By Bryan Gapinski
Belleville, Kan., July 8—One of midget auto racing’s biggest events is less than four-weeks away. The 35th annual Belleville Midget Nationals are slated for Aug. 2-4 at the Belleville High Banks. Entry blanks will be mailed this weekend and will available for download at the tracks website starting July 9: www. highbanks.org.
For the third straight year the event will be officiated by the National Championship Racing Association (NCRA) and The Belleville High Banks Race Committee. A new event has been added for Thursday night Aug. 2 a 30-lap midget race on the quarter-mile dirt oval, along with the JayHusker Micro Series.
Action switches to the half-mile track on Friday Night Aug. 3, and will be highlighted by qualifying, heat races, pole dash, semi feature and the preliminary night feature event. The evening’s top point earners will be locked into the starting lineup for Saturday’s Championship feature.
All other participants will return Saturday Aug. 4 for heat races and the semi feature, hoping to earn one of the twenty-four starting positions in the sport’s most grueling feature of the season. The United Rebel Sprint Car Series will also participate in both days with the running of the inaugural 305 Sprint Nationals.
As in previous year’s Saturday’s winner will collect $12,500, to win the 40-lap championship feature. Last year Kyle Larson took the lead with seven laps remaining ending Bryan Clauson’s hopes of becoming the events first three-time winner. Friday Night Mario Clouser lowered the midget track record to 17.497 seconds in qualifying.
General Admission tickets for all events are sold first-come first-served on race day at the ticket gate. Reserved Seating tickets is available for the Belleville Midget Nationals. General admission available only if the event is not sold out, and available only on the day of the race at the track ticket office (bottom 3 rows only).
Tickets can be ordered by going to the tracks website, or logging onto The TicketForce website (direct link to Belleville events) : http://tickets.ticketforce.com/eventperformances.asp?evt=1031 . #