Shadow Report
Delaware Supermodified Classic Weekend. Part 1

Howdy all. Well this is the Delaware Classic Supermodified Weekend night 1, and what a night it was. Heartbreak and a bad fright for Mark Sammut fans. Great run for the trucks, not so great run for the LMs...and some raw, awesome powerful machines.

Heats

Truck 1
82-McCaw goes from the back to knocking on the door of 57-Triska. Triska keeps the door shut though, and McCaw has to settle for 2nd. 3rd to 93-Matt Koricina. This race heralded the welcome return of Kathleen Hosang in the 16 truck. Unfortunately Kathleen's luck went south with som apparent maechanical issues.

Truck 2
This one boiled down to a fierce 4 way fight between 01-Bloemendal, 56-Showler, 75-Depuis and 33-Fothergill. 1st Showler, 2nd Fothergill, 3rd Bloemendal

Late Model 1
Started with 22-Ramsay getting out of shape going into 1 and clipping the wall hard. Great fight between 5-Doerr and 10-Kennedy, and Jamie Cox in the double zeroes served up notice that hes taking the chase for the the Great Canadian Race seriously by fighting Cole Powell tooth and nail. 81-Greisel steals the race however. 2nd to Doerr, 3rd to Kennedy.

Late Model 2
1st to Sheridan, 2nd to 21-Pritiko and 3rd to Robblee.

Supermodified.

Npw Im gonna be honest, I'm not well versed in who's who in the Super ranks. I'll just say they ran 3 heats of 7 cars each. Heat 2 saw a frightening first lap crash when Mark Sammut and Rod Sauder got together on the backchute and Sammut went end over end in the most insane crash I've seen in ages at Delaware. You need to be a special breed of cat to drive one of these buggies.

Maudsley nailed the shot and it was posted on Delaware's Facebook site. Photo is here.

http://www.facebook.com/# !/photo.php?pid=188448&id=102636069776581 (you have to cut and paste the whole url)

Heat results will likely be up soon on the ISMA site here   http://www.ismasupers.com/results.html
I understnad they usually get the stuff up pretty quickly. I also understand that ISMA has its own transponder system and thats why their results don't go up on the Delaware page.

Suffice it to say, they were fast, loud, and just a little frightening. I went down to the front grandstand, front row to try and get a neat frontstretch shot (that didnt turn out) and it was the only time in my life that sitting that close to the fence made me nervous.

Truck Feature

Starting pole was Triska with 17-Brydges alongside. They took off side by side with 82-McCaw tucked right in behind them. McCaw made it 3 wide diving low in 1 and came up with the lead. McCaw had it all to himself for a bit with 75-Dupuis not far behind, while the other top runners like Fothergill, Johns and Adraeinsen were fighting their ways up from the back.

Battle of the night was about the halfway mark with a 3 way between Showler, Adraeinsen and Bloemendal for 6th. Showler ultimately bumps past Adraeinsen, then Adraeinsen and Bloemendail get together and 55 spins around in turn 1 to bring the caution out.  

Now at the restart, lap 20, and the order is McCaw, Dupuis, Fothergill, Johns, Showler and Bloemendal. Dupuis is practically pushing McCaw around the track, but soon Fothergill gets Dupuis loose and allows McCaw to get away again. It comes down to a last lap battle for 2nd between Dupuis and Fothergill, which Dupuis actually wins.

Big time victory burnout for McCaw. The smoke was beginning to clear by he time his interview was over.

Win to McCaw, 2nd to Dupuis, 3rd to Fothergill, 4th to Showler, 5th to Bloemendal.

Late Model Feature

The Late Model gang had a bit of a rough go tonight, but we at least heralded the return of 78-Watson and 10-Kennedy. The race started poorly, with 72-Thompson running straight into the turn 1 fence. Fortunately he'd scrubbed off most of his speed before hitting so only did minimal damage. Caution

Once the race started in earnest, it was a thrilling side by side duel between 5-Doerr and 21-Pritiko for the top spot. This went on for 5 laps and was unfortunately brought to an end with a caution for 10x-Shepherd spinning on the fronstretch.

It didnt take long for 3rd place Sheridan to get around Doerr and Pritiko to take the lead. 81-Greisel foolowed Sheridan through for 2nd. Doerr unfortunately got out of line and started going backwards, and Pritiko got spun around by Robblee to brign out another caution. Back of the line flag for Robblee.

Ultimately the race shakes out as a lead pack of Sheridan, Greisel, Lindsay and Watson, and a second pack of Kennedy, Cox, and 25-Powell. Kennedy makes good on one restart, grabbing the 4th spot from Lindsay, and leaving Lindsay none too happy. Then there's a series of cautions. At one point Ramsay appears to have a malfunction and hits the turn 3 fence, and at another point theres a big mash up on the front stretch involving Doerr, Stewart, Emery and 51-M. Robblee. It was this point where they had to call the next caution as the end of the race. (they needed to put the open wheel crowd out of its misery I think)

Sure enough it came quickly. After the green flag, 25-Powell gets tagged and goes around in turn 2 and that's it.

1st to Sheridan, 2nd to Greisel, 3rd to Kennedy, 4th to Lindsay, 5th to Watson

ISMA Supermodified Feature

I beleive 20 cars showed, but with the loss of Sammut and Sauder brought it to an 18 car field...which, believe me you, was enough to raise the roof on Delaware. You guys know me, I'm a fan of it all, but the Supers top the list for pure adrenaline. Sorry sprint guys. I love me some dirt racing, but even full bore sprints don't do it for me like these guys do.

It started as basically a 4 car race. 1-Ordway, 84-Lichty, 61-Shullick  and 17-Seitz took off and left the field behind. For a little while Ordway owned the track, but then Shullick got by and started to reel him in. After that it was a 2 car show between Ordway and Shullick. Sound dull? Not a freakin' chance. Multiple times Shullick almost got him but wasn't able to close the deal. Then they hit lapped traffic, and watching them do this high-low 140 mph shuck-and-jive through lapped cars was just astounding. Shullick never quite got him and Ordway went on to win the race. It was a tainted win however, because he went across the finish line under the checkers, then his front brakes let go and he sailed hard into the turn 1 wall. So unfortunately, while he was doing his victory interview, the safety crew was in turn 1 putting parts of the the front end of his machine into a basket.

1st to Ordway, 2nd to Shullick Jr, 3rd to Lichty, 4th to Seitz, 5th to 35-Holbrook/Summers (Im pulling names from the program)

NOTES

There was a pretty scary fire in the pit area before the show. Something happened with some fuel on of what I beleive to be the the trailer of the 44 Supermodified that caused a pretty mad scramble in the pits. Apparently one of the female crew members got a taste of being on fire. However, it was also a chance for our safety crew to show their quality and they came through in spades. The lady was up and sitting when I saw (I didnt feel right sticking a camera in there) and as far as I know there was no mad scramble to get her to the hospital...so I assume she's basically OK. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.)

I'll tell you this though, when chemical fire supressant and supermodified fuel get together...you do NOT wanna breathe the fumes. I'm sitting here 7 hours later after multiple coffees, coca-colas and toothbrushings, and I can still taste it.

MRA/Powerade Modified News

Just want to let everyone know too that, although tomorrow night is generally about the ISMA Supers, its also a pretty big night for the Modifieds. Tyler Hendricks, as well as Kim McCullough and Bill Robinson were up top tonight selling their new MRA baseball caps to go with the t-shirts. (There was also a chance to see and win a one of a kind die cast replica of Tyler's Mod.) Anyway, tomorrow night is a pretty big invitational for the MRA. Some might remember about a month ago when they had a 23 car field up at Sauble. Well they have some prize money in hand for tomorrow night and are expecting to draw a number of Varney and Mosport competitors out for the big show. So remember, when you come out tomorrow night, wear your MRA T-shirt loudly and proudly. And buy a hat too. They're groovy, fashionable,  8) and the proceeds are going to the MRA Modified point fund.

Bill Robinson also asked me to send out a huge thank you to the Demelos and L82 Construction for their part in having those hats done up.

Thats it for night 1.

Tomroow night its Supermodifieds for a 50 lapper, as well as Super Stocks and MRA Modifieds (Which are also super!)

Be there or be square!

Trev

Photo Journal

The return of Kathleen.

Scary Pit Fire

Pit full O Supermods

Mark Sammut's ride. The 'before" picture.

More Supermodifieds

Ready to Rock and Roll

2nd place Dave Shullick Jr gets a post race push back to the pits.

Charter member of the CRO Faithful. That's Justin.

Jesse's Gang. Another hard working Late Model Crew.  ;D

Delaware sunset. ISMA Style

Here's a sign off photo if I ever saw one.

Goodnight sweet prince. Cameron snuggles into Grandma Lois. Someone had a long night it looks like. (Another pair of Turn 1 stalwarts...this is after the show and waiting for the crowd to clear out)