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Quick Time: Dream XIX by the numbers

June 12, 2013, 10:39 am

By Todd Turner

DirtonDirt.com managing editor

Take a quick lap around the proverbial dirt track with managing editor Todd Turner for a roundup of Dirt Late Model racing through the latest weekend of action along with some other quirks of racing (and the occasional ax-grinding). Quick Time, presented by PFC Brakes, appears throughout the regular season every Wednesday at DirtonDirt.com:

Frontstretch: Drivers of the Week

National: Winless since February, Scott Bloomquist of Mooresburg, Tenn., backed up a confident prediction by earning his sixth $100,000 victory at Dream XIX presented by Ferris Commercial Mowers at Eldora Speedway.

Regional: Tony Jackson Jr. of Lebanon, Mo., swept the Comp Cams Super Dirt Series Rockabilly weekend at Northeast Arkansas Speedway for a $4,500 weekend.

Weekly: Zack Olger of St. Johns, Mich., stretched his personal winning streak to three races with June 7-8 victories at Tri-City Motor Speedway in Auburn, Mich., and Crystal (Mich.) Motor Speedway.

Crate: Damian Bidwell of Eldred, Pa., swept June 8-9 action on the Stateline-Eriez circuit with Fastrak-sanctioned victories in Busti, N.Y., and Hammett, Pa.

Turn 1: Dream XIX by the numbers

0: Car number of winner Scott Bloomquist, who collected a $100,000 Dream victory for the sixth time.

1: Driver with a backup car (John Blankenship) making the feature lineup.

2: Teenagers in the starting field: Tyler Reddick and Devin Moran.

3: Bloomquist Race Cars among the top five finishers, a feat not accomplished since Rocket in 2007.

4: Provisional starters going to the fastest four qualifiers after none could overcome the six-car inversion.

5: Years that Scott Bloomquist had gone without winning at Eldora Speedway, a stretch second behind a 1995-2001 drought.

6: First-time starters: Jon Henry, Wayne Chinn, Mason Zeigler, Chris Simpson, Gregg Satterlee and Devin Moran.

7: Lead changes in the first preliminary feature’s 25 laps.

8: Chassis brands represented in the feature field, led by eight for Rocket Chassis.

9: Laps remaining when second-running Matt Miller broke a driveshaft; he’d won two preliminary features.

10: Drivers 40 or older among the top 10 finishers.

15: States represented in the starting field, led by Ohio with four drivers.

22: Laps led by polesitter Tyler Reddick, who lost power and retired.

28: Feature starters, an event record.

32: Pounds that Josh Richards was light at the scales, stripping him of a third-place finish.

36: Laps led by winner Scott Bloomquist.

42: Laps led by Jimmy Mars, who was shuffled back to sixth in late-race restarts.

84: Entries, the fewest in event history.
200: Feature laps turned during the three-day event, including two 25-lappers apiece on Thursday and Friday.
304,000: Event-record dollars in total purses distributed.

(Complete Dream XIX coverage)

Turn 2: Five quirky items

• Best observation by Dream XIX announcers Dustin Jarrett and James Essex at Eldora Speedway: The six-car field for the C-main scramble was made up of drivers from three countries. There's no better duo to report on such an international incident.

• There are few Dirt Late Model drivers with the initials “K.K.,” but two of them finished third and fourth Saturday at North Georgia Speedway: Kenny Kizzar and Kolby Kilgore. That’s krazy!

• Also on the initial front, two drivers with “Q” initials won weekly races last weekend: Quentin Myers at Wagner (S.D.) Speedway and Wayne Quisenberry at Friendship Motor Speedway in Elkin, N.C.

• At age 84, California veteran Larry Damitz was back in action over the weekend, scoring a third-place finish in Limited Late Model action at Placerville Speedway. His age likely far exceeded the combined ages of the drivers finishing ahead of him.

• Shorthand (and nearly indecipherable) results from a weekend track report: Fwd w4,92,unknown.

Backstretch: In memoriam

Short-track racing suffered losses in recent days with the deaths of an inspirational Illinois modified racer and a photographer who frequently contributed to DirtonDirt.com and other outlets.

Gary Cook Jr. of Deer Creek, Ill., a former UMP DIRTcar modified champion, died Sunday in Peoria, Ill. He was 37. The successful driver of the No. 64 touched nearly everyone in the Illinois racing community with his courage and determination during his lengthy battle with cancer. “Today the racing world has lost a true champion,” Peoria Speedway tweeted among hundreds of supportive social media messages about Cook’s death.

Jeff Eissing of West Harrison, Ind. — known in the photographer community as Photojeff — died last week, also of cancer. He was 49. Eissing was a longtime photographer at Florence Speedway in Union, Ky., among other photo gigs, including shooting for the legends racing sanctioning body, FAST Midwest. “His view from behind the camera lens will be missed by all of us,” the series wrote on its website.

Turn 3: Tweet of the Week

Austin Hubbard (‏@hubbard11) after his less than satisfying Dream XIX weekend at Eldora Speedway: "Maybe at the world 100 I wont hit the wall in both rounds of qualifying and in the b main ...”

Turn 4: Turn back the clock

Five items from this week in Dirt Late Model history:

June 14, 1991: Mike Head of Ellenwood, Ga., won the first of three season events on the Hav-A-Tampa Dirt Racing Series at Crossville (Tenn.) Speedway.

June 15, 1996: Dale Harris of Decatur, Ark., earned his first career MLRA victory, going flag-to-flag to win $2,750 at Tri-State Speedway in Pocola, Okla. Ken Essary put heavy pressure on Harris early in the 40-lap event but couldn't get past and settled for second spot, his best series finish since returning to full-time racing after a two-year hiatus.

June 14, 2003: Richard Underwood of Columbus, Miss., one of Mississippi's biggest supporters of Dirt Late Model racing, died. His Rick's Furniture has sponsored many racers and events for years, and gave its name to the Rick's Furniture Series, which ran six seasons through 2001. Johnny Stokes, John L. Cliett, Robbie Starnes and Steve Russell were among Rick’s Furniture-sponsored drivers.

June 14, 2008: Ninth-starting Casey Noonan of Sylvania, Ohio, captured the 19th annual Barney Oldfield Memorial at Oakshade Raceway to earn a career-high $4,400.

June 16, 2011: Mike Spatola, 20, of Manhattan, Ill., captures the season’s UMP DIRTcar Summernationals opener at Kankakee County Speedway to become the tour’s youngest winner.