Terbo Tops at LaSalle

 Ignoring the chilly temps, we headed north Sunday for the Thaw Brawl at Tony Izzos' LaSalle,Il. Speedway. The annual event was originally set up as a two day show, Friday and Saturday night, with the headline late model and modified classes sanctioned by the Michigan based American Ethanol series. With a practice night scheduled for Thursday, many drivers arrived to prepare for the long weekend. Unfortunately Mother Nature had other plans, with the schedule changed to a Friday night practice, with afternoon racing for Saturday, highlighted by the late models racing for a $5,000 top prize, followed by a Sunday afternoon program featuring late models chasing a $15,000 payday. Again, rain overnight on Friday and Saturday morning resulted in a one day show. with hot laps and qualifying at 1:00 PM followed by racing at 3:00 PM. The AE modifieds would be dueling for $1,500 to win, with the program filled out with IMCA modifieds paying $1,000 to win and IMCA sport mods racing for a $500 prize.
  Racing in March in the midwest is always a roll of the dice, especially with big money on the line, and staging a Sunday afternoon show certainly adds to the gamble. On a day when the temperature struggled to top 40 degrees and a stiff breeze remained steady, there was still a nice sized crowd on hand.
  Action got under way shortly after 1:00 with hot laps for the 32 American Ethanol late models and 21 AE modifieds, following by two cars at a time two lap time trials for those classes. Bobby Pierce topped the late models with a lap of 12.834 seconds around the quarter mile, while Frank Marshall topped the mods. A partial invert had the fastest qualifier in each heat race grouping staring third. The IMCA classes then hot lapped, and it was now heat race time.
  The late models ran three heat races, topped by Brian Shirley, Kyle Bronson, and Jason Feger, who grabbed the only heat not won from outside row one. Will Krup and Allen Weisser, who missed his late model heat when his car would not fire, captured the mod heats. Ricky Thornton and Tim Hamburg took IMCA wins, while Tyler Soppe was the sport mod heat winner.
  Ricky Weiss claimed the late model consy to round out preliminary events. 
  During a rather lengthy intermission, track workers reworked an understandably somewhat treacherous surface, and it would then be 21 late models lining up for 75 laps of action.
  Regardless of what had taken place before, or what would come after, the late model feature was easily worth the price of admission! Polesitter Kyle Bronson led lap one, with row two inside starter Shirley pacing lap two. It was Bronson back ahead as lap three was scored, then Shirley on lap four ahead of the first caution, with Scott Schmitt retiring from the action.  Back to racing, Shirley opened a nice lead, with seventh starting Chris Simpson beginning a move towards the front. Hudson Oneal brought out the next yellow about lap fourteen, and Feger briefly rebounded to second on the restart before Bronson retook the spot. Eighth starting Pierce now moved up to challenge Simpson for fourth. As Feger stumbled on the very tricky high line in turn two, Bronson began to close on the leader. Behind the lead duo, there was plenty of position swapping, and when the front pair caught slower traffic, Bronson grabbed the lead. But just as quickly, Shirley was back in front. Ahead of a caution period for Brandon Thirlby, Simpson had grabbed second with  Dennis Erb Jr. joining the lead pack. Shannon Babb saw his run end following a pair of restarts, and Bronson then tagged the turn two wall, with his day finished. Shirley again opened a sizable lead, but soon slowed, eventually heading to the pits. He returned to the track after a tire change, but retired after a couple more laps, turning the lead over to Simpson with still 30 laps to go. Back under green, Rusty Schlenk looped his ride in turn two, ending the day for himself and Frank Heckenast Jr. while Travis Stemler rejoined the pack. As the field came to green, Brandon Sheppard dove to the infield, his day done.
The leaders now hugged the inside line, and it looked as though everyone was prepared to ride it out to the end, BUT... slower traffic came into play, and those cars decided to race the leaders. With Simpson and Pierce searching for a way around Bob Gardner, even getting together at one point, row six starter Tyler Erb went to the top of the track and shot to the lead. Not to be denied, Pierce then climbed to the top and rocketed around the youngster they call Terbo. Now those two found themselves looking for a line around Stemler, Pierce going low as Erb took the high line. Erb emerged the leader at this point, leading only a couple of laps out of 75, but being in front when the checkers waved. Simpson joined the front duo on the podium, and while the action had been particularly intense, all three were complimentary of the track and each other. Following Erb, Pierce, and Simpson, it was Erb Jr., with Weiss coming from sixteenth to fifth. Jeremiah drove a steady race to finish sixth ahead of Thirlby, Rich Bell, Spencer Diercks, and Stemler. Gardner, and Logan Arntz rounded out the dozen cars still running after 75 laps.
 With the four of us well chilled, we decided to hang on for the AE mods, but after several caution periods before a lap was scored, we made the decision to head to the warmth of the car. A call on the long ride home from a fan heartier than us informed us that Weisser topped Marshall in the event, while Thornton took IMCA honors. I am still awaiting official results for the sport mods.
  Thanks go out to Izzo and crew for going the extra mile to stage the race when canceling would have been the easy and safe thing to do, as this will no doubt be one of the top races we will see in 2019.
  Hopefully the prospect of warmer weather will allow the racing season to now kick into high gear as we turn the page to April.