Rice Lake Speedway Racers Ready for 2017 Season
Rice Lake WI – As the calendar turns over to the month of April, drivers at the Rice Lake Speedway grow anxious for the first on track activity. As some drivers and crews rush to get their cars finished and lettered for the start of the new season, others wait for the first laps to be turned at the speedway.
Mitch Hansen has already been on the track making final preparations for the first competitive laps of the 2017 racing season and the track is expected to be in top notch shape for racing after a relatively mild Winter.
April 12th is the date many drivers have circled as that is when the first on track action is scheduled. An open practice night is slated for that Wednesday night with cars in all classes invited to work out any kinks in their machines before opening night. A 6-9 pm practice night is scheduled but the speedway website or facebook page should be checked periodically to make sure that no weather related postponements have taken place.
The first night of the 2017 racing season is slated for Saturday night, April 15th with the first green flag expected to fly shortly after 6:30 pm. The same racing program will be presented in 2017 with five classes of cars in action weekly along with a number of special events. WISSOTA sanctioned Modifieds, Super Stocks, Midwest Modifieds and Street Stocks will be joined by, for the first time, sanctioned Pure Stocks as all five classes will now race under the WISSOTA banner.
Weekly racing will take place every Saturday night through the Labor Day weekend with several special events and midweek races also on the card. Along with the weekly classes, Sprint cars both winged and non winged, Late Models and Mini Mods will have nights at the track. The Firecracker special will be held on Monday night, July 3rd and special Aquafest trophy races will be held on Tuesday night, June 6th. A Super Stock special will take place on July 1st and the Shaw Trucking Late Model Challenge Series will visit Rice Lake on July 29th. The Street Stock Little Dream race, continuing to gain more national attention each year, will be held on August 1st.
Track officials are optimistic about car counts for 2017 with a number of rookie drivers already registered for action and several drivers returning to racing after having been sidelined for several years.
Among those back on the track for 2017 are Rice Lake’s Chad Eastman and Barron’s Josh Bach. Both last raced regularly in 2012 in the Pure Stock class with Eastman being the division runner up. However, both are moving up to the Street Stock class for 2017. Also joining the Streets in 2017 is Kirk Bogdanovic from Phillips. Bogdanovic was a top driver in that class who stepped away from the sport a number of years ago. In 2017, he is looking forward to rubbing wheels with his brother Kevin, who has been one of the top drivers in the Street division the last couple years at Rice Lake. A number of other surprises are also in order for opening night fans.
The Rice Lake Speedway is located one mile North of Rice Lake midway between state highway 48 and Barron county SS. Check the speedway website at www.ricelakespeedway.net or their facebook page for more updates.
Comments
comments