Shadow Report - August : Friday the 13th

Jack Sharpe Tribute

Well, we started the evening on somewhat of a sad note. As has been reported already, we lost Jack Sharpe a day or so ago. For long time fans, Jack Sharpe and his famous "Lobo 1" car were synonymous with supermodified racing here in the 60's. I was only sad that, as a long time fan myself, I had no stories for John Houghton when he contacted me. Of course I was familiar with the name and the Lobo1...but unfortunately that whole era was before my time and I had nothing first hand to share, other than my parents spoke fondly of the days watching him and Lennox and Trepanier go at it.

I want to commend John on the piece he wrote for the handout program and of course the awesome pics he included along with it. (great work on such short notice.) There was a newspaper foldout featuring Jack on display by the souvenir booth, circa early 70s going by the Freeps typeset. Great find.

And I know they don't usually do this, but I wonder if I could implore John, if he would, to share the piece he wrote for the program with us here. For those that don't know the legacy.

Now in the course of the opening ceremonies, we did have a tribute to Jack. Paul Houghton did a little speech and then Barry Newman in his number 1 modified took a slow last lap in honor of Jack Sharpe. With a number of Jack's family in attendance they brought the checkers down one last time in what I thought was a very fitting tribute.

Way to go Delaware guys. It was a class act.

Barry Newman takes checkers in honor of Jack "Lobo 1" Sharpe while the crowd stands silent in tribute.

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Heats

We started off with the Demar Aggregates Trucks, and misfortune struck early in heat 1 for Blue Thunder Triska. 16-Rijnen got out to an early lead but a lap or 2 in, Triska spun going into 1, trucks went everywhere and most missed but 1-Thompson spun to avoid and ended up backing hard into the 57. Bad damage on the 57 truck. 1st to Rijnen, 2nd to 77-Zagarodny, 3rd to 17-Brydges

Truck Heat 2 was another physical affair that saw the 99 slow down and 33-Fothergill and 75-Dupuis both spun. Fothergill went into the turn 2 wall hard enough to cast some doubt on the rest of his evening. 1st to Showler, 2nd to 01-Bloemendal and 3rd to 55-Adraeinsen.

MRA/Powerade Mod 1 82-Demelo led from top to bottom. 1st to Demelo, 2nd to 38-Hendricks, 3rd to 39-McCullough.

Mod 2 - Was a rerun of last weeks feature as 1-Newman and 3-Cox run away from the field. 1st to Newman, 2nd to Cox and 3rd to 24-Smiling Stephen.

Late Model 1 saw its share of mishap as a 3 wide affair ended with 14-Emery sideways in 2 and 52-Sheridan going up over his hood and up nose first into the turn 2 wall. This was another one where the rest of the evening was in doubt, this time for Sheridan. But fans of the Rocket from Mt Brydges had no worry. Ron was back out for the feature. 28-Robblee got tagged in the same mess. Don't remember what happened with him exactly but it was the last we saw of him for the evening. The rest of the race was a killer battle with the Double-Ought, Jamie Cox out front and 81-Greisel right on his bumper. There was contact and Greisel actually got Cox out of shape but backed out and let him collect it. 1st to Cox, 2nd to Greisel, 3rd to 27-Box

Late Model 2 saw the return of Jesse Kennedy. Great run where Jesse did everything he could to get around 21-Pritiko but no dice. 1st Pritiko, 2nd Kennedy, 3rd to 22-Ramsay

Demar Aggregates Truck Feature

Rijnen started pole with Brydges alongside, followed by Zagarodny and 3-Gemmel. Rijnen takes the lead with Zagarodny and Brydges in tow. The three of them create a little bit of distance, but it wasn't going to last long as Showler, Fothergill and Adraeinsen hooked up near the back and began to freight-train through the field.

By lap 8, Rijnen and Zagarodny are out in front, followed by 99-Koricina, but now Showler and Fothergill are coming on hard in 4th and 5th. By lap 10 they're all in a line. Koricina has dropped back and now the order is Rijnen, Zagarodny, Showler, Fothergill, Koricina, Brydges and Adraeinsen.

Showler is the most aggressive at this point, putting the boots to Zagarodny to try and take 2nd, at one point getting Zag loose coming out of 4 and taking the spot from him. Not sure what happened next, but Zag might have got a little payback on the backchute that sent Showler scrubbing the wall hard. Unfortunately some innocent bystanders gor caught in the mess with 3-Gemmel going around and 82-McCaw going up into the fence and grating up against it all the way into turn 3. Caution.

At the restart, Rijnen maintains his lead with Fothergill right on his backdoor. Fothergill's pushing hard but the race comes to a stop when Zagarodny loses a tire coming off of 4 with an impressive spark show. Doesn't look like the 77 is hurt too bad but thats it for his evening as he goes back on the hook.

At the restart, now the order is Rijnen, Fothergill, 99-Koricina, Dupuis and Adraeinsen. Dupuis goes around on the backchute to bring out another caution.

Lap 17 Fothergill is continuing his charge on Rijnen. There's a battle for for 3rd between Koricina and Adraeinsen. At one point Adraeinsen gets Koricina wiggly enough to get alongside, but then coming down the backchute side by side and Koricina gives him a whack that nearly sends him into the grass. Unfortunately for Adraeinsen, Dupuis gets into the back of him going into 3 and that causes another stack up. Caution.

Now at this restart we're about 5 to go. Adraeinsen goes from the back to the front a little too quickly for the officials and next lap they're waving the black flag at him. I believe the call was for jumping the green.

Up front, its all Fothergill and Rijnen. And what a show! Fothergill is using all his tricks to get around Rijnen, but Rijnen, who's been around awhile himself, manages to hold him off and take the first ever checkered flag for the 16 team!  2nd to Fothergill, 3rd to Koricina, 4th to Johns and 5th to 01-Bloemendal.

Big congrats to the Hosang team! This one's been a long time coming.

MRA/Powerade Modified Feature

Starts with 6-Viera on the point with 54-Limon alongside, followed by Richmond and Demelo. Limon takes the early lead with Demelo right on his tail. Not too far behind the gruesome twosome of Cox and Newman are bearing down. Demelo makes a low charge on Limon and comes up with the lead, and by lap 10, its Demelo, Limon, Newman and Cox all running nose-tail. It continues thus until lap 14 when 70-Saunders loops it in 3 to bring out the yellow.

Now at the restart, Newman gets around Limon. Its Demelo, Newman and then a drag race between Cox and Limon for the 3rd spot. Demelo and Newman begin to check out on the field. Cox grabs thrid from Limon and now 39-McCullough is up into the fray as well. Demelo has them covered tonight though, as Newman just can't muster enough to get around him cleanly. 1st to Demelo, 2nd to Newman, 3rd to Cox, 4th to Limon, 5th to McCullough.  

Hearty congrats on a 1st time Mod win for the L82 Construction gang. Way to go Justin.

NASCAR Late Model Feature

Your polesitter is none other than Jesse Kennedy, with Box alongside, then Pritiko and Greisel, then 5-Christie (its actually Christie this time) and 00-Cox. Takes a couple of warm up laps before someone says "hey...where's Robblee?" and the 28 is nowhere to be seen.

Kennedy jumps out front followed by Pritiko, Griesel, Cox, Box and 20-Lindsay. Sheridan started a little futher back tonight due perhaps to his mishap in the heat, but fans of the Rocket were not to be disappointed as it took only a couple of laps for Sheridan to escape the box of slower cars he was caught in.

In the early going, the top 5 form a lead pack and begin their run. Greisel running 3rd is pushing Pritiko hard to take the spot, then there's a bizarre moment when Pritiko loses it in 2 and goes around all on his own.

After the restart its still Kennedy, then Greisel, Cox and Lindsay. The 4 of them are on the run, but lo and behold the 52 is now up to 5th and reeling them in. Caution flies again on lap 16 when Cox goes around. Looked at first glance like Lindsay helped, but apparently they were watching the vid up top and the 20 was deemed innocent.

So now were at the crossed flags and its Kennedy, Greisel and Lindsay, with Sheridan just a couple lengths back. Sheridan's looking good but just a little off of his usual pace. (He seemed to be bottoming out a lot coming thru 3 and 4.) Then on lap 19 it was another caution as Ramsay and Box end up in the turn 3 wall....but not too badly. Both drove away.

Now at the restart, once again its Kennedy, Greisel and Lindsay with Sheridan a few lengths back. Cox is on the move again coming up from the back  

About lap 25 there's some contact and the order is shuffled. Greisel, who has been dogging Kennedy all the way, gets Kennedy out of shape. Greisel backs out and Lindsay has to check up. This allows Sheridan to scoot past Lindsay into 3rd.

Now we're at a lap 29 restart. Greisel is pulling out the stops to try and get by Kennedy for 1st, while Lindsay is doing the same trying to get 3rd back form Sheridan. Greisel goes high, goes low. Can't do it.

Once again caution flies, this time for Christie who's around in turn 1 with some rear bumper/deck damage. He peels out of there mad at someone and it looks like its the 10x of Shepherd. Christie gives Shepherd a whack on the caution lap and goes in to have the crew rip the bumper off. It might have done something to Shepherd's car as on the restart, Shepherd has a tire let go and does a 360 spin and goes nose-first into the turn 1 wall. Kee-runch. Shepherd's back on the hook.

Final restart and the race is clearly down to Kennedy and Greisel. Again Greisel's throwing everything but the kitchen sink at Kennedy, but Kennedy holds on to bring the checkers back to Southwold! 2nd to Greisel, 3rd to Sheridan, 4th to Lindsay and a hard earned 5th to Pritiko.

Modified Racing Association Notes

In speaking with Bill Robinson, the MRA head honcho, he told me that the invitational event last weekend was to be considered a success with 18 cars in attendance. While the visitors were at somewhat of a disadvantage on the big half mile, Bill reported that a good time was had by all. Bill says they're working on the next modified invitational which will take place on the Great Canadian Weekend. Personally with all the excitement of reporting a 2 day weekend with the Supermodifieds, I forgot to simply thank all those travelling teams that attended for coming out. It was great to see some fresh faces in the ranks!

In other news, the bike draw will be happening on Championship night on Friday Sept 17. Thats only a month away, so if you have kids that come out to the speedway, make sure you swing by the modified display up top to fill out a free raffle ticket for the kid's bike. Barry Newman picked up the bike already and apparently its a beaut!  

Tonight we welcomed Rob Fennema out of Harrow ON to the modified ranks. Rob had a rough night and didn't finsih too well, but you have to start somewhere. Welcome Rob!

Also tonight was the unveiling of a new format for the Powerade Modified division. As most of us know, the mods are a little light on car count on a regular night, so they've introduced a double heat race format where they race 2 heats like always, but all cars are in both heats. They draw for position for the 1st race, then the second heat is the reverse of the starting grid from the 1st one. Also as of tonight, the modifieds are the only division to utilize a NASCAR style double up restart, rather than Delaware's usual "1-2-3 then double up" restart. I'd say they were successful on both counts!

Photos and Shout Outs

Shout out to Paul "Shippy" Shipway. Sorry you weren't there man. It ain't the same without you.

And a shout out to Jim and Jennie who were first timers that came along with us for their first race at Delaware. Jim's claim to racing fame is that he once played in a sandbox at a race with Micheal Andretti when they were both wee lads. Jennie's claim to fame is being best buds with Shadow Jr. aka Emma. Hope ya's had fun and come back anytime! 🙂

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Blue Thunder struck by lightning. Gary Triska had some problems tonight in his heat race. (This first one's a video....hope it works for ya)

Trev Out