The night started with a tongue lashing and ended with a collection of stickshift senoritas. Between the two, Bill Witherspoon decided second-best just wasn’t going to cut it.
The Devlin resident, third overall last year in the points race, broke through for his first feature victory of the season in the Street Stock division during Borderland Racing Association action Saturday night at the Emo Speedway.
Association president Dave Allen read the Street Stock drivers the riot act during a heated pre-race pit meeting dealing with allegations of cheating within the division.
Then Witherspoon went out and managed to run clean in the feature while steering clear of a late three-car crack-up that happened just behind him.
Simon Crans of Emo got an early jump, but was passed on the high side by Witherspoon and Emo’s Richard Visser. Then after a caution flag came out, Crans was dropped to the back of the pack for the restart by race officials for unknown reasons.
Witherspoon took control of the race, but had to contend with two hard-charging contenders over the last half.
Visser and Denny Trimble of Devlin were second and third, respectively, when they got tangled up coming down the home straightaway. Their collision also involved Bill Reimer, who ended up with Visser connecting with his back bumper, while Trimble was spun around and ended up smacking into the infield hill behind him.
Then on the restart, current points leader and defending division champ Ron Westover from Devlin discovered another gear and came from well back to challenge Witherspoon.
But the veteran driver held off several passing attempts by Westover to take the checkered flag, with Westover finishing second and Emo’s John Bosma capturing third.
Westover still has a comfortable lead in the standings with 364 points—18 more than Trimble (348)—while Anthony Visser sits in third (341).
The evening ended early for Devlin’s Wes Morriseau, who sits seventh in the points standings of the Modified division, but will be forced to miss next week’s action and possibly more due to suspension.
Morriseau was flagged by race officials for driving on the horsetrack surrounding the racetrack during a caution in one of the heats, then allegedly heading back into the pits without due caution.
Fort Frances racer Steve Arpin, meanwhile, turned the Emo Speedway into his own personal Brickyard with one of the widest margins of victory in a feature race in recent memory as he blew away the field.
Arpin, who couldn’t get past heat winner Ken Anderson of Fort Frances in the preliminaries, shot past him like a cannon down the backstretch three laps into the feature after being third for the first part of the race.
It was smooth sailing from there as Arpin rocketed to the win by a stunning three-quarters of a lap over Anderson and Vic Larson of Dryden.
Larson still leads the division standings handily by 61 points over second-place Dan Galloway of Emo (351-290), while Kevin Randell of Dryden remains third (273).
And it was a family affair in the Mini-Sprint division, with the father getting the best of the son and a trip to the top of the standings.
Kenny Perry of Fort Frances finished first in the preliminary heat, but after leading through most of the feature, ran into difficulties and ended up fifth while his dad, Ken, dashed to the line to take the victory.
His triumph meant sole possession of first place in the division by three points (300-297) over defending champ Kyle Ridlon of Aurora, Man., who bounced back from a fifth-place finish in the heat to take second in the feature.
Clay Sorteberg of Greenbush, Mn. showed well in his season debut at the Emo Speedway, claiming third spot in the feature, while another newcomer, Roseau’s Corey Olson, struggled to sixth-place finishes in both the heat and feature.
< *c>Four-wheeled females
It also was Organ Donor Night on Saturday at the Emo Speedway, held annually to promote public awareness about organ donation, and it was capped off with the ladies getting behind the wheel for the Powder Puff races.
In the Mini-Sprint event, Rhondelle Angus exploded to a big lead and eased her way home to defeat Gabi Thompson. Laurel Perry ended up in third.
The Street Stock category, which was reduced from 16 to seven racers because of the lack of available working cars after earlier action, was highlighted by some impressive driving control by race winner Michelle Korpi and some dramatic near-misses by third-place finisher Suzanne Soucy, who finished just behind runner-up Wendy Mortimer from Toronto.
Halfway through the race, Soucy and Korpi touched the front ends of their cars together on the home straightaway, with Soucy spinning 180 degrees but avoiding getting hit by oncoming traffic.
Then later, Soucy nearly lost control crossing the start-finish line—veering dangerously close to the retaining wall at the base of the flag stand.
Here are the results from Saturday’s races, along with the updated points standings:
< *c>Mini-Sprints
•Heat #1—1. Kenny Perry (#77) 2. Ken Perry (#2×4) 3. Steve Ridlon (#7R) 4. Clay Sorteberg (#75) 5. Kyle Ridlon (#15) 6. Corey Olson (#2)
•Feature—1. Ken Perry 2. Kyle Ridlon 3. Clay Sorteberg 4. Steve Ridlon 5. Kenny Perry 6. Corey Olson
< *c>Streets
•Heat #1—1. Chuck Lambert (#60) 2. Bill Witherspoon (#3) 3. Simon Crans (#09) 4. Neil MacDonald (#77) 5. Dirk Crans (#40) 6. Milton David, Jr. (#89)
•Heat #2—1. Chris Shine (#18) 2. Jeff Wickstrom (#17) 3. Richard Visser (#25) 4. John Bosma (#21B) 5. Bill Reimer (#04) 6. Darien Trimble (#7)
•Heat #3—1. Denny Trimble (#66X) 2. Ron Westover (#47) 3. Anthony Visser (#11) 4. Norman Heiskanen (#53) 5. Wes Morriseau (#5)
•Feature—1. Bill Witherspoon 2. Ron Westover 3. John Bosma 4. Jeff Wickstrom 5. Anthony Visser 6. Simon Crans 7. Richard Visser 8. Denny Trimble 9. Bill Reimer 10. Norman Heiskanen 11. Neil MacDonald 12. Chris Shine 13. Chuck Lambert 14. Darien Trimble 15. Dirk Crans
< *c>Modifieds
•Heat #1—1. Dan Galloway (#01) 2. Steve Arpin (#00) 3. Chad Jonson (#18) 4. Ken Anderson (#9) 5. Kevin Randell (#89) 6. Jamie Davis (#85) 7. Vic Larson (#91)
•Heat #2—Results not available
•Feature—1. Steve Arpin 2. Ken Anderson 3. Vic Larson 4. Chad Jonson 5. Jamie Davis 6. Dan Galloway
< *c>Standings
< *c>Mini-Sprints
1. Ken Perry (300) 2. Kyle Ridlon (297) 3. Kenny Perry (50) 4. Steve Ridlon (208) 5. John Wightman (143) 6. Sam Pelowski (50) 7. Gerald Halestad (50) 8. Clay Sorteberg (49) 9. Jason Strom (48) 10. Jamie Smart (48) 11. Tanner Wightman (45) 12. Corey Olson (44) 13. Jeremy Hughes (0)
< *c>Streets
1. Ron Westover (364) 2. Denny Trimble (348) 3. Anthony Visser (341) 4. Jeff Wickstrom (336) 5. Richard Visser (333) 6. John Bosma (329) 7. Wes Morriseau (318) 8. Chris Shine (318) 9. Simon Crans (268) 10. Darien Trimble (224) 11. Bill Witherspoon (218) 12. Dirk Crans (191) 13. Dan Rea (168) 14. Neil MacDonald (116) 15. Jeremey Simmons (111) 16. Chuck Lambert (103) 17. Rob Ranttalo (98) 18. Milton David, Jr. (96) 19. Bill Reimer (90) 20. Zack Hasbargen (44) 21. Norman Heiskanen (44) 22. Greg Maki (41)
< *c>Modifieds
1. Vic Larson (351) 2. Dan Galloway (290) 3. Kevin Randell (289) 4. Jake Kamm (287) 5. Jamie Davis (254) 6. Ken Anderson (207) 7. Gavin Paull (205) 8. Steve Arpin (166) 9. Jason Anderson (147) 10. James Simmons (131) 11. Scott Greer (105) 12. Curtis Kamm (92) 13. Chad Jonson (91) 14. Kyle Gavel (89) 15. Gary Labine (49) 16. Mark Kangas (45) 17. Chuck Arpin (11) 18. Tom Smart (0)
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
