The Veteran’s Shine Through Memorial Day Weekend “Veterans Night” Special At Fox Ridge Speedway
by Dan Bailey
Fox Ridge Speedway

(ARCADIA, WI) Fox Ridge Speedway began the lengthened Memorial Day weekend, Friday night May 28th, with a special night of festivities. With representatives of the Arcadia Unit of the National Guard, which will be deployed to active duty in Iraq June 8th, and the United States Marine Corp Color Guard on hand the “Veterans Night” special kicked off an entire weekend of celebrations in the West central Wisconsin community.

And fittingly enough, a majority of the checkered flags throughout the evening were waved first over cars piloted by drivers who’ve spent many years behind the wheel – veterans of the dirt-track wars.

Duellman dominates the double
Beginning the evening’s racing with make-up features from the rain shortened May 7th schedule, Les Duellman showed that he was going to be one tough customer the entire evening. “We built a new car, we changed a little bit of suspension design,” offered the modified master, who’s driven race cars for almost a quarter of a century now, as an explanation of his shear dominance through the entire evening, “It’s actually something we kind of experimented with two nights last year.”

That experimenting paid off big-time as Duellman ran away with both the make-up feature, the regularly scheduled feature for the evening as well as his heat race. There wasn’t another USRA Modified on the speedway grounds that had anything to offer in the form of a challenge for position. As a matter of fact, Duellman won both features by commanding distances, nary a challenge posted once the green flag had dropped.

“(The track) was in surprisingly good shape,” Duellman commented when asked if track conditions had played into his favor, “considering how much rain we’ve been getting here. I think, given what Mother Nature’s been handing out to us, (the track) was pretty good.

“The way (Fox Ridge) is laid out can kind of be deceiving to someone sitting way up in the grand stands or the V.I.P. tower; there was a lot more tack out there that first feature than it may have seemed to someone watching.” Said Duellman. But by the end of the night, when the regularly scheduled USRA Modified feature rolled onto the speedway, dry-slick was the name of the game. And Duellman was just as dominant on the different surface.

After relegating the excitement in the make-up feature to the two-car battle for second between Mike Sorenson and second heat-race winner Rick Hauser, Duellman came back and won the main feature, despite the dry-slick conditions by almost half a lap over the three car battle for second between Bob Timm, Ron Schreiner and Tim Donlinger.

Wiersgalla works to the front
“Finally huh?” was the first response out of Gary Wiersgalla’s mouth after winning his first feature of the ’04 season. “We didn’t have that good of a car that first feature,” commented the 13 year veteran on his fifth place finish in the make-up feature that started the evening’s events, “It wasn’t as good as it could have been. It also didn’t run too well in the heat so we figured ‘that ain’t workin’. So, we put some changes on it for the main feature race and the car was . . . “ words were simply not available to explain how good the car was for Gary, so he settled for a strong whistle and gesture of his hand like a jet taking off.

Opening night feature winner Dennis Earney appeared capable of eventually offering a challenge to Wiersgalla late in the feature, but, another 8 to 10 laps may have been necessary to close the gap entirely. After finishing third in the early evening make-up feature, Earney settled for a strong second in front of Troy Langowski and defending track Champion, and make-up feature winner, Troy Brand while third heat race winner Don Drew rounded out the top-5.

Dan Hesch turning season around
After breaking on opening night, WISSOTA Mid-West Modified driver Dan Hesch has turned his season around nicely. Picking up his second feature win of the season at the conclusion of the make-up feature, Hesch looked ready to pull a ‘Duellman’ and sweep the entire evening’s card of Mid-West Modified action.

Harlan Morehart, spoiled those plans by winning the night’s second heat race, just in front of Hesch, but Hesch battled back valiantly in the evening’s main feature for a strong second place finish, just behind the visiting #11K of Bangor, WI’s Dan Koziol. Koziol enjoyed a perfect evening for himself winning both the first heat-race and the feature.

Dean Hoffman, Morehart and Tom Brink completed the top-5 finishing positions as the checkered flag waived on the main feature.

Scary moment in Street Stock feature
At one moment the crowd was on their feet enjoying another strong run by defending Champion Travis Krause, who had worked his way through the field to challenge Shaun Wehlage for the lead, an instant later an uncomfortable hush had settled over the speedway grounds following a vicious roll-over in turn three.

After loosing the right-rear tire while entering turn three at speed, the rear end of Matt Wolfe’s #67 dug into the clay surface catapulting the WISSOTA Street Stock in to a series of no fewer than 5 barrel rolls, three of which occurred in mid-air. The crumpled car came to rest on its drivers side – members of the speedway safety crew were to the car before the rest of the field had even made it to the back straight.

What followed was the most uncomfortable 30 to 45 minutes as first the speedway crew, then first responders, local fire trucks, and ambulance personnel attended to the Independence, WI driver. Finally removed from the car, Wolfe was whisked away to the local hospital where he was held over-night for further observations. The last official report, however, was very positive as Wolfe was awake and alert, responding to staff and had suffered no apparent broken bones.

After this scary incident, it was, admittedly, a bit difficult to get back into the excitement of the 8 laps remaining in the Street Stock feature, but Krause and Wehlage took care of any hesitation on the crowd’s part, putting together an excellent bumper-to-bumper duel that lasted all the way to the checkered flag. And for the first time this season, it was someone other than Krause in Victory Lane following a WISSOTA Street Stock feature event.

“We’ve been struggling with motor problems all year so far,” explained Wehlage following the feature win, “Adams Automotive, That’s what got us into Victory Lane tonight. So the car was finally hitting on all 8 cylinders, I just kept my line on the top groove, and hit my marks and that was it!”

Krause finished second just in front of an incredibly strong third place finish for Tom Hund.

Hornets and Pure Stocks
Over 30 4-cylinder Hornets attacked the big 3/8-mile putting on a buzzingly good show for the crowd. Steve Dwyer won both the second heat as well has the main feature with Mark Bornitz crossing the line first in the first heat.

Augusta, WI’s Jordan Johnson held of a 5-lap challenge for the lead by heat race winner Mike Knopps to win the Pure Stock feature event at the end of the evening.

Late Models back to The Ridge Next Week
The stars of the WORLD Dirt Racing League PolyDome Super Series will converge on Fox Ridge Speedway Friday, June 4. The event will feature a $5000 to win 50-lap feature race on the high banked 3/8-mile oval, with some of the top drivers in the upper Midwest expected in the field. Also on hand will be WISSOTA Super Stocks and WISSOTA Street Stocks. Grandstands open at 5 PM with hot laps at 7:00 and the first green flag at 7:30. Visit www.foxridgespeedway.com for more details!