Fan Notes from Wayne County High Limit Sprint Car Series

Wayne County Speedway (Video Highlights from FloRacing.com) (Tom Myers) 5/16/23- I left work early and headed down to Orrville for the High Limit race that was paying $32,000 and some to the winner. The race was promoted as the Buckeye Brawl, the biggest race ever at Wayne County Speedway.

I arrived around 2:00 pm and went straight to the pits. The weather was perfect, not too hot, not too cool… just right. There ended up being 54 cars on hand to do battle. The track looked really good and well watered. The temperature didn’t seem warm enough to worry about it drying out.

Man, what a field of cars and racers! It was like a mini- nationals. I mean, really, we were only missing the top WoO points guys. Everyone else who is a top pilot was here. Later on, when Dad arrived, he asked me if there were any California drivers here to race. You have to understand, back in the day, it was a big deal when California drivers showed up because they had to come across the country, towing their cars and that kind of signaled a national event. Nowadays, California drivers just move to the Midwest and live here in Ohio or Indiana so they can race…or if they still live on the west coast, they hop a plane and fly out and then back. I explained this to my Dad and then reeled off some names. Larson is from California, as well as Abreu, Eliason, Sanders, Kofoid and Macedo. Heck, J.J. Hickle is from Washington State. I’m probably forgetting a few more.

Brad Sweet conducts the drivers' meeting I asked a Roth Motorsports crew guy if they hauled all the way across the country with that 83 car, since McFadden was competing in California the previous weekend. He said they all flew out here, but they keep more cars in the Midwest…. so this was a different car than what they drove in California…at least that is what I understood him to say. I asked Sye Lynch about his ride in the McCandless 29 and he said they planned on running the rest of the All Star tour in that car. That was cool to hear.

In the pits, I ran into my race friend Jack Schilb. Jack lives in Toledo and drives around to all the races in Ohio and Indiana. We met a few years ago at the races and its’ fun to see Jack and shoot the breeze. While in the pits, I also got to meet the History Mystery Man. He was walking around the pits looking for someone to interview and I came up to him and said, “ Hey, you’re the History Mystery Man.” If you don’t know who the History Mystery Man is, he has a Youtube channel and he interviews racers old and new and also does some Midwest history videos, especially of old towns and cool stuff. Recently, he posted a 3 or 4 part interview with Sammy Swindell. He also did an interview with Steve Kinser and there’s one with Karl Kinser as well as others. The videos are really done well, so look up the History Mystery Man channel on Youtube and treat yourself. One note about that Swindell interview…. Sammy doesn’t recall getting into any fights at the racetrack. That’s what he said during his interview, but I told the History Mystery Man that I saw Sammy and Steve throw punches at Wayne County in 1985 or 86 at a WoO show. Steve and Sammy were racing for the lead in the feature and spun each other out in turn 3. They both jumped out and ran at each other on the turn and started throwing punches. The History Mystery Man, ( I don’t know his name and I didn’t ask ) said he had a few others tell him the same thing after they saw his video.

A huge crowd showed up making the lines at the concession stand and the bathrooms much longer than usual. The line of folks trying to get in the place extended a football filed or more in length. The extra merchandise trailers behind the grandstands, combined with all the people there, made for cramped quarters when trying to get from one place to the other. It was cool for sure.

Justin Sanders Kyle Larson timed the quickest in qualifications. Group one results : . 57-Kyle Larson, 00:14.059[24]; 2. 83-James McFadden, 00:14.160[19]; 3. 9-Chase Randall, 00:14.312[18]; 4. 24-Rico Abreu, 00:14.413[15]; 5. 21H-Brady Bacon, 00:14.415[10]; 6. 11-Cory Eliason, 00:14.459[16]; 7. 19-Brent Marks, 00:14.468[26]; 8. 5T-Ryan Timms, 00:14.469[27]; 9. 4-Chris Windom, 00:14.486[22]; 10. 91-Tyler Gunn, 00:14.556[14]; / Group 2 results: 1. 39-Justin Sanders, 00:14.396[11]; 2. 52-Blake Hahn, 00:14.471[1]; 3. 8-Aaron Reutzel, 00:14.497[6]; 4. 7BC-Tyler Courtney, 00:14.584[27]; 5. 17-Sheldon Haudenschild, 00:14.618[15]; 6. 70-Scotty Thiel, 00:14.643[17]; 7. 55-Hunter Schuerenberg, 00:14.677[13]; 8. 13-Justin Peck, 00:14.680[22]; 9. 45-Tim Shaffer, 00:14.708[20]; 10. 71-Michael Kofoid, 00:14.740[21];

The series decided to scrap the non-qualifiers race and instead put 14 cars in the 4 heat races. Heats were 10 laps with the top 5 going to the feature. The first heat finish was Larson, Randall, Bacon, Windom and Cole Macedo. The Heat 2 finish was McFadden, Timms, Abreu, Eliason and Price-Miller. The heat 3 finish was Sanders, Ruetzel, Haudenschild, Schurenburg and Macri. The heat 4 finish was Courtney, Hahn, Peck, Kofoid and Dietrich. The B-main transfers were Thiel, Gunn, Lynch and Spithaler. Brown and Marks did not transfer but later chose to take their provisional and start at the tail. Each High Limit driver only gets one provisional for the season.

After the dash, the first 4 rows of the feature lined up with Randall and Sanders in row 1, Larson and McFadden in row 2, Courtney and Reutzel in row 3 and Hahn and Timms in row 4.

Kyle Larson celebrates his High Limit win at Wayne County Tuesday Randall grabbed the lead from the start with Sanders following, but Larson quickly got by Sanders and then reeled in Randall. Kyle looked smooth as he pressured Chase and then grabbed the lead from Chase on or around lap 8. Larson then drove away for the win. Kyle made it look easy. He is so so good in any racecar he gets in. It looked for awhile like Sanders and Courtney and Haudenschild would mount a challenge, when they got close to Kyle in traffic a few times. But then a yellow or one of the pursuers would hit the guardrail or cushion real hard. Windom had a great run. He and Courtney and Haudenschild waged a torrid battle racing 3 wide for 3rd place, slicing and dicing back and forth. Then Peck and Brown came up as Windom and Haud faded and Courtney got upside down on the next to the last lap.

The finish was Larson, Sanders, Peck, Brown, who was up from 25th spot, Abreu, Windom, Reutzel, Marks, Haudenschild and McFadden.

The track stayed racy all evening and the racing action was very good. The program ran smoothly and with the exception of the dust kicking up, everything else seemed to work out nicely. I was talking to one of the High Limit officials and thanked him for the series coming to Wayne County Speedway. He said it was what Brad and Kyle wanted to do, along with Sheldon. So thank you Brad and Kyle and Sheldon. Also, I want to thank Wayne County Speedway for working so hard to put these good shows on for us the fans.

See you at the next one!

High Limit Sprint Car Series At Wayne County Results

1  Kyle Larson
2 Justin Sanders
3 Justin Peck
4 Brian Brown
5 Rico Abreu
6 Chris Windom
7 Aaron Reutzel
8 Brent Marks
9 Sheldon Haudenschild
10 James McFadden
11 Danny Dietrich
12 Brandon Spithaler
13 Brady Bacon
14 Cole Macedo
15 Anthony Macri
16 Buddy Kofoid
17 Parker Price-Miller
18 Sye Lynch
19 Ryan Timms
20 Chase Randall
21 Tyler Gunn
22 Tyler Courtney
23 Cory Eliason
24 Hunter Schuerenberg
25 Scotty Thiel
DNS Blake Hahn