News Feed
July 19, 2011
BY DAVE GRAYSON
Rich Lindgren, and his Fire House Racing team, made their official debut in the Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series, presented by Rockstar Energy Drink and won round one of a special two race series: the Dart Machinery LTD North-South Shootout held July 16th at the Madera Speedway: the fastest one third mile in the west. Lindgren led all 75 laps of the feature but had his hands filled with heavy competition from Jim Mardis and Scott Winters all through the event.
The Dart Machinery LTD North-South Shootout was the result of several months of planning by officials from the Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series, the Madera Speedway and the Toyota Speedway At Irwindale, the site of the second race set for August 13th. Everyone involved thought it would be a great idea to create a special racing series that combined the open wheel modified talents of drivers from the northern portion of the western states along with their southern counterparts where the Lucas Oil teams race on a regular basis. Dart Machinery LTD loved the idea so much they stepped up in a very big way and sponsored the two race shootout.
This special event immediately garnered a lot of attention due to the lucrative details. The purse, for each of the two events, is $10,000 with $1,500 of that going to the race winner. Any driver who takes the green flag in these 75 lap main events is guaranteed $300 for just starting the race. Recognizing the state of the economy, and its impact on travel, series officials also presented the teams with tow money to help with the cost of getting to Madera.
But to take advantage of this opportunity, the drivers had to earn a starting spot in the Dart Machinery LTD 75. That process began Saturday afternoon with qualifying when the south teams fired the first salvo of the shootout. It was Austin Barnes who pocketed the $100 bonus for setting the Budweiser fast time. The Escondido-California teen driver blistered the Madera oval with a lap of 15.238 seconds with a speed of 78.672 MPH. Qualifying set the line up for the six car Dart Machinery trophy dash. That event, and the $200 bonus, was won by Las Vegas driver Aaron McMorran.
The healthy car count created the necessity of a B Main to complete the starting line up. Fallout-California driver Mike Salm won the 20 lap GEICO B feature. Once the B main was completed the line up for the Dart Machinery LTD 75 was now set and a field of 23 cars, representing the finest open wheel driving talent from the western states, were ready to officially launch the North-South Shootout.
In the final moments prior to the start of the Dart Machinery 75, eventual race winner Rich Lindgren caught a huge break. The Lucas Oil pre race inversion ceremony turned up the number 7. The shift created a true north-south line up and moved Lindgren from seventh to the pole position along side of Aaron McMorran. The second row was comprised of Jim Mardis and Mike Regalman while Doug Hamm and Scott Winters created a north-south duo in row three.
At the initial green flag Lindgren made what eventually would turn out to be the winning race move and jumped into the lead. However, he wasn't going to get a free ride to the Sunoco Race Fuels victory lane. Mardis made quick work of moving into second and glued himself to the race leader's rear bumper. The only time the race rhythm of this north-south tandem was disrupted was due to the yellow caution flags, a total of six all during the first half of the race.
Throughout much of this event Mardis displayed a great deal of patience, and saved his tires, while maintaining a close proximity to the race leader. On lap 57 Mardis decided it was go time and began putting the pressure on Lindgren. While Mardis was coming on strong, so was Scott Winters. The northern California driver, and a former two time modified champion at Madera, moved into third on lap 63 and aimed his sights on Mardis. Realizing that Mardis wasn't going to make the mistake of giving up any racing room on the inside, Winters made a beautiful pass on the outside and crossed over into second.
By now there were only eight laps remaining in the race and Winters began pressuring Lindgren for the win. Once again he attempted a winning pass on the outside, on the final white flag lap, and pulled alongside of LIndgren much to the delight of the spectators who had abandoned sitting in their grandstand seats quite a few laps ago. The pair were side by side coming into turn four, with the checkers in the air, when Lindgren made a defensive move to try to stop Winters from completing the outside pass. Winters made it clear that he was in it to win it and didn't give an inch despite grazing the front stretch wall as they completed the final lap.
Mardis followed them across the line in third while watching and waiting to see if there was going to be a final moment situation that might hand him the win. Austin Barnes was fourth while Mike Regalman completed the top five. In some post race contingency awards, Winters received a $100 bonus for the Magnaflow Exhaust Products clean pass award. Also receiving post race kudos was Brian Collins for winning the E3 Spark Plugs hard charger award. Collins, who started 16th in the field, earned that $100 bonus for some steady driving that netted him a tenth place finish.
After parking his #45 modified racer in the Sunoco Race Fuels victory lane, a very happy race winner said "it was awesome winning this deal. Our Fire House Racing team has been doing really good in the past several races. It was a pleasure to travel down here to race with the Lucas Oil guys and an even bigger pleasure to get this win. We're looking forward to going to Irwindale and doing a repeat."
Commenting on that final lap, wheel to wheel, duel to the checkers with Winters, he said "he's a really good competitor. I had no idea that he was that close on the outside of me. I really don't like to win races like that but, when it's the last lap going for the checkered flag, you do what you have to do. The good thing is no body's car was torn up and he still finished second. Like I said, I don't like to win like that. I thought we had the dominant car tonight and I just can't give up the race to one of the best modified drivers in both northern and southern California. He's in a class of his own whenever I race against him and to beat him is just an awesome goal for me and my team."
Lindgren also made it a point to thank his Fire House Racing sponsors which included A 1 Remediation Service, Service Master Clean, Regional Buildings Inc, Central Auto Parts, Transmissions by Hal and Capital Auto Parts.
Fire House Racing is a subject near and dear to the heart of team owner Jeff Stephens. This team is comprised of Sacramento area fire fighters. Winning round one of the Dart Machinery LTD North-South Shootout at Madera was a very special retirement gift for Stephens. On July 7th he officially retired after 30 years of dedicated service at the Sacramento Metro Fire Department.
In victory lane the very happy team owner said "I'm telling you, Rich and the crew did an outstanding job. I've been in some big fires during my career, but I'm absolutely shaking tonight. This is a very big win for us. We were at the right place at the right time tonight and we got some good breaks. The south guys drove us clean and I think it's going to be anybody's game when we get to round two of the Shootout at Irwindale."
Following his second place finish Winters, driver of the Ferrari Farms #24 modified, said "Madera is a very racy track, but sometimes abrasive on the tires so you have to really watch tire management here. With the pre race invert of seven it was difficult to move up early so finally, half way through the race, I decided to go up to the top of the track and we almost pulled it off. A lot of the guys have a tendency to go to the bottom and hold the bottom up. That means you've got to find a place to pass by going to the top and working the outside."
Despite having to settle for a third place finish, Jim Mardis was all smiles after the race. "Our Rockstar-Makita car was pretty decent tonight. I've never raced here before, just like at Irwindale last month, but Madera seems to have a lot of character. Overall it was a fun night. There's some bumps on the track and it's seems to be really technical. I wasn't sure what to expect from a 75 lap run here but I think we hit the set up pretty close. We ran second most of the race but a lapped car kind of got me there at the end and Winters got by us. All in all, it was a good night. We picked up some points, the car's in one piece and we'll go on to Irwindale."
Mardis is the reigning Lucas Oil Modified Series champion as well as the current points leader this year. He made it a point to say a huge thank you to his team of sponsors that has played such an important role in his team's success: Rockstar Energy Drink, Makita Industrial Tools, Blue Water Technologies, Arce Engines, Scoreboard 2 Bar and Grill and Premiere Wraps.
There was a lot of enthusiasm in the pit area among the race teams regarding the Dart Machinery LTD North-South Shootout. The response from the Madera racing fans was huge most of whom saw a Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series event for the first time. There was also an equal amount of pride and enthusiasm from the series promoter, Greg Scheidecker, and its race director, Bill Rozhon.
In some post race comments, Rozhon said "for our guys to come here to Madera and race with the northern teams was something to see on and off the track. Everybody raced each other very good, the competition was close and I was thrilled about the sense of camaraderie among everybody. There was a combination of the north and the south in the top five and that's the way it should be. We're not any better than the north and I don't think that the north is any better than our guys. I'm just thrilled that Lucas Oil, Rockstar Energy Drink and especially Dart Machinery allowed us to come up here. I think tonight was a real ice breaker. I really think this Shootout could become the start of getting something unified so these guys could race each other from Washington to San Diego. I think that's very important for the modified series right now."
A very pleased Greg Scheidecker said "this has got to be not only one of our best races of the year, but probably all time. There was just so much passing going on throughout the field. These modified drivers from the south, if we ever get the opportunity to come back here, will be coming back with a vengeance and will be well prepared. I'm glad to see the north cars do as well as they did with that first and second place finish, but I can tell you right now that the guys from the south are not going to let this lay."
In the process of setting up the dates for the two races in the Shootout, series officials carefully looked at the schedules from other speedways, who promote modified racing, to insure there would be no schedule conflict. However approximately two months prior to the Madera race, series officials were surprised by a schedule change at the All American Speedway, in Roseville-California, who decided to add the modifieds to their July 16th line up. The result was a lower than expected count, eight cars, from the north teams.
Commenting on this situation, Scheidecker said " there were a whole lot of unknown factors here. It was really disappointing to me that we were not able to come to some type of agreement with the All American Speedway and that's a shame. Believe it or not, Lucas Oil is looking at the big picture for all modified racing. We're not selfish. The north teams that were here will tell you that the attitude towards everything we did to work with them was second to none. But overall I'm just really ecstatic that we were able to jump over some of the hurdles to present this show. Again, there were a lot of unknowns here but now of lot of questions have been answered . We'll come back and I think we'll have a little different type of show. I truly believe the spectators got their money's worth tonight."
Sharing the level of enthusiasm was Kenny Shepherd, the promoter of the Madera Speedway, who said " I think this night was everything that we imagined it would be and probably even more. We started doing some open style shows with the modified's northern group probably back in 2007 and 2008. We are basically a central territory here at the Madera Speedway with most of the teams located north of us and of course the Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series is located south of us so we're kind of an island. But those open style shows back then really didn't work out, we drew 13 to 16 cars. But I always envisioned that with the quality of the Lucas Oil tour going head to head up here I thought we would get exactly what I saw tonight and I think the racing was even better than what I thought it would be. I was at the front gate after the race tonight and the fans walked by and said great show, awesome, when are they coming back?"
After a highly successful evening at the Madera Speedway the stage is now set for round two of the Dart Machinery LTD North-South Shootout to be held August 13th at the Toyota Speedway At Irwindale. Based on everything observed at Madera this second event, on the fastest half mile oval in the southwest, should be one spectacular racing evening for everyone: especially the fans of modified racing.
The Lucas Oil Modified Racing Series is strongly supported by a highly potent marketing concept known as "Team Lucas." Team members include: Lucas Oil Products Inc, Magnaflow Exhaust Products, E3 Spark Plugs, General Tire, K&N Performance Filters, GEICO, CANIDAE All Natural Pet Food, MAV-TV, Dart Machinery LTD, Rockstar Energy Drink and Master Craft Safety Equipment.
The series is also powered by a group of contingency sponsors featuring: Eibach Springs, Hoosier Tire West, Budweiser, Blue Water Resort and Casino, Sunoco Race Fuels, Frank's Radio, Racing Plus, Roush Yates Performance Parts and J E Pistons.
