By: Tony Baranek
SCHERERVILLE, IN (July 22, 2006) - It's highly doubtful that Dave Weltmeyer could have literally run around Illiana Speedway's half-mile oval Saturday night, given that he was still feeling some of the effects of a recent surgical procedure on his left knee.
But he sure did show some pretty impressive wheels.
The "Dyer Flyer" earned his fifth late-model feature win of the season, holding off points leader Mike White by less than a car-length.
The race was run in a continuous drizzle, which made things kind of tricky for the 12-car field. It was especially tough for quick runners like Weltmeyer, who had to work his way up carefully from the third row. "It (the rain) intimidated me," Weltmeyer admitted. "At the beginning my windshield was pretty full and I felt some slippage in the car. I had to wait until I got some grip before I made some moves and got more confidence."
The early leader was Len Nowosel, who did a good job of holding off Joe O'Connor for quite awhile before O'Connor, with Weltmeyer behind him, made the pass on the backstretch on lap 11. Two laps later, Weltmeyer passed O'Connor.
White, meanwhile, came from the rear of the field to work himself into contention with nine laps remaining. He closed on Weltmeyer and got within a car-length just before the white flag lap when a spin by Jeff Cannon brought out a yellow.
That set up a one-lap drag race the finish line between Weltmeyer and White. White got inside as they came out of Turn 3, but couldn't get far enough underneath to attempt to make a pass. "You're not going to beat him in one lap. You know what I'm saying?" White said of Weltmeyer. "We made it look interesting, but Dave drove a great race. My hat's off to him. We'll try again next week. "I got stuck there a little bit early behind some guys, but once I got into second I had a real fast car and I could run by myself. I just wish it was 30 laps instead of 25.''
Weltmeyer indicated that he felt no serious ill effects from having his left knee scoped. "I'm a lot better than I was 10 days ago," he said. "But Mike White has sure set a new high standard. His car is really working well. I saw him coming and he didn't lose anything the whole race. "I got tighter and tighter and I knew I was in trouble there at the end. I appreciate him racing me clean. But he set a new standard and now we've got to take this car home and work on it."
O'Connor held on for an impressive third-place finish. John Nutley was fourth, followed by Nowosel and Bobby Gash.
Jack Kalwasinski put on a power show at the start of the 25-lap limited late-model feature, but wound up hanging on at the finish to beat Phil Splant by 0.138 seconds.
Kalwasinski roared by Bill Neering on lap 3 to take the lead. Splant moved into second place by lap 7, but didn't seriously challenge until the last portion of the event. "Things changed, Kalawasinski said. "The car was loose and the rain didn't help me at all. Phil got on my bumper, but we got No. 6 (win) and that's all that matters when you're going for the championship.
Said Splant: "A couple more laps and I think we'd have been OK. Jack was good, but my car was coming in. It's good to be back. It's the first good car that I've had in a long time. We've had a lot of problems since we wrecked (a month ago). Hopefully we'll be good from here on."
Andy Marchiniak ran a solid race and finished third, ahead of Kevin McCann, Joe Fadke and Marc Hankosky. The scariest incident of the night occurred on lap 18. A few laps earlier, while battling near the front, Richard Dawson and Bill Neering had contact in Turn 1, with Neering spinning. Both were sent to the back of the cars on the current lap for the restart.
They restarted behind rookie Gina Mooi, who was in only her second night but was running well enough to stay with the lead pack. For two laps, Neering and Dawson ran side by side behind her, before Neering found an opening on the high side on the back straightaway.
While Neering made the pass, Dawson stayed on the bottom behind Mooi. The resulting contact between Dawson and Mooi sent her spinning into the infield. Her No. 66 smashed passenger side into one of the light standards.
The car was destroyed. Mooi, other than being shaken up, was uninjured. She was credited with 15th place. Dawson was disqualified.
A family feud erupted in the Mid-American feature when Shawn Wiltjer passed his uncle, Bill Neering, on the final lap to claim his first ever win.
The showdown was set up when a yellow flag fell on lap 24, allowing Wiltjer to start on Neering's back bumper for a one-lap shootout. Wiltjer got a good jump on Neering, and was already underneath him by the time they came out of Turn 2.
The race to the finish saw Neering bump Wiltjer very hard as they came out of Turn 4. Wiltjer, however, held on for the victory ahead of Neering, John Marshall, Tom Knippenberg, Dean Patterson and Darrel Sills.
"He (Wiltjer) drove right into me on the restart," an irate Neering said. "He should be ashamed. I know he's my nephew, but bad class. No class at all to drive into somebody like that. Terrible, terrible. "Going into (Turn) 1 he never gave me a chance. He just drove right through me. I'm not proud of him, and he should be ashamed. His first feature (win) is a disgrace."
Wiltjer said that the move was more a payback than anything else. "I sat there and pondered the whole time (during the yellow) what I had to do to get around him. I was hoping he'd spin his wheels and he did. I figured he'd blow the corner and he did. I wanted to make it a little bit cleaner, but he didn't give me much room. That's racing. At least we put on a good show for the fans.''
As for Neering's complaints... "I guess you could say I'm a little ashamed because I actually took a page out of Bill Neering's book," Wiltjer said. "He did it to me in the heat, so I decided to do it to him in the feature. He got my position in the heat, and I got his position in the feature."
Defending turbo stox champ Bill Serviss continued his mid-season surge with a victorious run in the 25-lap feature. Serviss held off an impressive effort on the outside groove by Chris Woodall.
"We finally got a decent bite a couple of times, but man, that was a great race by Chris," Serviss said. "I take my hat off to him. That's tough to run the outside groove like that. It takes a heck of a driver."
Eddie Ligue fought off points leader Tom Prim to claim third place, while Tony Neering was fifth and Brian Kucaba sixth.
Mike Jucius was the king of the pure stocks for the second time this season, beating out Dave Jacobs and Kelton Kaechle in the main event.
Late-model
Qualifying: 1. Jeff Cannon (19.815), 2. Mike White (19.965), 3. Bobby Gash (20.124), 4. Dave Weltmeyer (20.176), 5. Stevie Campbell (20.194), 6. John Nutley (20.248), 7. Len Nowosel (20.377), 8. Joe O'Connor (20.474), 9. Woody Pool (20.887), 10. Richard Ruckh (21.011), 11. Sean Murphy (21.268), 12. Don Sabatino (21.386).
1st heat: 1. Nutley, 2. White, 3. Campbell, 4. Weltmeyer, 5. Cannon, 6. Gash.
2nd heat: 1. Nowosel, 2. O'Connor, 3. Pool, 4. Ruckh, 5. Sabatino, 6. Murphy.
Feature: 1. Weltmeyer, 2. White, 3. O'Connor, 4. Nutley, 5. Nowosel, 6. Gash, 7. Campbell, 8. Cannon, 9. Pool, 10. Murphy, 11. Sabatino, 12. Ruckh.
Limited late-model
Qualifying: 1. Joe Fadke (20.281), 2. Phil Splant (20.312), 3. Marc Hankosky (20.429), 4. Jack Kalwasinski (20.475), 5. Rich Dawson (20.536), 6. Kevin McCann (20.568), 7. Bill Neering (20.776), 8. Michael Marden (20.855), 9. Steven Brooks (20.954), 10. Richard McGill (21.416), 11. Paul Zolodz (21.430), 12. John Finley (21.551), 13. Andy Marchiniak (21.695), 14. Gina Mooi (22.037), 15. Nick O'Dell (22.186), 16. Dennis Lyp (22.902), 17. Rick Miazga (23.286), 18. Kevin Offdenkamp (23.834).
1st heat: 1. Kalwasinski, 2. McCann, 3. Marden, 4. Splant, 5. Fadke, 6. Dawson, 7. Neering, 8. Hankosky, 9. Brooks, 10. McGill.
2nd heat: 1. Marchiniak, 2. Finley, 3. Zolodz, 4.Mooi, 5. Lyp, 6 Miazga, 7. Offdenkamp.
Feature: 1. Kalwasinski, 2. Splant, 3. Marchiniak, 4. McCann, 5. Fadke, 6. Hankosky, 7. Neering, 8. Brooks, 9. Zolodz, 10. Finley, 11. McGill, 12. Lyp, 13. Miazga, 14. Offdenkamp, 15. Mooi, 16. Marden, 17. Dawson (disqualified).
Mid-American
Qualifying: 1. Shawn Wiltjer (20.878), 2. Bill Neering (21.324), 3. Len Koprowski (21.326), 4. John Marshall (21.405), 5. Sean Matthuis (21.410), 6. Dean Patterson (21.424), 7. Darrell Sills (21.527), 8. Jeff Dillingham (21.769), 9. Tom Knippenberg (21.870), 10. Joe Clark (21.973), 11. Chris Martin (22.046), 12. Mike Wienc (22.427), 13. Brad Schug (23.912).
1st heat: 1. Sills, 2. Matthuis, 3. Koprowski, 4. Neering, 5. Wiltjer, 6. Marshall, 7. Patterson, 8. Dillingham.
2nd heat: 1. Knippenberg, 2. Clark, 3. Martin, 4. Wienc, 5. Schug.
Feature: 1. Wiltjer, 2. Neering, 3. Marshall, 4. Knippenberg, 5. Patterson, 6. Sills, 7. Clark, 8. Koprowski, 9. Wienc, 10. Schug, 11. Matthuis, 12. Martin, 13. Dillingham.
Turbo stox
Qualifying: 1. Tony Meier (17.933), 2. Bill Serviss (18.046), 3. Tony Neering (18.115), 4. Eddie Wolf (18.189), 5. Tom Prim (18.200), 6. Chris Woodall (18.209), 7. Mark Ross Jr. (18.278), 8. Ryan Moore (18.285), 9. Ed Ligue (18.299), 10. Brian Kucaba
(18.315), 11. Pat O'Rourke (18.321), 12. Mark Ross Sr. (18.384), 13. Bobbie Jean Wall (18.480), 14. Billy Jarrells (18.594), 15. Steve Prim (18.635), 16. D.J. Wilson (18.674), 17. Bill Neering (18.817), 18. Nick Grish (19.948), 19. Micha Sims (19.081).
1st heat: 1. Woodall, 2. Serviss, 3. Neering, 4. Kucaba, 5. Ligue, 6. Meier, 7. T. Prim, 8. Ross Jr., 9. Moore.
2nd heat: 1. Grish, 2. Wilson, 3. O'Rourke, 4. Ross, 5. Simms, 6. Jarrells, 7. Wall, 8. S. Prim.
Feature: 1. Serviss, 2. Woodall, 3. Ligue, 4. T. Prim, 5. Neering, 6. Kucaba, 7. Meier, 8. O'Rourke, 9. Jarrells, 10. Grish, 11. Wall, 12. Simms, 13. S. Prim, 14. Wilson, 15. Moore, 16. Ross, 17. Ross Jr.
Pure stocks
1st heat: 1. Mike Young Jr., 2. Matt Schaaf, 3. Matt Hiskes.
2nd heat: 1. Bob Palermo, 2. Levi Frey, 3. Bill Palermo.
3rd heat: 1. Helen Nester, 2. Tim Cronin, 3. Bob Rohweder.
Semi: 1. Craig Miller.
Feature: 1. Mike Jucius, 2. Dave Jacobs, 3. Kelton Kaechle, 4. Joe Moeglin, 5. Cronin, 2. Schaaf.
