by Gerald Laurie
Madera Speedway presented the Annual Harvest Classic featuring 360 Supermodifieds and Open Supermodifieds on Saturday September 18. When it was over, Lonnie Adamson had survived the fast and wild Super Feature for the Harvest Classic win.
The evening’s festivities started with qualifications. Dan Vanderpool paced the 360 Supermodifieds with a lap of 13.342 followed by Kyle Vanderpool at 13.599 and Willie Northammer at 13.834. Kenny Kinchen did not qualify due to a practice crash.
Lonnie Adamson was fastest among the open Supermodifieds with a lap of 12.169 seconds. Jeff Russell at 12.365 and Jim Birges at 12.399 rounded out the top three
The four lap 360 Supermodified Trophy Dash featured Willie Northammer, Kyle Vanderpool, his father Dan Vanderpool, and Kenny Kinchen after affecting repairs. There was a bit of a scramble on the start with Kyle Vanderpool grabbing the lead followed by Dan Vanderpool, Kinchen, and Northammer. Kinchen made several attempts to pass, but the end reflected the first lap. The Vanderpools (son, then father) finished one and two followed by Kinchen and Northammer.
The Supermodified Dash was originally scheduled to start Tanner Swanson, Jim Birges, Jeff Russell, and Lonnie Adamson. Russell opted out and Jeff Collins was added to the field. During warm up laps, Birges had something break in the front suspension and plowed into the third turn wall very hard. After removing the 32 car, Kody Swanson was added to the Dash. The starting order was Tanner Swanson, Lonnie Adamson, Jeff Collins, and Kody Swanson. Adamson blasted around the outside followed by Kody Swanson in turn three to make the order Adamson, K. Swanson, T. Swanson, and Collins. And that was the race. Adamson finished with win followed by the same cast of characters.
The 360 Heat lined up with Dan Vanderpool on the pole flanked by Kyle Vanderpool. Willie Northammer and Kenny Kinchen resided in the second row. Kyle moved to the lead with Dan and Kinchen side by side behind and banging wheels with one another through turn one and two. Coming off four, Dan Vanderpool pushed up the track and contacted Kinchen again causing a near spin and a yellow flag. Northammer spun to avoid the incident. Officials then black flagged Dan Vanderpool for rough driving. With his father in the infield, Kyle Vanderpool went flag to flag in the lead with Kinchen trying hard to pass to no avail. At the checkers, Vanderpool won over Kinchen and Northammer.
The open Supermodified heat race featured six cars with Birges still in the pits with wrenches, torches, and parts flying fast and furiously trying to get ready for the feature. Lonnie Adamson paced the field followed by Jeff Russell, Jeff Collins, Tanner Swanson, Kody Swanson, and George Greenway. Greenway opted out at the last minute, leaving five cars for the eight lap contest. Russell proved the high side was the fast way around by grabbing the point followed by Adamson, Tanner Swanson, older brother Kody Swanson, and Collins. The order stayed the same throughout the heat until Collins spun in turn four bringing out the yellow and checkers a lap early.
Madera Speedway combines the 360 and Open Supermodifieds for the fifty lap feature to provide a very thrilling race for the fans. Willie Northammer, Kyle Vanderpool, Dan Vanderpool, and Kenny Kinchen lined up in the first two rows. Kody Swanson, Jeff Collins, Tanner Swanson, and Jim Birges were scheduled to go in rows three and four. Jeff Russell, Lonnie Adamson, and George Greenway rounded out the field. While the drivers were being introduced, Birges’ crew were bleeding the brakes and buttoning up panels after a tremendous thrash to get the entire front end of the car rebuilt. As the announcer was interviewing the last starter, the pink thirty two was pushed from the pits without having had the opportunity to set toe-in, springs , etc. They guessed at the cross weight and pushed the car out.
The start was absolutely mad as Kody Swanson managed to pass all four 360’s by going three wide down the front stretch with brother Tanner hot on his heals. Birges took a brave pill and shoved through the middle of a three wide blast in turn two. The order at the end of lap one was Kody over K. Vanderpool, Northammer, Tanner, and Birges. Tanner Swanson and Birges disposed of Northammer on lap two and passed Kyle Vanderpool on lap three. Adamson was up to fifth. Adamson and Jeff Russell moved past Vanderpool on lap four and Kinchen took over the top 360 position in sixth place on lap five. Things spread out a bit as K. Swanson stretched out a lead over T. Swanson and Birges. With Adamson and Russell having a battle royal for fourth, Kinchen pulled out a little from the other 360’s, but both Vanderpools and Northammer were in a massive donnybrook for positions seven through nine. Order after ten laps was K. Swanson, T. Swanson, Birges, Adamson, Russell, Kinchen, K. Vanderpool, D. Vanderpool, Northammer and Greenway.
Kody caught the back of the pack on lap eleven and just sliced through traffic. By lap thirteen, he had put Collins, Greenway, and Northammer down a lap. The Vanderpools fell to the flying 72 car a lap later. By lap 17, the top five had cleared all of the lapped traffic and were trying to reel in Kody. Tanner was holding his own with big brother, but Birges was reeling in Tanner very slowly. Adamson had damaged a front wing in contact with Birges as they fought through traffic. Russell was all over Adamson trying to take advantage of the push from the damaged wing. Kinchen was holding on to the lead lap, but losing ground to Swanson. After twenty laps, it was Swanson the elder over Swanson the younger, Birges who was closing fast, Adamson, Russell, and Kinchen, all on the lead lap. One down were Vandrpool the younger, Vanderpool, the elder, Northammer, and Greenway.
Swanson started a second round of lapping traffic on lap twenty one and then dropped Kinchen off the lead lap on the twenty second circuit. Russell finally took fourth from Adamson on lap twenty five. The top five had all passed Kinchen by twenty six while Northammer , D. Vandrpool and Greenway dropped a second lap by number twenty seven. The order in the top five at lap thirty was Kody over Tanner, Birges, Russell and Adamson. Then the high speed freight train slowed for a yellow on lap thirty one when Birges coasted to a stop in turn three with steam spewing from the pink car. In the rush to repair the car, the Radiator cap had not been seated properly and had come adrift. With a hasty track side repair, Birges rejoined the field at the back of the pack in fifth place, last car on the lead lap. However, he had all of the lapped cars between him and the fleeing top four.
With the green flag flying Birges took Kinchen on lap 31, got around the rest of the lapped cars on thirty two and set sail for the back of the open field. Meanwhile up front, Russell had passed Tanner Swanson for second on the restart, but Swanson was back to second on lap thirty three and brought Adamson with him up to third. Birges was a straightaway behind and going like the Hammers of Hell. Lapping started again in earnest on lap thirty nine as Kody went three wide low on the front stretch to blow by the Northammer and Dan Vanderpool. Tanner repeated the move at the conclusion of lap forty. There was contact between Swanson and Vanderpool and both cars were eliminated with Tanner taking a hard ride into the turn one wall. The red flag flew immediately. Crews rushed out to check on the cars and several adjustments were made. The 98 crew managed to remove the damaged front wing and the restart order was Kody Swanson over Jeff Russell, Adamson, Birges, Kinchen, K. Vanderpool, Northammer, Collins and Greenway. On the completion of lap forty one, the yellow and then red flew again as Kody Swanson broke the rear axle tube and the left rear tire and wheel assembly bounced wildly down the front stretch with cars darting and weaving all over the place the avoid bouncing parts. Kyle Vanderpool got caught up somehow and knocked the left front corner off his car.
With Swanson and Vanderpool eliminated, Jeff Russell lead the restart with Adamson, Birges, Kinchen, Northammer, Greenway , and Collins rounding out the remaining field. With a top wing adjustment to counter the push from the missing front wing, Adamson sailed around Russell on the restart and Birges followed a lap later. However, Adamson seemed to have the best tires at the end and the rest of the show was anticlimactic . Adamson won over Birges and Russell, all on the lead lap. Kinchen and Northammer were the only 360’s to survive until the end. Greenway and Collins also managed to finish.
The Supermodified Race was interlaced with several on going story lines. This was only Kody Swanson’s fourth Supermodified Race and was Tanner’s first time in one of the winged roadsters. Both performed very well and it looked like we would have a one-two Swanson Brothers finish, a scenario that has happened several times in sprint car and midget competition with both brothers having a turn at the top of the heap. Kinchen had a major practice crash and the crew thrashed on the car fervently, borrowing parts and help from other crews only to miss qualifications by a couple of minutes. There has been an ongoing controversy for several races between the Vanderpools and Kinchen with both sides alluding to rough driving on the part of the other. With Kinchen and Kyle Vandrpool very close in year end points, much of the controversy involved blocking charges as well. Officials talked to both teams over the course of the season and Dan Vanderpool was penalized in this evening’s heat race. With Kinchen managing a clean finish in the feature and both Vanderpools eliminated at mid race, the points will be interesting.
In the open Supermodifieds, it was Jeff Russell’s first race of the year after having had back surgery in the spring and undergoing recovery throughout the summer.
And then there was Jim Birges. Pre-race race publicity involved Jim’s Pink Car, painted last year in a race for cure promotion and featuring the faces of breast cancer survivors, including Jim’s wife, on the hood of the car. This race was dedicated to a fund raiser for cancer, with Holly and Jim involved in promoting a fund raising concert, called the Pink Show, and featuring the pink car. And then Jim had the warm up crash in the dash and it looked like the whole promotion would fall through. However, Tom Silsby, one of the owner’s of Adamson’s car convinced Jim that they could repair car and there was another major thrash to repair the thirty two and make it to the feature event. And then with Jim running well, there was another twist of drama with the radiator cap incident.
So it was a very interesting evening with both on track and behind the scenes drama in spades. Madera promoter Kenny Shepard could not have written a better script to keep the crowd involved and on their toes. All in all, it was a great night of racing. And although several cars were damaged during the night, no one was injured. The cars are always repairable. I’ll see ya at the races.
Madera Speedway Harvest Classic, September 18, 2010
360 Supermodifieds
Qualifications: 1. 17 Dan Vanderpool, 13.342; 2. 1 Kyle Vanderpool, 13.599; 3. 29 Willie Northammer, 13.834; 4. 5 Fenny Kinchen, N/T
Trophy Dash: 1. K. Vanderpool; 2. D. Vanderpool; 3. Kinchen; 4. Northammer
Heat: 1. K. Vanderpool; 2. Kinchen; 3. Northammer; 4. D. Vanderpool
Supermodifieds
Qualifications: 1. 98 Lonnie Adamson, 12.169; 2. 85 Jeff Russell, 13.365; 3. 32 Jim Birges, 13.399; 4. 56 Tanner Swanson, 15.545; 5. 89 Jeff Collins, 12.555; 6. 72 Kody Swanson, 12.692; 7. 8 George Greenway, 13.146
Trophy Dash: 1. Adamson; 2. K Swanson; 3. T. Swanson; 4. Collins.
Heat: 1. Russell; 2. Adamson; 3. T. Swanson; 4. K. Swanson; 5. Collins
Combined Feature: 1. Adamson; 2. Birges; 3. Russell; 4. Kinchen*; 5. Northammer*; 6. Greenway;, 7. Collins; 8. K. Swanson; 9. T. Swanson; 10. K Vanderpool*; 11. D. Vanderpool*
* denotes 360 Supermodified.