Uotinen Returns to ABC Raceway Victory Lane

Ashland, WI, August 9 — Defending WISSOTA Modified track champion Al Uotinen of Superior won his first feature in nearly eight years at the ABC Raceway Saturday night, while two other drivers – Paul Suzik and rookie Ethan Beeksma, both of Ironwood, MI – each earned their first career feature wins in another fast-paced AmsOil Dirt Track Series race program.
With the Ashland Area Chamber of Commerce as the presenting sponsor, eighty entries took to the mutli-groove, sticky-fast red-clay track for a full five-division show, after which the Raceway – in the middle of its 50th Anniversary season – hosted a picnic and party for all in attendance on a clear, comfortable evening.

For the second straight program no feature winner started from the front row, including Uotinen, who started the 20-lap Mod main directly behind polesitter Paul Niznik. As Steve Lavasseur moved around the outside on Niznik for the initial lead, Uotinen slipped by to the inside for second, while Kevin Eder, points leader Steve Stuart and visiting Andy Jones battled feverishly close behind for fourth.
Uotinen stuck to the bottom groove and Lavasseur stayed high on the wide racing surface, and those two staged a great side-by-side battle for the lead, until Donnie Lofdahl and Dustin Hudack got together on lap 6 to slow the pace. Then, on the restart, Eder and Jones spun and collected Neil Balduc, sending Eder to the tail for the next green flag.
With the final 14 laps clicking off non-stop, Uotinen again battled with Lavasseur, with the pair swapping the lead with every lap, before Uotinen finally gained the advantage for good on lap 13. By then Stuart had finally fought his way past Niznik for third, and by the time he caught and passed Lavasseur for second with two laps remaining, Uotinen had built a significant enough lead that he crossed the final stripe nearly two full seconds ahead for his 25th career feature win in Ashland but first since August 2006.
Jody Bellefeuille followed Stuart into third with two laps to go, and Lavasseur held on for fourth ahead of second-in-points Jeff Spacek, who started 16th.
With the ABC Raceway Board announcing this week that the WISSOTA Midwest Modified feature purse was to be bolstered a bit for the balance of the regular season, a full 20 cars were on hand for action. Suzik, in his third season, started the 15-lap feature inside on the second row but moved into the lead coming out of the first turns, while polestarter Tad Schoonover had his hands full holding off challenges from Rick Przybylski, Jeff Klopstein, Wayne Stricker and points leader Mike Truscott.
Tad Bretting looped his ride after the first lap and collected Duane Dunbar, and on the next attempt to start Tyler Vernon’s car dropped its driveshaft, but the frontrunners stayed in close formation after that restart as well. Debris stopped the show again after lap 2 was counted, but Przybylski had taken second prior to the yellow lights coming on.
From there the final 13 laps ran uninterrupted, and Klopstein grabbed second from Przybylski on that final restart of the race. A circuit later Truscott moved inside on Stricker and then Przybylski to take over third, but by then Suzik had a full-second lead and was pulling away.
Once in the open field, Klopstein had to use every trick in the book to hold off a charging Truscott, as the pair also began cutting into Suzik’s advantage. The front runners began weaving their way through the tail end of the field with two laps left, and in the traffic Truscott tried to get past Klopstein one last time with an unsuccessful three-wide pass. Suzik came home with the popular landmark win comfortably ahead of Klopstein, who held off Truscott.
Stricker was a distance back in fourth, and after some post-race controversy Tanner Hicks was awarded fifth.
Beeksma, whose father Patrick won 30 Six-Cylinder features and four track titles on the Ashland oval, started sixth on the 15-car grid and was part of an early-race seven-car cluster battling at the front of the Sixes’ headliner. By lap 2 Aaron Mashlan had won the argument over the lead, but the rookie Beeksma worked his way around Mashlan a lap later and held the lead for the rest of the run.
On lap 4 DeJay Mihalek’s car stopped on the back straight to bring out the first of the race’s two yellow-flag slowdowns, and after that restart Schultz and Tiffany Hudack leapt past Mashlan and pole starter Brandon Ottman into second and third, respectively. Beeksma was eight-tenths of a second up on Schultz on lap 7, but that lead disappeared when Mashlan tagged the back straightaway wall just shy of mid-race.
Hudack gained second place on the restart, and rookie Colton Vernon used a strong outside run to take third within another lap, but Beeksma had already picked up where he had left off, building another lead of a second or more. Dale Coddington joined Hudack and Vernon to form a fun three-car battle to watch for second, but Beeksma cruised to the win by a decisive cushion and earned the Northern Clearing fast-lap bonus in the process, posting a lap of 18.295 seconds during the run.
Second-finishing Hudack increased her points lead in the division significantly after her brother Tyler did not make the call for the feature, Coddington edged ahead of Vernon on the final lap, and Schutz took over second place in the points standings with his top-five run.
Mason’s Nick Oreskovich quickly worked his way from the second row to the front, then held off a determined Cory Casari to claim his second WISSOTA Super Stock feature win of the season here and second in as many nights, following a strong run at Superior on Friday. Oreskovich worked the inside line while Ken Truscott hustled around the high side for a couple of laps before Oreskovich finally laid claim to the lead, with points leader Scott Lawrence working quickly up to third.
On lap 3 Lawrence overtook Truscott for second but trailed the “Flyin’ Farmer” by nearly two-thirds of a second before a four-car scramble among backmarkers drew the yellow flag out for the only time in the 20-lap race. Casari restarted third and worked a low-groove line over the course of the first full lap back under green before finally wrestling second place from the 13-time track champ.
The half-second advantage that Oreskovich had created just after the restart began to dissolve, and with just three laps to go Casari was showing the nose of his car just off Oreskovich’s left shoulder and threatening to take the lead. Casari had to check up to avoid contact with Marcus Dunbar as the leaders put the rookie a lap down at the white flag, but he recovered enough to make one last unsuccessful charge at the checkers, where Oreskovich prevailed by 51 one-thousandths of a second – barely a fender-length.
Lawrence came within a tenth of a second of his track record in setting the fastest lap of the run (16.914 seconds) and picking up the Northern Clearing bonus as well as a third-place check. Andy Grymala and Truscott completed the top five
Matt Deragon of Ashland needed a last-lap pass of Chad Nikstad to win his fifth straight and track-best seventh Pure Stock feature of the season. But not all of the work he had to do to accomplish this task came on the race track – the division’s points leader lost a tire and wheel while leading his heat race earlier in the event.
Deragon did have to start dead last on the 12-car starting grid and recovered from an early-race bobble that put him at quite a disadvantage to the five-car lead pack, which was pulling away and putting on another wild show. But when leader Nikstad was spun by second-running Randy Graham with three laps in the books, Deragon regrouped and made a charge from a fifth-place restart.
Michael Blevins, making his first-ever visit to the Ashland track, and Steve Udeen sandwiched Nikstad on the restart, with Udeen edging ahead, but on lap 6 Nikstad fought back with an inside pass and reclaimed the lead. Deragon drove through the middle of the pack up to third, then slipped to the outside to pull alongside Nikstad with two laps left. Coming off the final turn Deragon edged ahead just enough for the win, while Blevins drove down low to Nikstad’s left flank to complete a three-wide formation under the checkered flag. Terran Spacek swiped fourth away from Udeen on the final lap.
Prior to the program, the ABC Raceway, along with Brian Custer, Tyler Vernon and Colton Vernon, representing Northern Clearing Inc, presented a check to Janice Koehler of the Ashland-Bayfield County chapter of the American Cancer Society’s “Relay for Life” program in the amount of $2,796, which was collected during the track’s recent fundraiser event.
The 11th annual “Pure Excitement 25” Pure Stock special will take place at the ABC Raceway on Saturday, August 16, presented by the Ashland-Bayfield County Sportsman’s Club. Fans and businesses are welcome to contribute to an overall feature purse that is expected to exceed $5,000 and will pay at least $700 to the winner. All five divisions will be in action on this next-to-last points-paying night of the 2014 season.
Hot laps start on Saturday night at 6:15 pm, and the first green flag of the night will fly at around 7. The grandstand and pit gates open at 5 pm, and admission tickets for fans ages 13 & older are just $10, while fans ages 12 and under are welcome in for free when accompanied by a paying adult. “Race Night” will provide up-to-date racing news and weather information live from the track on WJJH, 96.7 FM, and online at www.wjjhfm.com, from 4:30-6 pm on Saturday.
The ABC Raceway is located 3-1/2 miles south of Ashland on State Highway 13 and one mile west on Butterworth Road. For raceday information call (715) 682-4990, or log on to the track’s website, www.abcraceway.com.
Results
WISSOTA Modifieds
Feature: Al Uotinen, Superior; Steve Stuart, Ashland; Jody Bellefeuille, Duluth, MN; Steve Lavasseur, River Falls; Jeff Spacek, Phillips; Andy Jones, Princeton, MN; Paul Niznik, Medford; Rick Rivord, Superior; Pat Cook, Washburn; Kevin Eder, Ashland; Brian Mikkonen, Iron River; Travis Nye, Ashland; Scott Hudack, Ashland; Donnie Lofdahl, Duluth, MN; Dustin Hudack, Ashland; Talon Laabs, Stetsonville; Neil Balduc, Bessemer, MI.
Heat 1: Eder; Niznik; Jones; Lavasseur; Balduc; Nye; Laabs; Rivord; Cook.
Heat 2: Stuart; Bellefeuille; S Hudack; Uotinen; Mikkonen; Lofdahl; D Hudack; Spacek; Zack Pagels, Marengo.
WISSOTA Super Stocks
Feature: Nick Oreskovich, Mason; Cory Casari, Montreal; Scott Lawrence, Superior; Andy Grymala, Superior; Ken Truscott, Greenland, MI; Shawn McFadden Jr, Ashland; Don Muzzy, Ironwood, MI; Charlie Anderson, Ironwood, MI; DJ Keeler, Superior; Greg Kuklinski, Ironwood, MI; Dave Elliott, Minocqua; Myron Basina, Washburn; Mike Hince, Watertown; Marcus Dunbar, Marenisco, MI; Randy Spacek, Phillips.
Heat 1: Casari; Grymala; Muzzy; Elliott; Hince; Dunbar; Anderson; Kuklinski.
Heat 2: Lawrence; Oreskovich; McFadden; Truscott; Spacek; Keeler; Basina.
WISSOTA Midwest Modifieds
Feature: Paul Suzik, Ironwood, MI; Jeff Klopstein, Tomahawk; Michael Truscott, Chippewa Falls; Wayne Stricker, Highbridge; Tanner Hicks, Ashland; Cody Carlson, Superior; Mickey Nosser, Phillips; Tad Schoonover, Eagle River; Duane Dunbar, Marenisco, MI; Bill Muhlig, Bessemer, MI; Ryan Adamczak, Ashland; Ryan Barningham, Bayfield; Rick Przybylski, Ashland; Chris Bretting, Washburn; Ricky Davis, Bruno, MN; Cole Spacek, Phillips; Paul Niznik, Medford; Tyler Vernon, Ashland.
Heat 1: Klopstein; Stricker; Przybylski; Suzik; Brad Seavers, Rib Lake; Nosser; Carlson; Spacek; C Bretting; Davis.
Heat 2: Truscott; Niznik; Adamzak; Schoonover; Tad Bretting, Ashland; Hicks; Dunbar; Muhlig; Barningham; Vernon.
Six-Cylinders
Feature: Ethan Beeksma, Ironwood, MI; Tiffany Hudack, Ashland; Dale Coddington, Hayward; Colten Vernon, Ashland; Forrest Schultz, Ashland; Ken Tyykila, Iron River; DeJay Mihalek, Ashland; Brendon Ottman, Ashland; Adam Traaholt, Ashland; Brady Jokinen, Mellen; Jonathan Popp, Iron River; Aaron Mashlan, Ashland.
Heat 1: Coddington; Schultz; Mihalek; Mashlan; Traaholt; Jokinen; Vernon; Tyler Hudack, Ashland.
Heat 2: Beeksma; Tiffany Hudack; Tyykila; Ottman; Popp; Zack Pagels, Marengo.
Pure Stocks
Feature: Matt Deragon, Ashland; Chad Nikstad, Superior; Michael Blevins, Hibbing, MN; Terran Spacek, Phillips; Steve Udeen, Superior; Andrew Hanson, Iron River; Randy Graham, Trego; Jeff Christman, South Range; Tim Carbon, Highbridge; Rita Anderson, South Range; Brandle Pupp, Ashland; Matthew Cunha, Hibbing, MN.
Heat 1: Nikstad; Graham; Blevins; Christman; Anderson; Spacek.
Heat 2: Udeen; Carbon; Hanson; Cunha; Pupp; Deragon.

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