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Saturday, May 4 was another wild weather day. After Rice Lake cancelled due to a wet track, I headed to I-94 emr Speedway in Fergus Falls, Minnesota.
The track ran a huge event on Friday night with the pits jammed with nearly 200 race cars.
With my late start, I barely made one lap of the pits before the first Street Stock heat almost beat me to the track. Monster fields were on hand in just about every class.
I wonder if the local fans from the Fergus area realize just how lucky they are to get to see such a big field of entrants and drivers from all over the place, so early in the season. This opening weekend doubleheader is really becoming quite the event for I-94.
Across the board there was a great field of entrants in just about every class. The Street Stocks had 31 on hand, after having even more on Friday night. There were a large number of new-to-me drivers; so much so, I had to keep referring to my list to figure out who was driving some of the cars.
The Mid Mod field was even bigger, with 43 of them on hand. Twenty-nine Modifieds were on hand and what a strong field. There were so many fully capable of winning that the draw was important. Twenty Supers were on hand for a track that doesn't even run the class on a regular basis, and 25 Late Models were present. New faces to the class included Nathan Sletto, Travis Robertson, Kollin Hibdon and Lee Grosz.
Even the Hornets, running as a sanctioned class for just the second time at I-94, had 17 cars with no doubt plenty more to come.
It would be an early start on Saturday, just after 5 p.m. The track was already black and slick as the show started, due to a combination of sun, strong wind and a full night's worth of racing behind them. They misted the track quite often and did a ripping before the main events, but there was racing all over the track all night. The slick conditions required a feather-like touch on the accelerator and the ability to search around on the track and find the line that worked for you.
They opted to run all the drivers in the Street Stock feature, and 30 just might be a few too many in my mind, especially considering all the new and inexperienced drivers who were on hand. Imagine scoring this back before transponders!
The Streets did an amazing job for much of the event, running three and four wide a number of times. However, the first yellow, after seven laps for a minor spin, triggered more yellows. The double file restarts continued to do their thing, producing more yellow flags.
Eric Riley led many laps of the feature but late in the race Ty Agen drove past him and came home the winner. The top five, including Braden Brauer, Kyle Anderson and a great run from Nick Shumansky, kept him close. I don't want to get into officiating, but a noncall may have been a big help to the winner ... but that's all part of the game, right?
A strong-running Matt Schow topped the 28-car Mid Mod feature, including a single yellow flag for a minor spin. Schow battled for much of the contest with Ryan Schow and Brennan Weight, but was strong as he held off all challenges from Weight for the win. The wild looking pink car of Corey Storck advanced nicely into the top five and Lucas Rodin also made a late charge, running out of time at the end to move up farther.
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