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Starting out April’s column, I have to report that longtime Rice Lake Speedway photographer Doug Zimmer had emergency triple bypass heart surgery on March 15. The good news is things went well, he is home and feeling better, but still has some healing to do.

Tacoma Randall, after moving from the karts to race in the Midwest Mod class for the last two years, will be sitting out 2024. They had a devastating fire at the their race shop over the winter. While batting insurance issues and rebuilding times, they will not be able to field a car in 2024.

However, Randall will not be missing from the track. He will be working on the Adams racing team’s two open-wheel cars in 2024. The Adams team, by the way, have themselves their first stacker trailer rig so that they can haul multiple race cars in one trailer and not have to bring two rigs to the track. This will also help them during their long travels, which sound to be a part of their 2024 racing season. It sounds like Blake has planned somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 races for 2024. They are not likely to be seen much around local tracks this coming year.

Clay Albrecht at the Rice Lake Speedway car show. (Doug Zimmer Photo)

Best wishes to the Hallquist racing team and all their friends after the passing of Rick Hallquist, a longtime Super Stock driver. You could see him most often at Red Cedar Speedway in his Super Stock, and as a fan at other tracks to watch his brother Steve race. Hallquist passed on February 21 after a long battle with cancer.

Modified driver Austin Ellis has moved back to Madison, Wisconsin where he attended college and has taken a new job working for — are you ready for this — the Wisconsin Department of Revenue. That means if you live in Wisconsin, Ellis will be working on your state taxes! Their race car will still be housed in Rice Lake at dad Rick's shop, and Austin does plan to race locally as much as he can, even with the commute to Madison.

Sam Fankhauser at the Rice Lake Speedway car show. (Doug Zimmer Photo)

I have a little more information on the renovation of the Rice Lake Speedway under the operation of the new owners, Kolby and Dean Kiehl and Dick Kalow. During the first week of April they were scheduled to have new LED track lights hung on their poles and readied for the season, along with the new sound system that has also been purchased. The scales were also moved that same week into the new tech building, housed off turn two in the pits.

A number of new event and track sponsors have already been announced, with more to come.

They also have some other things in the works that can't quite be revealed just yet, but I guarantee that these three are going to make the speedway unlike anything we have ever seen before here. I continue to pinch myself to make sure that I am not just dreaming when I hear of all the things they have already done, with so much more yet in the planning.

Mike Siewert at the Rice Lake Speedway car show. (Doug Zimmer Photo)

A couple of employee announcements have also been made public. Former racer Ryan Viltz will be the race director for the track. Ryan has an extensive background in racing, having been with the sport nearly his entire life. He is a former racer in the Street Stock, Mid Mod and Modified class, and understands the sport from both the racer's perspective as well as that of the fans and track operators. He's a cool, level-headed guy who will fit the position and do a good job. Pat Netz, a former tech employee at Rice Lake and other area tracks, will return to do the teching and be the first to use the new building.

Bob Thompson at the Rice Lake Speedway car show. (Doug Zimmer Photo)

Several additions have been made to the original track schedule as it was published several weeks ago. The WISSOTA Late Models will make a second appearance at the track on Saturday night, July 27, with the Streets and Modifieds now having that night off.

The Modifieds will get their special night, too, as they will have a special, high-paying event on Saturday night, May 11.

Finally, the USRA-sanctioned Late Models will join the Dairyland Dash event on Saturday night, August 31 and Sunday night, September 1. They, along with the regular five classes that race at the speedway, will have two complete shows that weekend, along with music and a pig roast following the event on Saturday night. There still could be a few additions to the schedule, pending further developments.

Expect that 2025 will bring even bigger announcements when it comes to events at the track.

I was very sorry to learn that Lance Allan (Hajdasz) has become a free agent after he was the lead sportcaster for WTMJ Channel 4 in Milwaukee, after 28 years. Such are the shocking things that happen in media these days, and Ch. 4 offered no reason for the dismissal. The news of the firing brought immediate negative responses from such Wisconsin sports powerhouses like J.J. Watt and Bonnie Blair.

Lance is the son of Al Hajdasz from Rice Lake, who is a member of the Rice Lake Speedway Hall of Fame. Interestingly, Lance had a taste of dirt track racing while he was still in school, as he functioned as a scorer for the track for several years. That was back in the days before transponders, when everything was hand scored and the scorers made the decisions on who went to the back of the pack for on track incidents. Oh, and there was about a fight every week at the track in those brawly days!

Lance likes the Milwaukee area, and plans to stay there with his family. I'm sure he will be solidly back on his feet very quickly.

Red Cedar Speedway April 12

It was good to get the area racing season underway for 2024. Red Cedar Speedway in Menomonie started off its season with a bang, as they celebrated the Randy Buss Ice Breaker Classic, honoring the memory of the former track president and WISSOTA tech official. His brother was on hand to pass out the winner's plaques following the feature races.

This was certainly the earliest opening night for Red Cedar in a number of years. While I don't have the stats in front of me, it has no doubt been quite a few years since they were able to open this early. For a track that was plagued by the weather in 2023, I would say that Mother Nature owes them a few favors in 2024. They lost both of their highest profile races to the weather last year and for a club run track, losing the Punky Manor Challenge of Champions event was a stunning blow. Hopefully, they will have a good season at the gate and nice racing weather all summer. It looked to be a very nice crowd for the opener.

This year, 2024, marks the 51st consecutive year of racing at Red Cedar Speedway and the club, who has run the show for all 51 years, still has some of the old timers helping them out weekly. And, many of the key workers now are second-generation race people.

The track was looking good with a lot of nice-looking billboards all surrounding victory lane and elsewhere. It looks like they had a very successful off-season selling their product to area businesses. Kid's Club was going strong on opening night, but unfortunately the scoreboard was not functioning for the opener. Hopefully that can be up and running soon.

Red Cedar is always saddled with the problem of not being able to run a practice night because of restrictions, and that can affect the quality of the first Nights of racing, track-wise. Opening night is always a crapshoot when you put more than 100 cars on a fresh track that sat all winter. I always give them a pass on track conditions for the opener because of this. Friday night, while the track was a bit bumpy, it was not bad at all and the drivers were able to pass, race side by side, and put on a good show. (I swore the Late Models were four wide down the front chute in the feature, in fact!)

I am always reminded just how darn good our race car drivers are in this area. Many of the drivers who ran on Friday had new or rebuilt equipment, and many had yet to turn a lap in competition. Yet when that first green flag was dropped, they took off at full speed and for the most part, only good things happened as their skill still leaves me in awe.

Many of the key officials returned for the new year, with Rodney Olson waving the flags once again and Scott Tiefs calling the action from the tower. I understand they have a new person in charge of track prep, but he is one of the longtime workers at the track, so he’s not foreign to the job.

The WISSOTA home office staff was on hand, particularly in the pits where “Big Kenny” — regular tech man at Ogilvie, Princeton and Brainerd — was working on this night along with the new WISSOTA traveling tech man Justin Pogones.

A very nice field of race cars was on hand for the opener, and track officials should have been pleased with the number of racers who showed up. Knowing there are still a number of local and area drivers whose racers are not yet done, having 100 cars in the pits was a very nice thing.

With the time restrictions and curfew that Red Cedar always has to deal with, this was about the perfect number of cars to race. The heat races provided full heats and no B features were needed.

I was coming off a medical procedure on Monday of this week so there was just a little “hitch in my getalong” that slowed me. I confess that I didn't get to as many drivers as I should have, but between talking to a few and my observations, here are a few things I learned.

A new driver to this area is T.J. Wyman, who is originally from Arizona. I saw him race Modifieds out there over the years and a couple of years ago, the young driver picked up and moved to northern Iowa, where he relocated to and raced Modifieds at tracks in that region. Now he is living in Princeton, Minnesota and has converted his Modified into a WISSOTA Mid Mod. He will be racing at a lot of tracks totally new to him in the coming weeks, but should be able to get lots of racing in at the three eastern Minnesota tracks in the coming weeks.

Former driver and car owner Jerry Brummond has a busy summer lined up for himself, now fielding a pair of Late Models for hot shoes in this area. He has an MB that was just returned from Mars shop, after it was gone over, which will be driven by Cory Mahder. Cory will again get to race with his cousin Chad. I don't know if a Modified is still in Cory's plans or not.

Jerry also has a new Longhorn with a new shock and suspension package installed over the winter that will be driven by Modified standout Mike Anderson. Mike will be busy himself, as he is still fielding his own Modified.

John Kaanta has a new MB after bending the frame on his car in a crash last fall. In its first time on a track, period, he was later rewarded with a top-five finish in the Late Model feature.

Pat Doar is still running his 2022 Rocket chassis. He tells me he has another older Rocket, too, but in the biggest news, he also has a new Rocket frame that he will likely get on the track this year at some point. I never thought I would see Doar in any other mode of transportation in the pits other than walking, but he broke out a fat-tired, electric bike to get him around the pit area at tracks faster. (Note Darrell Nelson, I said electric bike.)

A couple of veteran racers graced the Street Stock pits tonight. Bruce Stanley, who has been racing for what seems like forever at central Wisconsin tracks, made a rare visit to Red Cedar Speedway on Friday. Bruce is always by himself with his well-used Streeter, but always puts on a show and still enjoys being a part of the action.

And joining him Friday was “Fast” Freddy Prudoehl from Winona, MN. Another driver who has been racing for decades, Freddy is now 82 years old but still enjoys getting out on the track and does travel to quite a few different tracks over the course of the summer. He is a living legend in southeastern Minnesota.

It was quite a surprise when Turk Letizia pulled into the pits with his Late Model. Letizia is a second-generation racer from Milwaukee, who I had not known to have raced in a WISSOTA sanctioned event before. He was sporting a brand-new MB and he has a very sanitary operation.

Speaking of the Late Models there were plenty of new and fresh faces in this class, and what a good thing that is for the sport. Adam Ayotte, Chad Fouquette, Jason Quarders, Cory Crapser, Mahder and Anderson are all new to the Late Model class, and along with other young chargers like Sam Mars, Jordan Langer and Nick Panitzke, the class is looking good for the future.

And that doesn't even take into account the visit last year's national champion and rookie, Tyler Peterson, made to Red Cedar. After a bad draw in his heat race, he started 11th in the Late Model feature and charged all the way up to fourth. He showed just how skilled he is in this class.

There were fine battles in the feature races on Friday, and just a taste of controversy in a couple. For opening night, everyone was driving in the “hard mode” theme.

Eighteen Street Stocks signed in on Friday and their feature race battle came right down to the final corner and a wild outcome. Scheduled polesitter Gunnar Watkins scratched out of the contest, so the field was adjusted before the green flew. It was quite the night for Cody Kummer, who spun out while leading his heat race but raced his way back into a redraw spot. He then redrew and started on the outside pole. Kummer led most of the race but Andrew Hanson eventually worked his way to second and put the pressure on for the win. They were side by side down the back chute on the final lap into turn three, where both spun out. Did they bump, did someone come up the track, or someone down? Those were the questions that had to be decided quickly.

In the end, after a pause to sort things out, Hanson was judged to be at fault and Kummer was restored to the lead. Since all cars had apparently taken the white flag, the race was called complete with Kummer the winner over Jeff Ekdahl and 18th-starter Kyle Genett. Hanson went to the back of the pack and Tommy Pogones lost a good finish when his car quit late in the race.

The procedure that was used to finish scoring this race, was later changed in following events, causing some confusion.

The Mid Mod feature produced a great battle between a young charger and a seasoned veteran, as Blake Adams and Jason VandeKamp duked it out for the win. It was so interesting to watch the veteran work around on the track, as he tried to find a weakness in the young fireball.

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