Feature

KNOXVILLE, Iowa (July 20) – Chris Abelson made sure the race was for second Thursday night at Knoxville Raceway. Abelson started on the pole and led all 25 laps of the Arnold Motor Supply Hawkeye Dirt Tour main event. A caution with six circuits to go in the IMCA Modified headliner put Todd Shute right behind Abelson for the restart, but Shute’s challenge ended with bobble on the final circuit. Abelson pulled away to the $1,500 Dynamic Drivelines Dirt Duel checkers to become the sixth different winner in as many tour events this season. Shute ended in second. Richie Gustin was third and Jeff Aikey fourth. Hard charger Justin Kay started 15th and finished fifth. Joel Rust and Kelly Shryock came into the night tied for the tour point lead. Rarely separated by more than a car or two, Rust finished eighth, one spot ahead of Shryock, and will take the top spot in the standings to the July 25 show at Dubuque Speedway. Abelson, the defending Side Biter Chassis North Central Region and 2016 Hawkeye [Read More]

OSKALOOSA, Iowa (July 19) – Another night racing with the big names at his hometown track brought out the best again in Cayden Carter. Carter led the last nine times around the Southern Iowa Speedway oval in winning Wednesday’s Arnold Motor Supply IMCA Modified Hawkeye Dirt Tour main event. The checkers paid $1,000. “When all the big names come to town, there’s some extra pressure,” said Carter, echoing the comments he made after winning the Stock Car Shootout feature on Fourth of July at Osky. “We put a lot of extra time in the shop to be 100 percent prepared for tonight. I believe a lot of races are won in the shop.” “We won our heat and we redrew good. Everything went our way tonight,” he continued. “It was Fair Night so there was a big crowd in the stands. It was a good night to win.” Hunter Marriott, coming off another Kupper Chevrolet Dakota Classic championship, started from the pole and checked out early on the rest of the field. Carter worked his [Read More]

CENTER LISLE, N.Y. (July 15) – Tyler Stoddard has seen a lot of countryside traveling to a lot of different tracks over the seven years he’s followed the Empire State Series for IMCA Modifieds. On Saturday, he got his first view of the tour from victory lane. Stoddard won his first career series feature, and first IMCA Modified event since 2015, at Thunder Mountain Speedway. The 2016 tour runner-up noted that he’d made one small adjustment, suggested by car builder Bob Bills by text earlier in the day. “It seems like I’ve always been the bridesmaid. I’ve got a ton of second-place finishes,” he said. “This win was just unbelievable especially because going into this race we had been having setup issues with the car.” Stoddard started outside pole and fell back to third briefly before getting the second spot, behind Gary Lamphere. Three early cautions came out but Stoddard had the lead before midway in the 20-lapper. Lapped traffic was not a factor as Bumps Scott, Rich Michael Jr., Will Ward and Keith Jack [Read More]

MANDAN, N.D. – When they give out the next tourism awards in North Dakota, the Kupper Chevrolet Dakota Classic Tour should be a shoo-in. Drivers from 18 states and two Canadian provinces competed over the course of the July 8-13 tour, the biggest geographical representation in its 28-year history. “The exposure we get from IMCA and IMCATV has been very good. It really gets the word out,” said Tour Director John Gartner. “We had quite a few Texas drivers this year. They like being able to race every night for six straight nights.” “Some of our guys go down South and race in the winter so a lot of them were already friends,” he added. “We really enjoy when those drivers come up here.” Hunter Marriott and Elijah Zevenbergen both won three features in repeating as tour champions in the IMCA Modified and IMCA Sunoco Stock Car divisions, respectively. One hundred and twenty-five different Modified drivers competed over the course of the tour, 42 of them at all six events. Twenty-two of the 55 Stock [Read More]

SOUTH SIOUX CITY, Neb. – Ricky Stephan started his IMCA Modified career 30-odd years ago at Park Jefferson Speedway. Fittingly, he returned there on July 8 to win his 100th feature in the division. “It’s really my home track and I was racing in front of my home fans,” Stephan said. “Plus, Pepsi of Siouxland sponsored the night and I’m a Pepsi guy.” “It was about time. I knew I was capable of doing it,” he continued. “Winning 100 features puts you in the history book. It’s an elite group.” While Stephan is the 50th driver in division history to reach 100 wins for his career, he’s got a re­sume full of equally impressive accomplishments. He earned his first of 16 career track championships, at Buena Vista Raceway, in his rookie 1987 season. He became just the ninth driver to win four track titles in a single season last year. Add in a couple Side Biter Chassis North Central Regional championships (2001 and 2003) and six Allstar Performance State championships – three in Iowa and a current [Read More]

BOONE, Iowa (July 15) – With nine days to go before the first round of voting, 127 IMCA Modified drivers are on the current ballot for the upcoming Fast Shafts All-Star Invitational. Twenty-eight of the 30 starters in the Sept. 8 race at the IMCA Speedway Motors Super Nationals fueled by Casey’s at Boone Speedway will be elected in a pair of polling sessions. The final qualifying event is the July 20 Arnold Motor Supply Hawkeye Dirt Tour show at Knox­ville Raceway. Three drivers from each of the five regions for IMCA Modifieds will be elected during polling from July 24-27; 13 more will be elected from an at-large pool of the next 25 top vote recipients be­tween July 31 and Aug. 3. All voting will be conducted through the IMCA Facebook page. Completing the starting grid for the 30-lapper will be All-Star candidates with the top national point to­tal and the most 40-point feature wins as of Aug. 31 competing at Super Nationals. By home region, the 127 drivers qualified for the 2017 Fast [Read More]