ABC Offering Big Purse for Mid-Mods Saturday; IRA Sprints Added August 1

by Nick Gima

                Ashland, WI, July 15 — The only thing consistent about the schedule for the ABC Raceway so far during the Summer of 2020 has been its state of constant change.

                The Board of Directors of the Ashland-Bayfield County Racing Association has made a couple more significant adjustments to its upcoming slate, starting with this Saturday night’s show.

                The WISSOTA Midwest Modifieds will be running for a huge $1,500 winner’s check during the rescheduled opening round of the first-ever Ashland Ford-Chrysler Center “Summer Series” for that division. Saturday’s opener of the three-race series will be presented by the Safari Tavern of Ashland.

                WISSOTA Modifieds, Pure Stocks and Hornets, plus ABC Raceway Six-Cylinders, will also be included in Saturday’s offering, while the WISSOTA Super Stocks get the night off. But the Raceway’s Board has also extended an invitation to area Street Stock drivers to compete at the historic three-eighths-mile northern Wisconsin oval for a night of unsanctioned racing.

                “The Midwest Mods have drawn the largest numbers in any division in WISSOTA for several seasons now,” Raceway president Eric Erickson recently offered. “We’ve drawn around 60-70 of them for each of the past five Red Clay Classics.

                “Zeilie’s Tree Service of Ashland stepped up with a huge contribution to this Saturday’s show for the Mid-Mods. So with the first-place check for this race equal to what we paid at last year’s Classic, there’s good reason to expect a strong car count for this event.”

                Mid-Mod racers and their fans have benefitted from the inclusion of at least one increased-purse show for them on the ABC Raceway schedule every Summer since 2006 – two seasons before the division was added to the venerable track’s regular weekly offering.

                The addition of unsanctioned Street Stocks was a last-minute suggestion within the Raceway’s Board of Directors earlier this week. Based on the positive feedback of both fans and drivers from the division’s visit back in mid-June, the invitation has been sent out to drivers who would, under normal circumstances, be otherwise racing at tracks in Menomonie, Rice Lake, Three Lakes, Tomahawk, and a small number of Minnesota tracks.

                “It won’t be a big purse, like we had for the June show,” Erickson explained, “but we will pay out a bit more than these drivers are used to getting for a regular night’s work, and it will give them a chance to race.

                “Drivers will run under the rules of their own home-track sanction. It should make for an interesting comparison of types of race cars on what is basically a neutral track.”

                The first 500 paying customers to enter the grandstands at each of the Summer Series’ three events will receive a commemorative “can koozie.” The Series will also include events here on August 8 and during the Raceway’s regular-season finale on August 29.

                Slated since May, the ABC Raceway will host the championship round of the five-track, five-night FastLane Motorsports Northland Super Stock Series on July 25. But a recent update to the August 1 offering should get fans of another kind of high-speed action enthused.

                The Interstate Racing Association’s powerful winged 410 sprint cars will head to Ashland for a full night of qualifying events and feature racing. The “winged warriors,” whose cars can reach lap speeds exceeding 100 mph on ABC’s sticky red-clay oval, will be coming off of major tour stops at Plymouth and Antigo on the two nights immediately prior to their eighth-ever scheduled appearance here.

                For this Saturday’s show, the pit gates will open at 4:30 pm, the grandstand gates will welcome fans in at 5, hot laps will kick off the on-track action at 6:15, and green-flag racing gets going at 7 pm. Adult grandstand admission tickets are just $11 per person, either at the gate or online via www.myracepass.com, and kids ages 12 and under are admitted free when accompanied by a paying adult. Ten-race punch passes are also available at the Raceway’s ticket window on race nights, and advance pit passes are also available online.

                “Race Night” will air on WBSZ, 93.3 FM, as well as online at www.wbszfm.com, from 4:30 until 6 pm with the latest news and weather information from the track.

                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, log on to the track’s website, www.abcraceway.com, or check out the track’s FaceBook page.