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Remembering a Friend
Dave Buss

They often say that the racing community is like a big family. There will be disagreements and spats throughout different areas. But in the end when it is time to come together you know that you can turn to your competitors, fans and friends. On Friday night, the Oshkosh Speedzone Raceway held the 2nd Annual LeRoy Dehn Memorial race where the drivers, the track and the fans paid tribute to an individual who meant a lot to the family.

The Miller Lite Grand Nationals led off feature action and it would Troy Weich leading things from the start but on lap three things would come to a screeching halt as Nick Schumacher would spin in front of traffic collecting Brian Monday, Gary Neau and sending Don Schumacher rolling in corner two. All drivers would walk away uninjured but the cars were in tough shape. When things restarted Weich and Tim Doehling would grab the front positions with Brian Henry running third. As the leaders battled, Henry made his move past both of them down the backstretch grabbing the lead. Henry would survive a couple of restarts to solidify his points lead and grab the feature win. Doehling finished second with Tim Reichenberger taking third.

The Modifieds were trackside next for their twenty lap feature which turned out to be the best race I have seen in a long time. After some early lap cautions in which one included the Mike Mueller machine ending up on its side the race would settle down a great show would take place. The actors in this show were Jay Schraufnagel and Dennis Schultz. Schraufnagel and Schultz locked in an epic battle of side by side racing. Each lap would be separated by just inches at the line. Schraufnagel running the middle groove and Schultz the low groove. After about 7 laps of racing side by side it would ultimately be Schraufnagel grabbing the lead and getting away for the win. Schultz would have to settle for second with Frank Firari grabbing third and Chris Engels fourth.

The Total Power Sales Street Stock division would run twenty five lap feature event to honor LeRoy Dehn. Frank Formiller looked to be the class of the field as he powered to an early lead and maintained that lead for the first twenty laps of the event despite many unsuccessful attempts by Jerry Kope to get past. However, on lap twenty two Kope got the room he needed and pounced on the opportunity. Kope would never look back and grab the win. Formiller would spin on the final lap after a great run and finish ninth. Shawn Haydon and Jeff Jungwirth rounded out the top three.

The Lynn’s Service Center Dirt Devil division would spend the first half of the race in stop and go racing as yellow again filled the air. Once things got in running order it would be Eddie Lemay grabbing the lead on lap seven and never looking back. Points leader Tim Sheppard would give him a hard time throughout the final laps but to no avail settling for second The rest of the top five would also remain the same over the last half of the race with Nick Furman finishing third, Matt Janke and Tyler Lind finishing just behind him.

The Fastrak Dirt Late Models would have a disappointing car count and run a ten lap feature event. Brett Swedberg would pick up the win with David Fieber, Scott Lewis, Ron Paulick and Steve Doehling finishing behind him.

Racing returns to Tuesday night for the final time this year with racing kicking off the Winnebago County Fair on Aug 5th at 6:30.