Sunday, September 14 - We pulled on to the parking lot at Selinsgrove at 6:45 only 15 minutes prior to the starting time and were surprised at the lack of cars in the lot. Selinsgrove has a wooden grandstand and it usually is the first to fill up before the bleachers. On the ride here from Muddy Run I was concerned we would not be able to find a seat in the bleachers due to our late arrival. Jeff Alhum was driving up from the Lehigh Valley but he was also arriving late and whoever would be there first would save the seats. Jeff called us as we were pulling into the parking lot to tell us not to worry there were plenty of seats. I do not believe I have ever been to a 410 sprint race here with so few fans in the stands. It was sad. Now Wiliams Grove was rained out on Friday night and this race was rained out on Saturday. Central PA is pretty true to their 410 sprints but where were they. Not to mention this was the 26th running of the Annual Sprint Open and they were paying $7,500 to win with only 27 sprints in the pits. To be honest it probably was the same 27 sprints you would have had in the pits if you were only paying $5,000 to win. This might have been enough to bring down the ticket price from the $24 admission and maybe more fans would have been there. I do not know, is it the price of gas? The economy? Or the fact that it was Sunday night and the kids had school the next day? Maybe, it is just near the end of the season when football and other sports come into play. But I felt bad for management because the monitary outcome could not have been good. Remember we like to see promoters make money because this is a business and if a business does not make money it fails.

Back to the racing, time trials started at 6:18 and the first car out set fast time. It was not beginner’s luck it was Todd Shaffer and he has been known to maneuver the big 1/2 mile excellently. Following the time trials they ran two pro stocks heats while they set the sprint heats and as always these guys ran hard and put on a good show. The three sprint heats followed and a brief 15 minute intermission followed that. There was a B main for the sprints and the pro stocks ran their 15 lap feature. As I mentioned these guys put on a good show and if you were just looking at passing and close competition this was the better of the two features.

At 8:55 the green dropped on the 30 lap feature with Alan Krimes starting on the pole with Brian Leppo on the outside pole. Leppo took the early lead but a restart on lap 2 saw Shaffer take over the top spot and it was all over. Although it was a good race it was not a jumping up and down race. Shaffer won with Fred Rahmer, Mark Smith, Greg Hodnett and Chad Layton rounding out the top five. We were on our way home before 9:15. The show was very well run and the surface was good. I was really looking forward to the night but I have to say it was just okay for me. Yes, it was a little sad.