A Long Night of Racing At Quincy

Following a successful Friday night of UMP Summernationals racing at Quincy Raceways, we were right back at it on Sunday. My first thought was that attendance may be down, but the cooler(?) temps brought out a nice gathering of both cars and fans. Unfortunately, a stiff southerly breeze resulted in a dried out race track, and following heat races for the modifieds, sport mods and late models, the track prep crew came out and spent 45 minutes or so reworking the track. The result was less dust, but the cushion never really came up, and most of theracing was around the bottom of the .29 mile track. The UMP mods and UMP late models tied for the lead with 17 cars in each class to lead the 81 car field. In addition, the KIDZ MODZ made an appearance, but only two showed up to race.
  The mod feature was up first, and all 17 took the green flag. Steven Delonjay won the drag race into turn one over Michael Long, and whoever says you don't win a race on the first lap was wrong tonight. Steven survived five caution periods in the 25 lapper to pick up the victory. Long and Dave Weitholder swapped the runnerup spot early, but Michael settled into second, unable to overtake Delonjay. Weitholder ran third, with Shawn Deering fourth. The night started off poorly for Jared Schlipman when his # 42 would not fire in the staging lane prior to his heat race. As a result of needing a push, Jared was on the tail of the heat, and started deep in the feature field. He battled his way forward, crossing the line in fifth.
  With last weeks winner Vance Wilson a fan in the stands on sunday, Tony dunker marched to yet another IMCA sport mod win, taking the lead after a lap eleven restart in the 15 lap finale. Second generation drivers Tanner Klingele and Brad Holtmeyer, as well as Bobby Anders all spent time at the front, but trailed Dunker in that order at the checkers.
  The UMP late models ran third, and again, Justin Reed out raced Dewayne Kiefer to turn one at the green, and from there on the race was for third on back. Kiefer, who made his third visit to QR all the way from St Genevieve, Mo. inched closer to Reed as the two worked lapped traffic in the non stop event, but JR was up to the task. Dustin Griffin battled his way to third, with Michael long and Brian Dively rounding out the first five. Jason Perry entered the night leading the points, and competed in teammate Bill Genebachers # 72 after hurting the engine on his
# 27 on friday. He led the second five ahead of Jim Moon, Mark Burgtorf, first time visitor John Beck from Springfield, and Clint Kirkham.  Jason frankel made his season debut in brother Rickeys # 33F , but started near the tail and ran just outside the top ten.
  The IMCA stock car class count was up a bit at eleven. The word had been out that point leader Abe Huls would miss the night of racing while on vacation, so when we passed the # 30c hauler enroute to the track, I thought I had bad information.  A quick look found no Abe in the hauler, and at the track we learned that Tony Dunker would be behind the wheel. For a time it looked like " Bones " would take the car to victory lane, but it was not to be. Aaron Brocksieck started shotgun on the filed, and patiently worked his way past Dunker on lap twelve. Tony then looped his ride while running second, and after a two week layoff, Aaron rolled his for sale # 40A into victory lane for his first win since April 8. Gabe Harrison, Michael Larsen, and Terry Houston were next in line.
  Austen Becerra topped the 15 car IMCA sport compact filed for the third week in a row, besting Seth Woodruff, Brandon Lambert, and Kimberly Abbott.
   A correction to my last blog, as Brandon Symmonds of Keokuk entered the night as the points leader. Brandon hung around the front all night in the 20 lap finale, but Brian Hoener had the hot set up and picked up the win. Tanner Klingele and Jeff Delonjay completed the top four.
  We were excited to learn last night that former late model competitor Justin Jennings, a recent high school graduate from right here in LaGrange, who last fall entered the NASCAR driving school, has earned a ride in this weekends Camping World truck series race at Iowa Speedway. Justin will be in either the # 63 or # 65 truck, so if you get a chance, watch the race and root this nice young man on!
  Next up Racin' Down the Road is headed to West Liberty for the IMCA Deery Brothers Summer Series race tomorrow night. If you see me, say " Hi! "