The 4^th Turn

~ By Tom Boggie

How does a promoter know when he’s done a good job?

When Gary Balough, who knows a little bit about putting excitement into dirt track racing, stands in victory lane and shouts, “What a f—in’ SHOW!”

That was Balough’s reaction, and I’m sure just about everyone else who walked out of Albany-Saratoga Speedway Tuesday night felt the same way after Brett Hearn’s “Big Show 11.”

As everyone knows by now, Stewart Friesen put on an I-don’t-believe-what-I-just-saw charge and walked out with $11,111, snatching the Super DIRTcar Series’s top prize right out of Hearn’s pocket on lap 110 of the 111-lap feature. As a driver, Hearn was disappointed; as a promoter, he was ecstatic.

“I won before I even took the green flag,” said Hearn, discussing the promoting side of “Big Show 11.” “This was a great show, and everyone had a great time. To see the smiles on everyone’s faces, that was awesome. And to be in contention at the end, that $11,111 was starting to look real good.”

A lot of the credit for the great finish has to go to promoter Lyle DeVore, who also handles track prep at the speedway. A serious storm rolled through the Malta area in the morning, and DeVore and his staff spent the rest of the day getting the track ready, giving the star-studded field of drivers a perfect racing surface.

“We could run all over the track,” said Hearn. “That’s what dirt fans want.”

Until Friesen’s late charge, Hearn was actually the star of the show. He set fast time during time trials, and also won his heat race. The draw put him fourth on the “Big Show” grid.

“The funny thing was, we were really bad Friday night,” said Hearn, who struggled to a 14th-place finish at Malta. “We were as bad as we’ve been here in the last two years. But then to come off the trailer and set fast time, that was really good for us.”

Friesen wasn’t perfect until the last two laps of the race, and he was quick to give credit to the DKM and Halmar crews for getting him to victory lane.

“This is a new piece,” said Friesen of his DKM chassis. “The guys were really grinding and trying to get something good on a black, slick track like we had tonight.

“When we had that caution on lap 98, I thought, ‘I’m sure glad Brett made this a 111-lap race.”

By winning “Big Show 11,” Friesen made his October a little easier, because one of the perks of the win is a guaranteed starting spot in the Billy Whittaker Cars 200 at Oswego Speedway during Super DIRT week. The NASCAR Gander World Truck Series will be running in Talladega during Super DIRT Week, and Friesen was a little worried about flying back and forth for qualifying for both events. But now, with the guaranteed starting spot, he can race at Talledega on Saturday afternoon and be in Oswego on Sunday in plenty of time to start at the rear of the field in the 200.

So when all was said and done, Friesen was happy, Hearn was happy, Devore was happy, and Andrew Ferguson was happy.

Who is Andrew Ferguson, you might ask? He’s the Camillus-based driver who pulled into Albany-Saratoga for the first time ever Tuesday night. After winning the Last Chance Qualifier, he had a choice to make; take a $750 payday or take the last starting spot in “Big Show 11.”

DIRTcar Series announcer Shane Andrews leaned into Ferguson’s car and asked him the big question.

“I’ll take the money and sit in the stands and enjoy the show with [the fans],” Ferguson said.

NOTES AND QUOTES

When Ronnie Johnson won last Friday’s modified feature at Albany-Saratoga, he said he couldn’t put his finger on why the car was so much better.

Now I know why he said that. He really didn’t know.

I ran into my old friend Dennis Palmatier, who is now the Northeast modified specialist for Integra shocks, at “Big Show 11” and he explained the scenario to me.

“Ronnie called me last week and said he wanted me to put my shocks on his car and set it up,” said Palmatier. “And he said, ‘Don’t even tell me what you do.’”

That explains everything.

Rocky Warner was a late arrival for “Big Show 11” and was driving a different car. The Flying Squirrel has acquired a ride in the Jason Simmons Racing 358 modified. Simmons is a former supermodified driver at Oswego whose primary driver is Tyler Thompson.

“They were late leaving their shop, and then I had to fit the seat and scale the car,” said Warner, who scored his third modified win of the year at Fonda on Saturday, and won three of four races, including the Jason Morrison Memorial for one of his longtime friends, at Glen Ridge on Sunday. “That’s why we were late. But we’re just here to do some testing and get it ready.”

Warner failed to qualify for Wednesday’s DIRTcar 358 Series race at Can-Am, and was scheduled to try again Thursday night at Fulton. Tim Fuller got the win Wednesday at Can-Am.

Tim Hartman Jr. won one of the 20-lap sportsman races run in conjunction with “Big Show 11’” He spent the first half of the race trying to find a way around invader Jesse Leiby. But once he got around Leiby, it was clear sailing on his way to his second win of the year at Malta.

“I’d have blocked like that, too, if I had the lead,” said Hartman. “He knew I was a little bit better than him, and he did what he could to keep me back there.”

Leiby, who goes by the nickname “The Gunslinger” and wears a black cowboy hat in the pits, is the 2017 sportsman champion at Orange County Speedway.

Former track champion Jeremy Pitts won the other 20-lap sportsman feature, marking the second year in a row he’s been to victory lane on “Big Show” night. In fact, Pitts seems to save some of his best runs for “Big Show” nights. In 2016, the sportsman ran three features, with Pitts winning two of them.

Derrick McGrew Jr. made a new fan Tuesday night. DJ Eric Sanchez, who handles the sound mix for Hearn’s “Big Shows,” couldn’t believe it when speedway announcer Dan Martin mentioned that McGrew was only 12 years old, and was even more astonished to discover that McGrew had won 17 races last year. So before the modified feature, McGrew and his father made a quick trip to the control tower to meet Sanchez and get a couple of pictures.

AROUND THE TRACKS

Jackie Brown Jr. was in the wrong place at the wrong time, if being second can be in the wrong place. In last Friday’s modified feature at Albany-Saratoga, Brown and Matt DeLorenzo were having a heck of a battle for second when a caution came out. On the restart, Bobby Hackel IV got too high coming out of turn two and ran into Brown. Brown tried to get to the bottom, but Neil Stratton and Marc Johnson had already filled that hole, and Brown wound up spinning his car around. In a matter of seconds, Brown went from second to last, through no fault of his own.

Despite having two second-place finishes so far at Albany-Saratoga, Warner is still looking for the right combination. “We’re still a little off,” he said after finishing second to Johnson Friday night. “I’m still too free on the bottom and two tight on top. We’ll just keep working at it.”

During last Friday’s hot lap session before the modified feature, Peter Britten’s car came to a sudden stop in the third turn. After getting pushed back to the pits, Britten discovered that water had gotten into one of his fuel jugs. His crew then had to drain the diluted fuel out from the cell and the fuel lines. Now out of fuel, Britten had to borrow fuel from Keith Flach for the feature. But he made it pay off with a third-place finish.

It was good to see Jack Cottrell honored by the Mohawk Valley Vintage Dirt Modified group Saturday at Fonda Speedway. Cottrell won his first late model championship in 1977 and I started covering racing in 1980, so needless to say, I spent a lot of time with Jack and his wife, Debbie. Too often, drivers like Cottrell, who were the backbone of racing for so long, go unrecognized after they retire. The MVVDM group gave him another night in the spotlight.

Anthony Perrego spent the last month at Albany-Saratoga on Friday nights, preparing for “Big Show 11.” But he only finished 24^th on Tuesday. Does that mean he’s done racing in Malta on Friday nights?

Ken Tremont Jr., who is still looking for his first win at Albany-Saratoga, won last Sunday’s sportsman/modified feature at Devil’s Bowl, and another Albany-Saratoga regular, 17-year-old David Boisclair, won the sportsman feature, his first win ever at the Bowl. He had one win in the limited sportsman division at Albany-Saratoga last year, and has a pair of seconds to his credit so far this year at Malta.

Albany-Saratoga will be having its annual fireworks display Friday night. The racing card will include another $1,000 to win sportsman feature.