Viking Speedway held Night 1 of its Labor Day doubleheader with an excellent 116-car field on hand, led by 29 Wissota Midwest Modifieds. There was a nice crowd on hand as well on a nice September evening. The bottom line seemed like the place to be on this night. I don’t know if the top was too dirty or what the situation was, but it seemed like the bottom third was were the majority of the cars ran. And the cars that dared to go up to the top and try it, well they paid for i

RaceChaser was back at Norman County Raceway in Ada as the 3/8-mile oval resumed its season after a two-week break. One of the interesting things on the night was two new faces in the IMCA Stock Car class. One was Randy Klein of Lisbon, a long-time IMCA/Wissota Midwest Modified driver; the other was street stock standout Ryan Satter of Dent. Klein has sold his IMCA Modified to Dan Pederson and bought a stock car this year. He still has his USMTS modified. Satter, who is seve

RaceChaser blog was back at I-94 Sure Step Speedway for the Advantage RV Mod Tour show on Friday. An excellent 34-car field was on hand in the mods aiming to claim the $1,500 top prize. There were 29 Wissota Midwest Modifieds on hand and car counts in the other three classes were solid. Once again, the weather looked like it would play a factor as the radar didn’t look good, and neither did the skies. The modifieds got their 40-lapper in, and it turns out the rain went just

RaceChaser was back at I-94 Sure Step Speedway on Friday for the opening night of the Steffes Street Stock Tour. What a race that turned into, and if that’s an indicator of what’s ahead, we are in for some big-time racing. The intensity in the street stocks was amped up a notch or two with 43 cars in attendance -- and a ton of quality cars, I should add. There was hard racing in the feature and the battle between Parker Anderson of Phillips, Wis., and Ryan Satter of Dent over

The Fall Classic wrapped up the RaceChaser season, so it’s time for a little recap to 2020. I Highlighted the Top Guns (top drivers in area), Breakout Performers, Most Improved, etc. in the blog I will do a year in review later to highlight more individual/specific events by the calendar. Here are some drivers who stood out in 2020. Top Guns: Brock Gronwold (#2020G Wissota Midwest Modified, Fergus Falls): Including his wins down south over the winter, Gronwold had a RaceChase

With I-94 Sure Step Speedway and Devils Lake Speedway wrapping up this past Saturday, it’s time for RaceChaser to take a look back at some of the point races and feature wins this season. Here we go: —Jade Hastings of Grand Forks wrapped up the Buffalo Wild Wings NOSA Sprint title in style with a dominating feature win on Friday. It is his first series title. Hastings had six NOSA feature wins this season. —Speaking of the NOSA Sprints, three different drivers won features at

RaceChaser was at Norman County Raceway for season championship night at the 3/8-mile oval. Despite some rain in the late afternoon the show got in and was done by 9:30 p.m. Nice work by the NCR officials and drivers to keep the show moving. Despite the overcast weather and rain, the track was actually on the drier side with a little dust. My guess is track prep workers erred on the side of caution with water earlier in the day knowing rain was on its way. A couple of the div

If there has been a driver who’s been one of the top dogs in the Wissota Midwest Modified class in western Minnesota over the past two decades, it may be Brock Gronwold. The Fergus Falls driver has a Wissota national championship (2007), nine track championships and more than 150 feature wins in a career that has spanned nearly 20 years. This season, if you include his racing down south in Arizona and New Mexico in January, Gronwold has eight wins. Since the season started up

Norman County Raceway in Ada opened the season on Thursday with a solid 61-car field in attendance. Some familiar names found victory lane during action at the 3/8-mile oval. Veteran Rich Pavlicek is running an IMCA Sport Mod this year and got his season off to a strong start with the win over Chris VanMil of Barnesville. Luke Johnson of Moorhead was third, Scott Jacobson of Fargo fourth and Andy Wagner of Ada finished fifth after starting 10th. Pavlicek had raced an IMCA Mod

It’s time to reflect on some of the on-track successes this season in the RaceChaser area. So I’ve highlighted some drivers who stood out this season. This applies to people who raced regularly at one of the eight RaceChaser-area tracks — for example, Shane Edginton of Winnipeg raced weekly at River Cities in Grand Forks. Here we go: Top dogs Jonny Carter (#46 Wissota Street Stock, Lisbon): Hard to argue against a driver who won the Wissota Street Stock national title, won 25

First, I want to commend all of those involved – workers at I-94, Wissota officials, volunteers, whoever – for getting the Wissota 100 in. I admit after the rain on Thursday and seeing how muddy the grounds were on Facebook photos, I thought getting this show in was a long shot. It took a lot of hours from a lot of people to get that show in and all involved deserve credit for getting the racing in. I think the drivers and fans who attended, at least based on the facebook pos