For The Fans

It is one of our biggest events of the season and it happens within the first month of our new year.

FanFest brings in a ton of new faces, and some that haven’t been in a while, through our gates to enjoy some great short track racing action from our Friday night stars. If you are new to FanFest, our evening starts at 6:45pm when we open the flagstand gate and invite our fans down to meet our drivers during the annual FanFest Autograph Session. At 7:15pm, the racing goes green. This year, in order to accommodate all divisions within a suitable time frame, heat races have been cut from this event only to make sure every class gets to run in front of the big crowd.

It is an event that makes our drivers go harder, if that is even possible, to put on a show for the crowd and makes our crowd get up on their feet to salute the drivers that are putting on a great show every Friday night. At the end of the day, it is a Win/Win for everyone.

Oh, and did I mention the FREE GRANDSTAND ADMISSION if you picked up a ticket from one of our great participating sponsors. (Click here to find out who's got them!) They love racing and love supporting our drivers, so if you haven’t already, be sure to stop in and thank them for standing behind their stock car racing program within the HRM.

Now, onto the racing portion of the show.

A quick recap. We’ve had repeat winners so far in our Toursec Thunder, Hydraulics Plus Bandolero Bandit and Hydraulics Plus Bandolero Beginner divisions. Our Hydraulics Plus Bandolero Outlaws and Strictly Hydraulics Legends have both gone three races with three different feature winners while our Sportsman class has only completed one feature after our second race was fogged out (no makeup date has officially been scheduled yet).

For all divisions, this will be the third or fourth week of racing. We are transitioning from that time where drivers have shaken the rust off from the winter months and should have their cars all but dialed in for racing. Some drivers and teams catch on to setup tweaks and changes quicker than others but for the most part teams will now know what at least doesn’t work on their race cars and what changes work better than others.

What does it mean? We are in for a great early Summer stretch of racing between now and our mid-Summer break in July.

Let’s start with the Strictly Hydraulics Legends division, where in three 25-lap features we’ve seen three different winners and our share of fireworks. All three drivers, Cory Hall, Braden Langille and Emily Meehan, have gone to victory lane with an FZ09 motor in their cars as well, which is worth noting. Nathan Blackburn and Andrew Lively each have two top five finishes in three races and find themselves second and third in the standings behind Meehan. With this FanFest event being a special show, it wouldn’t surprise me to see some part time drivers make appearances this week as well trying to become the fourth different winner on the CARSTAR Weekly Series Strictly Hydraulics Legends program in as many feature events.

One of the most intriguing Tim Hortons at the Airport Rookie of the Year fights is also brewing in the Strictly Hydraulics Legends division with four rookies looking to take home the extra cash at the end of the season. It seems like wherever Tanner Spinney finishes, Matthew Rushton hasn’t been too far behind or in front of him. Spinney is ninth in the standings and leads all rookies, but he’s only eight points up on Rushton, who is 13th overall. Think about that, that’s how close the points are with five drivers within eight points from ninth to 13th, or 12 points between six drivers if you count Arnie Spinney in 14th. Dylan Sutherland, who hasn’t been able to catch a break this season after a strong end to 2018, sophomore driver Jody Fraser, who almost won a heat last week and reigning Tim Hortons at the Airport Rookie of the Year Nicole Richard find themselves between Tanner Spinney and Rushton after three races.

Don’t count out the Wadden family either. Devin and Brad have both experienced mechanical issues early this year and hopefully they’ve put those behind them and can now focus on dialing in their Legend cars. Devin leads his father by nine points and is only 25 points out of Spinney for the Rookie of the Year lead.

Our second big battle for a freshman title after three races comes in the Toursec Lightning division. Matt Burgoyne has a six point advantage on Roy Christian and another eight points back is Ashley Stevens. Burgoyne has a bit more oval experience than his two peers battling for the title but this is the Bridgewater drivers first year on asphalt. Matt and his father Rick have a few years under their belt at Valley Raceway, but as they’ve told me the pavement racing is a whole different animal. They’ve been experimenting with different tires and the car they are racing is a new build so while they are also trying out a different discipline of racing, they are also racing a different race car.

We’ve mentioned in this space before, it doesn’t matter if the car is a brand new Pro Stock or it’s a Lightning car, it will take some time to get accustomed to. Some teams will chase a car for races while some get it right away. For the Burgoynes, they are also running on a new surface. It’s a tall task, but keep an eye on that No. 181 car as he battles for a rookie title in 2019.

Transitioning with that new car conversation, it was neat to see Nathan Langille shake the monkey off his back and score a big win on Friday night. That team had still been trying to dial in their car and those extra hours in the shop finally paid off in a convincing win for the No. 3 car. Give some big credit to Nathan Singer too. Once Langille got by Singer for the lead, Singer was able to stabilize a two to three length gap behind Langille as he chased him to the stripe at the end. If we have a fourth different winner in as many races in the Hydraulics Plus Bandolero Outlaw class, it may come from Singer on Friday night with another solid run like last week.

We’re running out of room here for the week, but keep an eye on these Sportsman boys and girl this week as they look to get back to racing action this week. After running heats before getting fogged out two weeks ago and an off night last Friday, you best believe they are chomping at the bit to get back to racing. Matt Vaughan and Pete Miller are both coming off great finishes last weekend at Riverside International Speedway and Deven Smith looked real good until he had to visit pit road late. Add them, along with the likes of Jordan Veinotte, Richard Salter, Alex Johnson and Megan Parrott, among others, on Friday night and we are in for quite a show on Friday evening.

Speaking of Johnson, I want to thank Alex for joining me last week on the call of the Toursec Twin 50s. It was great to get his take on our racing program and pick his brain about the action on track. This week, I’ll be joined by current Parts for Trucks Pro Stock Tour point leader Dylan Blenkhorn. Among his resume which includes an IWK 250 and Toromont Cat 250 win are two Scotia Speedworld track championships early in his career. He’s also won the last two Pro Stock Tour races at the track dating back to last September. If the FanFest action wasn’t enough to get you to the race track, you know it’ll be a party with Dylan in the house!

It’s going to be a great night of racing and we hope to see you out there as we salute some of the greatest fans of stock car racing in the region!

Until then, keep the hammer down and we’ll see you at the track.