Catching Up with Osky & Marshalltown

It’s been a while since I’ve written about IMCA racing. My time has been occupied with getting married, moving to Oskaloosa, and writing a book about the Knoxville Nationals since January. Come July you will hear more about this book when it’s printed and ready for sale. But now that it’s done, I’ve been able to catch some races at Oskaloosa and Marshalltown and as I write this on Saturday with a rain out at Knoxville, I finally found time! You will notice that Hawkeye Ovals is now for IMCA type racing and my blog for sprint cars is now under the Knoxville Raceway banner at the following link, http://blog.knoxvilleraceway.com/ I had to separate the two as being the Blogger for Knoxville has been a good opportunity and since they actually pay me money, I had to segregate the two blogs and give them as much traffic as possible.

Osky has been lucky avoiding weather more than some tracks as of late. With the first three weeks were cancelled due to weather (and new dirt not getting worked in) they have been on a run with five weeks in row now. But mother nature hasn’t cooperated even the nights they we have raced with it being cold and windy. June is almost here so it has to start warming up soon…. right?
The Osky Modified class has been healthy with car counts staying in the 11-12 range. Winners this season so far Cayden Carter, Jesse Sobbing, Jacob Murray, and Tyler Groenenyk. It appears the points will come down to Carter, Groenendyk, Bill Gibson, and Murray. Sobbing is not racing for points but the weeks has been to Osky he looks fast and will likely win the IMCA Modified rookie of the year honors after moving up from SportMod last season. Adam Larson and Todd Shute have been frequent visitors and looked stong as well. I’m just so happy that this class is growing. This past week Tyler Groenendyk made slide job on Brandon Banks with two laps to go to get the win.

Sport Mods at Osky has seen Curtis Van Der Wal win twice, Jason McDaniel, Ryan Fullenkamp, and Brett Lowry win features. Van Der Wal appears to be the class of the field but has had some bad luck come his way. Otherwise this class is wide open with a handful of drivers able to win the track championship. Brayton Carter almost won last week, leading the entire distance and holding off Lowry for several laps, he drove it a little too hard into turn one after taking the white flag and brushed the fence, losing his momentum and Lawry went by to steal the win. Brayton came home to second.

Stock Cars have been competitive as ever at Osky. Zack VabderBeek probably has the fastest car but isn’t competing every week. Nathan Wood is my pick to win the track championship at this point. He hasn’t won a feature but been close. Feature winners are VanderBeek, Damon Murty, Jason Minnehan, and Jeff Joldersma who won in his furst appearance at Osky last week. Murty has been fast, and so was Joldersma last week.

Hobby Stock has been all Mike Hughes so far this season. Hughes missed week one with the car not ready but won his first three at Osky, plus the Knoxville Shootout. This past week the track was tacky and fast and Hughes finished sixth, but when the track dries out he is unbeatable. Dale Porter got the win this past week, and Dustin Griffiths won in week one. Bill Bonnett has looked so far this season as well contending for wins.

Sport Compact class is still a 5-6 car field. Merv Chandler, Bill and John Whalen are the usual suspects. This class needs to grow to be more entertaining for me.

It’s been great to see Late Models on the schedule once a month this season. Spencer Diercks has won both features so far this season. Man I love to watch these cars race. The car count was fifteen the first week and last week dropped to ten. Ten is about what I expected to see each week they raced. Really wish we still had a Deery Bros show at Osky and Knoxville. They put on great shows.

I’ve only been to Marshalltown once this season. They have four weeks in and almost got the fifth week in this Friday before rains came after the heat races. Glad to see Kyle Brown get a couple of Modified wins already this season. Jimmy Gustin and Cayden Carter have won features as well. Still early in the season but Carter was the point leader coming into this past Friday and he wasn’t there in the heat races. Look for Gustin, Jon Snyder, Adam Larson, Racer Hulin, Luke Wanninger, Ronn Lauritzen and Brown to be the top contenders. Marshalltown is one of my favorite race tracks, and it’s a shame more race fans don’t’ make their way there on Friday nights.

I can’t believe how many races Joyse & Dick Eisele attend each week. And the work they do in their blog is impressive. I hear they are going to be in the upcoming Speedway Illustrated. Should be a great story! See you around the Hawkeye Ovals….