Tony Jackson Goes Flag to Flag at Wheatland

  When rain fell mid week and the forecast offered chilly temps for the weekend, the Lee County Speedway in Donnellson, Ia. pulled the plug on the entire two day Fall Extravaganza. With a family outing three hours south on Saturday evening, it looked as though there would be no racing for me. But when Jeff Broeg offered up a chance to tag along to the Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland,Mo. for the rescheduled second day of the MLRA Fall Nationals, I hustled home on Sunday morning and jumped in with him, Fred, and Darryl and headed three and a half hours back south for our first 2019 visit to the Diamond of Dirt Tracks.
  The original scenario for this event, which also offered up a $3,000 to win forty lap finale for B mods was two sets of B mod heats on night one followed by E,D,C,B mains preceding the money race on night two. Meanwhile, the late models, co sanctioned with the southern Missouri, northern Arkansas Comp Cams series would run a complete $3,000 to win show on night one and a separate $5,000 to win headliner on night two. Here a switch was made, with the $5,000 to win forty lapper staying on Saturday, while the $3,000 to win show moved to Sunday. For the B mods, everything slid back one day. While the late models boasted solid fields of thirty eight cars on Friday and thirty one on Sunday, the B mod count was about twenty less than we saw in 2018, with fifty three on night one and fifty one returning on Sunday, with the drop most likely due to the finale being on a Sunday.  Although we were not sure how many cars had qualified through the two sets of heats, we speculated that likely a C and B main would be sufficient to set the starting grid. Apparently the folks at Lucas Oil subscribe to the " more is better " philosophy, sticking to the full slate of qualifiers, even though things kicked off about thirty minutes after the posted start times on a quickly cooling Sunday night.
 Unfortunately, " yellow fever " was rampant during the B mod preliminary events, and even though the officials did an excellent job of transitioning from one race to the next, the clock continued to move. Interspersed with the B mod " alphabet " races, the late models contested four ten lap heats, with the top fourteen in passing points ( the race schedule said sixteen? ) locking into the feature. Those qualifiers were evenly balanced, with three advancing from heat one, Tony Jackson Jr. topping Hunter Rasdon and Jason Papaich. Raymond Merrill in his own #12M led surprise entrant Brent Larson, Terry Phillips, and Mason Oberkramer from heat two. Tyler Bruening, Payton Looney, and MLRA point leader Will Vaught moved on from heat three, and Ryan Gustin, Joe Gorby, Timothy Culp, and Logan Martin moved on from the last ten lapper. A pair of ten lap B mains for the late models saw 2018 MLRA champ Chad Simpson, Colton Horner, and Steve Drake advance followed by Minnesota driver Jake Timm, B.J. Robinson, and Mitch McGrath also making the transfer. Two point provisionals from each series, Brian Rickman, Morgan Bagley, Jeremy Grady, and Reid Millard completed the starting field.
  We were still in pretty good shape, but the twenty minute intermission for track prep became closer to forty, and our self imposed curfew was now looming large.
  The late models came to the 3/8 mile oval first, with Jackson Jr. and Bruening setting the pace. A rare mistake by Bruening saw him spin on the top side of turn two on the opening lap, and he would be forced to line up at the tail for the restart. Whether he would have had anything for Jackson we will never know, but it is safe to say that no one else did. Jackson was already stretching his lead when Millard went for the first of two spins on lap two. Back to racing, fifth starting Looney charged to second while tenth starting Martin entered the top five. Soon Jackson, Looney, and third place Merrill all had put distance on the car behind them. Jackson hit slower traffic on lap eleven, but he was having no issues ahead of a spinning Millard two laps later. On the restart, Looney tried to stay with the leader, while Gustin challenged Merrill for third, and row seven starter Vaught raced his way to fifth about lap eighteen, then fourth just past the halfway mark. Jackson again caught the back of the pack at lap twenty three, but he continued to maintain his advantage as Vaught moved to third. Soon Vaught was challenging Looney for second, and he took the spot with three circuits remaining. As he worked through turn two, he became trapped momentarily behind a lapped car, allowing Looney to retake the position. Jackson Jr. led all forty laps to grab the win, with Looney and the 2019 champion Vaught next in line. Gustin, the Saturday night winner, ran fourth in front of Culp. Simpson began a high side charge about mid race, advancing nine spots to sixth, followed by Oberkramer, Merrill, McGrath, and Martin.
  The clock had now ticked past 7:30 as on track interviews began, and the working man in our group would now have to hustle to get home before midnight, so we regretfully headed for the parking lot. A check of results on the ride home told us that Kris Jackson had topped the B mod finale, followed by Andy Bryant, Gunner Martin, J.C. Morton, and Ryan Gilmore.
   This is my second year in a row attending the Fall Nationals, and even with a few hiccups, it is still a good show. I am not sure what the issue was, but I do hope we will be better able to hear the race announcer if we ( hopefully! ) make it back in 2020!
  As of now, I am not sure if I will be able to get to the track this weekend, but there is still plenty of good racing to be found.
  Thanks for reading!