Some things on my mind...

Now that we've hit the halfway point of the racing season, I have some things on my mind that I'd like to clear out: 

--Congrats to Jonny Carter of Lisbon who won the Dakota Classic Modified Tour IMCA Stock Car championship this past week.  Carter topped Bock Beeter of Minot by 12 points for the win.  In the five features contested (Williston’s features rained out), Carter had one win, four top fives and finished in the top 10 all five nights. Jonny is a good guy, and one of the things about him is he is the same guy whether he wins or loses, which I can’t say about all folks in racing.

The local IMCA Stock Car class showed its strength on the tour. Brody Carlsrud finished fifth in the tour points with three top 10 finishes; Rob VanMil of Barnesville finished seventh with one top five and two top 10s, and Andrew Jochim of Harwood qualified for all five features. The Dakota tour is a grueling week of six nights of racing and a decent amount of travel and I admire the folks who tackle running the whole thing.

--something I’ve seen at some tracks this year and not directed towards one individual at all: There is a such thing as being dangerously slow on the track, particularly in the late model and A mods.  A very slow car is a hazard, especially at the speeds the leaders travel in the late models and A mods. Imagine driving on I-94 at 75 mph and a car is driving 30 and you come up upon them and you don’t know if they are going to switch lanes or not.  Or imagine if I thought it would be fun to race Dustin Strand and Tyler Peterson in a late model so I went out and bought a brand new one and hopped behind the wheel with zero experience and just got in the way…you’d think I was an idiot in over my head. If you are racing in those classes and are running times that are comparable to short trackers or hornets, it might be time to reconsider dropping to a different class. I have much less problem with this is like the hornets or legends or bombers because that’s where drivers are supposed to learn.

--How track management and workers treat people DOES matter.  I wonder if promoters and track management take time to thank drivers and crew for coming from time to time.  Drivers want to feel appreciated for spending hours and hours in the shop to get their cars ready for race. Not to mention the money spent. I talked to a driver years ago who said he’d raced at a track for several years – and had never had a conversation with the promoter. It doesn’t cost any money to say thank you.

--I did a story on the Hellerman family from Parkers Prairie last week. An interesting note on Bryan Hellerman. When my parents promoted Fiesta City Speedway way back in the 1990s, the super stocks ran a few shows (they were fairly new to the region(.  Hellerman was one of the drivers who could come down from the Alexandria region to race. Yes, I have an odd memory. The story on the Hellermans can be found HERE.

--Things I would love to see: --Jonny Carter in a late model. Tyler Peterson in a 410 sprint car. Justin Vogel in a super stock. The black flag used more for rough driving.  Better pay for A mods at weekly shows.  Making it easier for IMCA Mods to run Wissota and vice versa (rules wise).  Officials not afraid to make a tough call no matter who the driver involved is. Better restarts at some tracks (they are a fiasco at some).

--What a run for Mike Greseth at Brown County Speedway in Aberdeen last night. He had to go through his late model B main to get into the feature and started 22^nd in the A main – and climbed up to second at the checkered. William Lund of Brandon finished second in the Wissota Super Stock feature, where Trevor Nelson, the dominant car in South Dakota for years now, claimed the $3,012 top prize for the Andy Daly Memorial.

--I’d be curious how many thousands of dollars in damage infield tractor tires cause to race cars in a year.  I understand the logic behind them but at several tracks they are simply hazards.

--I don’t think tracks should be blamed for cancelling because of the extreme heat. Here is why: first, it is miserable for the drivers and workers; second, fans won’t show up to sit and bake in the stands for a 3-4 hour show.   I went to a race last year where the heat index was 105 degrees and it was lousy.  There were maybe 100 people in the stands total. Bad for that track’s bottom line.

--Brina Seng, who runs the social media for River Cities (and does it very well), asked a question about what drivers are looking for when it comes to racing. A majority of them said they wanted a good, multi-lane racing surface.  I think most fans want that, too.  I’ve seen some really good tracks this year in terms of being racy, and unfortunately I’ve seen a few one-laners, too.  Track prep is a hard job, and the weather certainly factors into it.  But trying the same thing over and over again and getting the same mediocre racing surface makes no sense to me.

--People wonder why I harp on the long shows and too many classes.  Answer: it is driving away people. 4-5 hour weekly shows kill racing in terms of attendance.  I watch streams and at the end of these shows there are about 15-20 people left in the stands. I applaud tracks that are making the effort to keep their shows moving. There are others who frankly need some work.

For the first 6 weeks of the season I avoided getting too rough on tracks for running long shows (and I've complimented the ones who've ran good, quick, efficient shows), but I won't sugar coat my views going forward.