Kevin Kovac's Take Five
Take Five: Sprint action caps RTJ's busy holiday
In a new feature appearing regularly on DirtonDirt, senior writer Kevin Kovac will offer readers five things worth mentioning from around the Dirt Late Model landscape (index to previous Take Fives):
No. 1: Ricky Thornton Jr. has the weekend off from Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series action, but the race-loving 35-year-old is embarking on a holiday schedule with even more ambitious travel than he faces on the national tour. He’ll start Saturday close to his home in Indianola, Iowa, with a visit to Boone (Iowa) Speedway to pull double-duty in the IMCA modified and stock car divisions during the track’s Prelude to the Super Nationals program. Then it’s a nearly 600-mile drive to Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio, to meet his Koehler Motorsports Dirt Late Model team for a World 100 tuneup run in Sunday night’s Baltes Classic. The most surprising event of his weekend? Monday afternoon’s 410 sprint car Labor Day Classic at Port Royal (Pa.) Speedway, a roughly 470-mile overnight drive from Eldora. Thornton has remarked that his success in Lucas Oil Series competition at Port Royal at least partially derives from him watching broadcasts of sprint car races at the half-mile oval, so now he’ll have a chance to test his open-wheel ability there behind the wheel of the Indy Race Parts No. 71 that he’s occasionally piloted in recent years.
No. 2: The basic concept behind Thursday’s MARS Late Model Championship Series-sanctioned twin 25-lap features at La Salle (Ill) Speedway was a bit nostalgic for me. Growing up attending big-block modified races at the dirt-covered Flemington (N.J.) Speedway from 1983-90, multiple-feature programs were a once-a-month occurrence — typically twin 20-lappers early in the season, then triple 20s in July and a big four-20s show in August. I loved those nights, which sometimes provided interesting new winners but more often produced memorably frenetic charges to the front; I recall the first race using regular handicapping (starting the highest money-earner over the past three weeks in the 18th spot) and then the top-12 finishers being inverted for each subsequent feature. I saw my favorite driver, Billy Pauch, sweep a triple 20s card and come oh-so-close to winning all four 20-lappers on another occasion. Those core memories made La Salle’s double-feature program intriguing, but unfortunately, the execution wasn’t quite the same. I’m not a fan of the way Thursday’s second 25-lapper ran immediately after the first one was completed following an in-car invert-draw by first-race winner Ryan Unzicker. There were some extenuating circumstances that hampered the double-dip because unexpectedly rough track conditions led to only 10 of the first race’s 20 starters staying on the track for the nightcap, but twin features are much more interesting when there’s a break between them and teams are given an opportunity to make changes to their cars — like I witnessed back in the day at Flemington. I’d like to see one of those old-school, multiple-feature shows for Dirt Late Models someday.
No. 3: Doesn’t Labor Day weekend at the racetrack usually provide a first taste of autumn-like air, especially in the Northeast and Midwest? Well, not this year. As I perused weather forecasts for tracks hosting holiday-weekend events, I was certainly surprised to see the heat wave that’s overrunning so many of them. Temperatures in the high 90s in the Southeast aren’t all that shocking, but advisories for heat indexes of 105 degrees or more across the Midwest — including special events at such tracks as Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Mo., and Illinois’s Farmer City Raceway and Fairbury Speedway — is more like mid-summer. A couple tracks, I-55 Federated Raceway Park in Pevely, Mo., and the Brownstown (Ill.) Bullring, even cancelled weekly shows scheduled because of extreme heat. And looking ahead to next week’s World 100, long-range forecasts don’t indicate triple-digit heat indexes, but they do show rather warm temperatures with highs in the mid-80s.
No. 4: Veteran Dirt Late Model wrench Vinny Guliani has been enjoying plenty of success over the past few years with his VG Performance business offering technical assistance to teams running Longhorn Chassis and Bilstein Shocks, but he announced that he’s joining Longhorn Dynamics to bring Ohlins Shock products, technology and support to racers. Guliani wrote on Facebook that he will continue to service his existing Bilstein customers but is shifting his focus to Ohlins to align with Longhorn’s primary shock partner.
No. 5: I’ve noted in the past how Hall of Famer Gary Stuhler of Greencastle, Pa., has, amazingly, never eaten a slice of pizza. He says it’s just not his thing, and, at 71, he still hasn’t tried the popular food item. So I couldn’t help noticing while stopping by Stuhler’s pit stall Saturday at Port Royal Speedway that his No. 4 Dirt Late Model’s quarter-panel sported the logo of Anthony’s Pizza, the restaurant in Winchester, Va., that’s a big supporter of racing. Stuhler said even having a pizza shop as a sponsor hasn’t prompted him to take a bite. “But he likes their steak-and-cheese,” said Stuhler’s wife, Jerri, offering an alternate name for a Philly cheesesteak.
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