Sunday, November 8 - Today was suppose to be sunny with temperatures in the mid 60’s in Pennsylvania but we decided to enjoy the sun in Delaware where the temperatures jumped into the 70’s. We met Jeff Ahlum at his house in Quakertown just after 7 AM and jumped on the Northeast extension of the Pennsylvania Turnpike for our trip south into the first state of Delaware. The drive was smooth and we avoided some of the traffic through Dover and the small towns below on Rt. 13 by taking Rt. 113 to just below Milford. We cut back across the Rt. 13 at that point and arrived at Delaware International Speedway at 10:15 after making a Subway stop for some sandwiches. We ran into Dwight Bucks, Gary Grim and Ron sitting in their lawn chairs in the parking lot below the grandstands and struck up a conversation for the next half hour or so. We were surprised to see equipment on the track working the surface and this brought hope that maybe the track would not succumb to the sun and turn into the normal day time conditions. When I entered the stands at 12:20 the track looked good and racy but those conditions disappeared quicker than the roadrunner as the track became black and slick.

There were only two modified consies to spin off before the main events would begin and two young guns, Billy Pauch Jr. and Brad Brightbill nailed down the wins. It was 1:45 when the modifieds took the green flag with Stewart Freisen on the front row by himself (the Delaware start) driving the Delaware based Will Brown #1W. It took second starter, Jimmy Horton, 11 laps to work his way by Freisen but once out front no one would be touching the 50 year old driver from New Jersey. The only real excitement after this was when Jaime Mills started to lose his patience and started bangin on third place runner, Kenny Brightbill. He even ran up and over the left rear tire of Brightbill before trying to pass him on the outside the next lap entering turn one. The two banged each other several times before Brightbill made a right turn and spun Mills out of contention. From that point until the finish the top five ran nose to tail without any passing. Jeff Strunk made some early moves from his 14th starting position into 6th but a late race charge on the outside found Strunk sliding from 6th to 11th at the end. The top five all started in the top five with Horton winning over Freisen with Brightbill third, Chic Cossaboone fourth and Richie Pratt Jr. rounding out the top five. Three of the top five are 50 or older and two of them (Brightbill and Cossaboone) are 60 or over.

Next up were the late models for their 50 lapper and if you thought the first one was bad then you were wrong. This one had triple the amount of cautions (9 to 3) with only one driver finishing in the top five that did not start there. Kirk Ryan led the entire distance and won over fourth starting Richard Jarvis Jr., the track champion, who muscled his way past David Pettyjohn for second with Pettyjohn spinning him in turn two after the checker. Pettyjohn, Rob Schirmer (6th starter) and Donald Lingo Jr. filling in the top five. The crate modifieds were next up for their 25 lap feature go and ran a decent race with only three cautions and a pass for the lead. Tim Trimble passed Jon Callaway for the win with Michael White third, John Curtis fourth and Tom Moore Jr. clinching the rest of the top five. It was only 3:30 the sun was feeling good on my neck so we decided to stay for the next two features. The crate late models would run 25 laps also and though not quite as clean (five cautions) there was another pass for the lead with track champion, Joe Warren, getting around Justin Breeding for the top position. In fact Breeding lost second in the late going to Mike Wilson with Kelly Putz fourth and Nick Davis in fifth.

The last feature of the day that we would watch was the 20 lap mod lite event. Four cautions in the first three laps had we thinking maybe we should have left but once they pared down the field the rest of the race was very competitive. Kevin McKinney started first and won over Ken Meadows and Kirk Miles who all started in the top five but the Musser boys, Landis and Calvin, ran the wheels off their cars moving from 23rd and 13th to finish fourth and fifth. The checker waved at 4:24 and it was time to head north back into Pennsylvania. We stopped in Milford at the local diner and enjoyed a very good meal before making the 3 hour plus trip back home. The racing was the most boring we have seen all year but the warm weather and the fellowship made the day bearable.

That’s it for another typical weekend and next week if the weather is good we will report from the Houston, Texas area on hopefully two new tracks we will visit.