Johnny Parsons III Overtakes Matuska in Nonstop Traditional Run at SCVR

By Greg Parent
St. Croix Falls, WI

Although Mother Nature caused about an hour rain delay when the back edge of a thunderstorm complex just clipped the St. Croix Valley Raceway with a brief but heavy shower, it did nothing to dampen the spirits of Johnny Parsons III.  Growing up racing on the Indiana bullrings which usually were heavy and tacky, JP3 found himself right at home on the sticky and very fast 1/4 mile SCVR racing surface.  Parsons wrestled the lead away from Neal Matuska on lap 11 following contact coming across the finish line to complete lap 10.  Parsons went on to lead the remaining 15 laps in what turned out to be yet another nonstop feature race for the Traditional sprint cars this season at SCVR.

Parsons wasn’t the only car with some contact, as a couple of lapped cars caused problems for the Owatonna, MN racer while attempting to lap them.  After brief contact on a couple more occasions, Parsons was finally clear of the them and soared around the heavy cushion.  The excitement continued further back in the field, as cars were bumping and grinding with amazingly no ill effects, something you don’t often see in open wheel sprint car racing.  Parsons picked up his second win of the season and his 16th career series victory.  Parsons celebrated with his crew in Rock Auto Victory Lane and commented after the races on his run.  “This is the kind of track I grew up racing on.  I’m glad I came out and wheel packed after that rain delay, as I realized just how tacky it was going to be.  Good race with Neal (Matuska) and then those two lapped cars were racing each other hard which made it really tough to pass them.  I might have dirtied them up just a bit, but I needed to get by with Neal right behind me.  It was a blast out there tonight.”

Matuska turned in his best run yet in a Traditional sprint car with a solid second place finish.  Another impressive run for rookie driver James Giossi produced third in the final results.  Mike Mueller and Rob Caho, Jr. completed the top five.  Jake and Jimmy Kouba ran sixth and seventh with Kevin Bradwell, Chase Viebrock and Anna Hippe rounding out the top ten.  All sixteen cars that started finished the race with thirteen of them on the lead lap.  The heat races were won by Mueller and Matuska.

Racing action the following night moved a bit east over to the Rice Lake Speedway, as the Traditional sprints finished out their triple header weekend along with the winged sprints on the program.

UMSS Traditional Sprint Race Results, St. Croix Valley Raceway, July 24, 2015 (Race #15):

GRP Motorsports A Feature 1 (25 Laps): 1. 12-Johnny Parsons III[4]; 2. 48-Neal Matuska[1]; 3. 11-James Giossi[6]; 4. 87-Mike Mueller[2]; 5. 78-Rob Caho Jr[3]; 6. 6-Jake Kouba[8]; 7. 2K-Jimmy Kouba[10]; 8. 95-Kevin Bradwell[5]; 9. 50-Chase Viebrock[14]; 10. 16-Anna Kouba[7]; 11. 3K-Jeremy Kerzman[13]; 12. 55-Joseph Kouba[11]; 13. N1-Tony Duran[16]; 14. 81-Dan Peper[12]; 15. 27-Mike Walters[9]; 16. 23-Jake Hendrickson[15]
Lap Leaders: Matuska 1-10, Parsons 11-25. No cautions! All cars finished with 13 cars on the lead lap!

Hoosier Racing Tire Heat 1 (10 Laps): 1. 87-Mike Mueller[1]; 2. 78-Rob Caho Jr[2]; 3. 16-Anna Kouba[3]; 4. 6-Jake Kouba[5]; 5. 27-Mike Walters[4]; 6. 81-Dan Peper[6]; 7. 3K-Jeremy Kerzman[8]; 8. 50-Chase Viebrock[7]
Lap Leader: Mueller 1-10. No cautions.

Track Rat Photos Heat 2 (10 Laps): 1. 48-Neal Matuska[2]; 2. 95-Kevin Bradwell[1]; 3. 12-Johnny Parsons III[5]; 4. 11-James Giossi[6]; 5. 55-Joseph Kouba[3]; 6. 2K-Jimmy Kouba[7]; 7. N1-Tony Duran[8]; 8. 23-Jake Hendrickson[4]
Lap Leader: Matuska 1-10. No cautions.