opening laps until Brian Harris nosed under him to take over at lap five. Harris soon had Richie Gustin to contend with, and after running side by side, and a couple of slide jobs, Gustin made it stick and took over the lead. The race was far from over however, as a pair of #77 cars came calling. Visiting York, Nebraska racer, Cory Dumpert moved from fourteenth starting spot to run in second, and Jeff Aikey, fresh off of his Modified victory, had moved from nineteenth spot to run in third. The closing circuits saw Aikey make his move and he took over the top spot. He would then hold it to take the checkers and secure the $1,500 pay day. Cory Dumpert was second, Darrel DeFrance took third place, fourth went to Brian Harris, and Sherrill, Iowa's Jeff Tharp came from fifteenth starting spot, to score a top five finish.
We note that although Richie Gustin crossed the finish line in second in the Late Model feature, the official results show that he was disqualified....for unknown reasons at this writing.
We were happy to meet Dustin Jarrett in the stands last evening who was visiting his 250th different track. Jarrett is a strong supporter of racing. He works at https://www.dirtondirt.com/ contributing on social media, a columnist and publicist, and has a long history of announcing at among other tracks, the historic Eldora Speedway. Thanks to Blake Anderson knowing we were there, he introduced himself. He had rave revues about the racing last night and said how lucky we are to have the racing we have back here in Iowa. He was amazed at how efficiently the program ran as well. He's off to more tracks to get under his belt before returning to home base in Ohio.
There is no Friday night racing at the speedway this week. Next races will be Friday, July 19 with racing in all six classes. Hot laps are scheduled for 6:50 and racing at 7:30.
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