Finally, after a l-o-n-g seven days of waiting and wishing for no rain, Saturday rolled around. Cloudy, but no real threat of rain. The races would go on!
I was excited for this race schedule for several reasons:
1. Our car was a solid 5th in points, but had a mathematical chance at any of the top 5 positions. There was an actual chance to win the championship.
2. John's responsibilities as race director were done. He would be able to watch the race from the stands and not have to worry about the antics of the other drivers. (However, he still had to deal with my antics as a fan.)
3. Are you kidding me? Rayray was going to go! Yahoo!
4. Season Championships = double points = people really stepping it up = really good racing.
5. No stupid sprint or thunder roadsters or legends. My apologies to the fans of those cars. I can't stand them. At least not at Anderson Speedway.
6. The Fabulous Figure 8's off the high banks. Allegedly, after weeks of antagonism between the Swinford team and the Poore team, both factions would have a hitman driver to take out another team's car. Now, at Anderson Speedway, you hear these rumors all the time, and often, nothing happens. So and so is going to bring an extra car to junk this guy next week, and if #xx bumps me one more time, he'll be eating the wall. Usually, this doesn't happen. However, with the Swinford's and the people on Poore's teams, I think everyone knew something big was going to happen.
The races started off pretty clean, with a Street Stock heat win from Rich Boyer. I was pretty excited about this, as he was in a close 2nd to Bret Miles, Sr. for the points championship. As some of you may remember, I'm not a huge fan of Bret Miles, Jr., so that just kind of carries over to his dad. I did recently find out that B.J. was much younger than I realized, so my feelings changed from dislike to just wishing someone else would win. In the second Street Stock heat, Bruce McFall jumped out in front for his second consecutive heat win. Hells yeah! 5th spot was pretty much a lock, but 6th place Kyle Flynn blew his motor in this heat, so 5th was definitely in the bag. Still felt bad for Kyle though.
Next up were the Thundercars with Rod Phipps and Rob Allman battling for the championship. Both are very good, clean drivers and just seem like nice guys. Honestly, I'm sure alot of the drivers here are nice people, but I think it's good to call out the ones who are. Because I definitely call out the ones who aren't.
Josh Poore won the first heat with Rod finishing right behind. Allman won the next heat, so it was going to come down to the feature! Ronnie Rose finished last, so I was pretty stoked about that, even though I think he wasn't trying, given that he
Spoiler Alert won the feature . :eyeroll:
I'm not commenting on the front wheel drives, because there were so many cars, and I was too concerned for the other races. It was also pretty obvious who was going to win those championships, so I wasn't paying close attention to those. I must say, those cars do put on a good show. I used to hate them, but I've come around. Ok, I changed my mind. I would like to say to the orange car's family, SIMMER DOWN. Yeah, he's new, it sucks that he got wrecked, but they were leading the race and he wasn't on the bottom, like you so proudly screamed. He wasn't hurt and his racing will be all the better for it. They just bumped him out of the way. And seriously, do I scream nonsense when my family is involved? Yes. But I know when to stop. And generally, that time is before the police arrive to take you out of the stands.
The figure 8 heats were relatively quiet. Calm before the storm, much? Mike Riddle, Jr (Cobra!) and Shawn Cullen won the heats, respectively. Booyah!! On to the main events!!
The street stock feature was again, pretty calm. Rich Boyer was trying to get around Jake McElfresh for 2nd spot, as they were both chasing Bret Miles. Remember, Boyer right behind him in the points chase. Anyway, from my vantage point, Jake was not exactly giving him room to race, but it also didn't look like he was cutting him off or anything. I don't know. But Boyer got a little impatient, or a little aggressive, or whatever, and pushed Jake around a bit, but ended up cutting his own tire. It seemed like a good gamble, but it didn't pay off. I'd also like to note that at this moment, something happened to Ronnie Rose's car, taking him to the back, and I let out an ecstatic cheer. I was not cheering for Boyer's demise. Remember, not a big fan of Miles. But he ended up winning, and that risk cost Boyer not only a shot at the championship, but 2nd place too. Rob Allman ended up passing him in the points race. And hell to the yeah, Bruce McFall finished the year in 5th!
The Thundercars had a pretty great race as well. About halfway through the race, someone in the designated hitman car of the evening took Ronnie Rose out, allowing Rod to pass him for the lead. It was more like a little love tap though, and it didn't knock Rose out of the race, just out of his position. So pretty much everyone was confused by the fact that the race director decided to throw the yellow flag. I'll admit, that if the yellow flag is thrown and it looks intentional, the wrecked party should get his/her spot back. But this flag shouldn't have been thrown. Total crap call. And, just for fun, let's take a moment and count the times that Rose has been the instigator. Are you done yet? Oh, still counting? I'll wait. How about now? Shoot, let's just stop because people do have school and work in the morning. So anyway, he got his spot back and went on to win. So yeah, nice last place showing in the heat, FEATURE WINNER. Oh, and you were .009 seconds off fast time this week? You really are a pansy ass. It's a RACE car, and you're no newbie. Race the fucking car! Anyway, Rod Phipps finished 2nd and Rob Allman finished 4th, so the former teammates went 1-2 in the points race for the season.
So here were are, finally. The big one. Who was going to win the championship? Who was going to take whom out? Would any cars remain standing? If a hit in fact did take place, would it be a good one in the crossover, or just a run-of-the-mill ramming someone in the wall. I'd just like to take a moment and say that if you are a "hitman" driver in the figure 8, take advantage of that big X in the middle of the track for a nice takedown of your nemesis. Might as well make it interesting for the fans.
And I must say, I have to give props to Doug Riddle for doing just that. I will bash on his cowardice in just a moment, but each lap through the crossover, he was aiming for Jeff Swinford. He wasn't waiting around on the corners, he was going for the money shot. And about 5 laps in, he got it. BAM! Riddle clips Swinford and they both go right through and hit the wall by the flag stand.
Let me back up a second. Everyone, and I mean everyone, knew that Doug Riddle was going to take out Jeff Swinford, and Andy Shirley was going to take out Mike Riddle, Jr. And, as a race fan, I generally like the Swinfords, and I generally like Mike Riddle, Jr. Sometimes the Swinfords are a little too "off the deep end" for me, but they're always exciting. The Riddle's have also been known to get silly, but my main issue is that I really don't love the owner of Riddle's car, and more importantly, their fans are asshats. Like, straight up, need-a-good-beatdown douchebags. But like, redneck douchbags, because everyone's a redneck at that race track. (Myself included) So, like I said, EVERYONE knew that Jeff Swinford and Mike Riddle Jr. had giant targets on their backs. Therefore, Jeff and Mike knew that they were targets. Everytime they came through the crossover, and saw their hitman, they had to wonder if this would be the time. And neither of them rolled over. Yes, they tried to avoid the hits, but they didn't pull off the track like big babies (which I totally would have done). So props to them, especially Jeff, when he saw Riddle coming in for the big one.
And this is where I'll call out Doug Riddle for being a giant gutless punani. After deliberately hitting Swinford (which I wasn't opposed to on principle, given that I was actively cheering for the other guy to take out the 85 car), he jumps out of his car, escapes through the fence and fucking runs away! Are you kidding me? Swinford, on the other hand, was shaken up pretty good. I don't know if he was knocked out or just a little woozy, but it took him awhile to get out of his car. But when he did, he came out ready to fight! Ran back to Riddle's (empty) car, where I'm sure he would've put a pretty good pounding on him. Alas, it was not to be. And Andy Shirley was never able to take out the 85 car - I don't think I've ever seen him take anyone out, and I do think they've had him out there in that car for that purpose before. Josh Tharp won the race, but Swinford had enough points to win the championship.
A few things about the incident that were funny - in Swinford's championship speech, he said, "It's a shame that happened tonight."
Anderson Speedway website Really Jeffrey? I mean, maybe you have to say that, but everyone knew that your team had the same deal, so would it have been a shame if your guy took theirs out? And what in the heck was Mike Swinford doing running his mouth to Rick Dawson immediately after it happened? YOU GUYS WERE GOING TO DO THE SAME THING! Seriously. I know you're pissed, and I totally understand you wanting to fight with the other team, but for real. Unless it was just part of the show, but I'm doubting that. Maybe ya'll were just pissed that your hitman driver sucks and you need to find a new one. Although I did appreciate the fact that no other cars were harmed in the making of this drama. I was also pretty happy that the Swinfords won the title. One last thing I found funny, although there may be a valid reason, was that Josh Poore didn't even start the feature. He is the teammate of Mike Riddle Jr. I think he might have been skeered.
So that's that. Points racing at Anderson is over; the rest are money races. Will there be vengeful drivers, ready to take out the next person who gets in their way? We shall see!
Below is a link to a video of the crash. You can't really see how obviously intentional or just how bad of a hit it was. Still, very cool of the Mad Cow Racing Team guys to get it. Check out some of their other videos on YouTube. Those guys really have fun with their racing team, and I believe one of them finished 2nd in the front wheel drive oval division. Check it out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13qD8jBoAbQ
