WEEKLY REPORT (10 to 17 July )

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WEEKLY REPORT (10  to 17 July )

With no medical appointments due this past week, I looked forward to a relaxing week at home and away.

Monday 10 July, was spent at home, but I had plans for the next day.

Tuesday 11 July was the scheduled date for the Super Dirt Series at the Weedsport Speedway , New York. It’s known as the “Hall of Fame Classic” as it coincides with the 2017 inductions to the Dirt Hall of Fame, that’s located on the grounds of the speedway.

Three of the notable inductees this year were local Quebec Dirt official, Gaston Salvas , and top drivers Alan Johnson and Steve Paine. I’ve know Steve for many years and was pleased to hear he was being honored,  

FLASHBACK to SUPER DIRT WEEK 2004 hanging out with the Steve Paine team in pit lane
FLASHBACK to SUPER DIRT WEEK 2004 hanging out with the Steve Paine team in pit lane

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I set off from my home in Cornwall Ont , mid morning on Tuesday  for a leisurely drive down there.

As usual, when heading down I 81 , I broke up my journey  for a lunch stop with my long time ‘racing friend’ Dawn Kampff who lives just south of Watertown.

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We spent an hour or so chatting over lunch, before taking a ‘selfie’ before I departed. As you will probably guess, I’m looking forward to getting my medication sorted out, so I can get get my front teeth fixed. The dentist wont touch them right now until the meds are correct.

Before going to the track I booked into my motel in Camilus NY and chilled out there for an hour. I got to the speedway around 4-00 pm and soon bumped into all my CNY “tog buddies’ .

FLASHBACK to WEEDSPORT 2016 with my buddy John Meloling
FLASHBACK to WEEDSPORT 2016 with my buddy John Meloling

It was good to see John Meloling who was nursing a few bruises after being hit by a tow truck at the Brewerton Speedway a few days earlier.

L to R Don Romeo, John Meloling and Dan Mailhot
L to R Don Romeo, John Meloling and Dan Mailhot

I joined John, Don Romeo and Dan Mailhot by the concession area for a chat. John and I had a wander around, and not far from the concessions , we found Matt Sheppard’s wife Bethane and her friend selling her merchandise , so a picture was taken.

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John also obliged  by taking a picture of me and Steve Paine. When I heard of his ‘Hall of Fame’ induction, I dug out my old Steve “The Hurricane” Paine Tee Shirt. Steve , # 7x was guest driving the Matt Sheppard car

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Once the Hot Laps began, I joined all the other ‘togs’ on the center.

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The Hot Laps and time trials were interrupted after Dave Rauscher had a nasty wreck after hitting the wall.

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Thankfully he was OK and walked away to be checked over by the medics. Joining the Big Block Modifieds on the program were the Sportsman and Vintage Mods.

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After the heats , the redraw took place on the front stretch where Tim McCreadie drew pole.

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The anthems soon followed and the Feature races began.

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Rocky Warner won the Sportsman feature which preceded  the nights big one.

After the traditional four wide parade lap the race got under way. As you’d expect Tim McCreadie shot into the lead and stayed there until a caution occurred around half distance. Stewart Friesen had been some way behind in second place, but on the restart he got the better of McCreadie.  

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For the second part of the race, the two of them dueled for the lead with Friesen using the middle of the track and McCreadie trying for  some extra bite at the top. It was very exciting as they crossed the line in that order, with Larry Wight not far behind.

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Once the Victory Lane pictures were taken, I made the short drive back to my motel.

Wednesday (12 July) morning there was no rush to get home, as that night,  I’d  planned to attend the ‘re-scheduled’ races at the Mohawk International Raceway, which are  just ten minutes from my home, but on the US side.

I had plenty of time to kill and never left my motel until 10-30. I made several stops on the journey north, and while exiting the I 81 at Watertown for a Mac and Cheese lunch at the Panera Bread, I took a short ride out of town to Sackets Harbour.  

I’d never been there before and had always wanted to check it out.

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In my conversation with Dawn , the day before we’d been talking about the high water levels of Lake Ontario, and how the beaches were under water. I saw this first hand at the harbour.

By 4-30 pm I was in Akwesasne at the Twin Leaf Diner, two miles from Mohawk International Raceway ,  having an early supper.

At the track , I snoozed in the car for a while before meeting up with my usual MIR friends.

It was obvious straight away that the rare Wednesday night show had attracted a few ‘invaders’ and the pits were full. The program consisted of four cylinder Bandits, Mod Lites, Sportsman and the 358 Mods.

I took position in my lawn chair on the center by turn four with fellow ‘togs’ Don Simpson and Dan Mailhot.

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It’s also interesting to note that young Brianna Ladouceur was doing double duty that night. As well as her usual Sportsman ride, she was making an appearance in a 358 Modified.

Mohawk International Raceway NY 12 July 2017 www.rickattheraces.com
Mohawk International Raceway NY 12 July 2017 www.rickattheraces.com

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The show moved along swiftly and at intermission time I walked over to the grandstand for a chat with my buddy Ron Morin.  

The Mods were first up, for their 50 lap Feature.  

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After Lance Willix, looked good for the opening laps, it proved to be a run away win for Tim Fuller, with only Carey Terrance able to make a challenge late in the race.

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Up next were the Mod Lites which were plagued with cautions, with eventual winner being Nick Mallette  .

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The last feature of the night was for Sportsman, which proved to be the best race of the night.  

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We  watched a race long battle for the lead between Thomas Cook and Brent Kelsey , with Cook hanging on , to take the checkers.

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Racing was all over at a sensible time and I was back in my house by 11-00 pm.

Thursday 13 July, was a restful day at home, apart from a visit to my local muffler repair shop for a small job on my HHR.

Once again Friday  (14 July) , turned out to be a wet one, and my home town of Cornwall was getting heavy rain by mid morning. It wasn’t long before my local Mohawk International Raceway , gave out the all too familiar notice that the evenings races had been canceled.

In the meantime, my friend Chantel Lesage, had called me to tell me of her intentions to head down to the Albany-Saratoga Speedway , to see her boy friend, Pro Stock driver, Rob Yetman race. The weather there was good and she asked me if I wanted to join her.

So, to cut a long story short we set off together sharing the driving. As we left Cornwall the rain was torrential, and that’s how it was for most of the drive there.

A road trip across the Adirondack Mountains to Malta.
A crazy road trip across the Adirondack Mountains to Malta with Chanty

 

 

We got to the speedway, in Malta,  just in time for the start, as Rob was going out for his heat race. (which he won). It wasn’t long before we met up with Rob and all our friends in the #7 Yetman Team .

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I was too late to get out on the middle for the heat races so sat high in the turn one  grandstand to get my first bunch of action shots.

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I didn’t have to wait long, when Stewart Friesen came to grief in this one.

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After the intermission I joined track photographer Mark Brown and Dave Delasandro on the center by turn one.

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First of the Features was for Pro Stocks and was won by Chucky Dumblewski.

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Next up was the Modified feature which gave us a surprise winner, Don Ronco .

I never stayed out to get pictures of the Sportsman Feature, and instead I rejoined the Yetman crew in the pits.

With the race car loaded up I followed them down the road to The Recovery Sports Bar and grill for a late supper. After we’d eaten I followed Rob and his trailer back to his place at  East Greenbush, near Albany.

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Next morning (Saturday 15 July) some of the crew turned up to wash down the car from the previous night.  Rob, a three times Syracuse winner, as well as the winner at the inaugural Oswego SUPER DIRT WEEK has the use of two race cars. The ‘green one’ used for the aforementioned big races was the one raced the night before at Malta, and was getting the wash down.

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The other car, the ‘yellow and orange one’ he uses for his weekly Saturday night races at the Lebanon Valley Speedway. This was all cleaned and ready to go in his garage.

While all the work was going on , I relaxed by the side of the pool in Rob’s back garden. Just after lunch,  I joined them for the short twenty minute drive to the “Valley”.  They like to get there early to get a good spot in the pits.

Like many of my local tracks, the Lebanon Valley Speedway have suffered from rain outs and had not had racing for a few weeks.

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The place was packed.

By now, the # 7 Yetman team had expanded with plenty of people around the trailer wearing the apparel. Thanks to Jenifer, I was also wearing one .

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The ‘Valley’ is one of those tracks that has the pits on the infield, and I found a nice little grandstand on the inside of turn one and two, for taking my pictures.

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Joining the Pro Stocks on the program,  were the Big Block Mods, 358 Mods, Sportsman and the 8 cylinder pure Stocks.

Come feature time Rob got involved in a big wreck but limped back to the pits for a quick repair.

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On the restart ,  from the rear of the pack he was the fastest car out there, and worked his way up to  fifth spot before the checkers fell.

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Winner was Connecticut’s  Jon Routhier.

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The 358 Mod winner was Peter Carlotto.

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The Big Block  winner was another new name for me, when Kyle Sheldon took the honors.

The Sportsman feature was the final race of the night, but I was back with the # 7 team while this was taking place.

With the racing over for the night, the plan was to all go out for a late supper again, but when we arrived at  the chosen eatery in East Greenbush it was packed with diners , and after much deliberation, the decision was made to give it a miss. So Rob, Chantel and myself  headed back to his place.

About 8-30 am on Sunday (16 July) morning, Chantel and I set off for the drive back to Canada.

This last minute decision for an Albany trip scrubbed out my original plans for Sunday morning.

Originally I thought I’d be at home at 8-00 am in the morning, tuned into the live coverage on TV of the British Grand Prix from Silverstone. Instead I was travelling over the Adirondacks, in the morning sunshine, heading for Plattsburgh NY.  I missed Lewis Hamilton get this one on home turf.

After eating at the Panera Bread in Plattsbugh, around 11-00 am, we made a few more stops on route , before getting back into Cornwall, Ontario at around 1-30 pm.  Time for a bit of rest and relaxation, before our next port of call.

Sunday nights, means the Cornwall Motor Speedway, so once cleaned and rested we drove across town to the Speedway. Chantel’s dad , ‘Tech Man Ted’ was in the camping field, so we headed for there , and chilled out in the sun until the gates opened.

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It had been a lovely dry and sunny day , since we left Albany NY in the morning, and we  were looking forward  to a great night of racing. My local track has suffered the wrath of Mother Nature far too many times this year, and  I was feeling positive.

That was until I bumped into my friend, Raymond Lavergne, the promoter and he spilled the bad news.

Apparently the forecast was for rain later in the evening.

They were playing ‘catch up’ after a string of rain outs and the first race on the agenda was Danny Lefebvre / Cindy Ladouceur Memorial race for the Mini Stocks.

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This was going too well , with very few stoppages or cautions until about five laps to go, when the yellows came out for car that had stopped on the back straight. After this there was a red for a rollover, and as I expected, this race turned out to be a long one.

To delay things even further,  on this busy night, the Patriot Sprint cars were paying a visit.

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Sprint cars always seem to add precious time to a busy schedule but on this occasion they weren’t too bad, and the show was able to move along quite smoothly.

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I took a few pics from the Pit Tower before moving to the center when the skies became darker.

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With the skies getting darker and rain looking imminent , the Sprints forgave their usual Dash for Cash and were hurried out for their feature.  

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With sprinkles of rain falling on the track, Steve Poirier took the checkers.

After a quick five minute intermission the Modifieds were brought out to the staging lane for their feature.

By now the sprinkles of rain had got heavier, and the track was ‘lost’.

The rain eased off,  and an armada of packing vehicles worked to get the track back in shape as the Mods returned to the pits.

Things looked good , and when the rain stopped , it appeared the packers had done a good job.

The Modifieds returned to the staging lane and my camera came back out of the bag.

Just as the cars were about to follow the pace truck to get the race underway, the heavens opened once more.  The rain was a lot heavier this time, and it was soon pretty obvious, that we’d lost yet another night of racing.

So it was early night departing my local track once more.

I have to feel sorry for my local promoters at Cornwall and Mohawk, who are getting the worst kind of luck for this years schedule , that I can remember.

Finally, before signing off for this week I have to thank John Walker and the staff at the Airborne Speedway at Plattsburgh. If you remember in my last weeks report , I mentioned losing my car keys at the track on SUPER DIRT SERIES night .  Well thanks to John, they turned up not far from where I was sitting , and they have since been returned to me.