USRA FINALE

STARTED 5TH IN B FEATURE

FINISHED 8TH

TOP 6 TRANSFERRED TO A 

DNQ

9/22/2024

Lucas Oil Speedway

Joe Chisholm captures top prize as Summit USRA Nationals conclude at Lucas Oil Speedway

WHEATLAND, MO. (Sept. 21, 2024) - Four nights of racing culminated with championship features in five divisions at Lucas Oil Speedway on Saturday night, with the Summit USRA Nationals hitting the finish line.

The big winner was young Iowa driver Joe Chisholm, who took command late in the USRA Modified feature and went on to capture the top prize of $4,000.

Other winners were Jon Sheets in USRA B-Mods, Josh Cain in USRA Stock Cars, Oliver Monson in USRA Tuners and Jeremy Crimmins for the USRA Hobby Stocks.

Ninth-starting Chisholm of Osage, Iowa, seized the lead on lap 39 and drove away after a restart. He beat J.T. Wasmund and Nic Bidinger for the biggest victory of his rookie USRA Modified season.

Chisholm, 18, earned $4,000 for feature win No. 12 in 2024. He took the lead when dueling with USRA Modified national points leader Tyler Wolff as Wolff spun after he drifted too high in turn two.

Patience was a game plan for Chisholm, in his first season driving Modifieds. He hoped to save tire wear by running the low side of the track and gradually advance toward the front.

“In my mind I was like ‘I’ve got to save’ and I knew people were gonna start losing tires up top and it was gonna eat ‘em hard,” Chisholm said. “I just had to keep running the bottom and told myself ‘just be patient, just be patient.’ I started running lower than everybody else and I could keep (passing) one car at a time.”

Bidinger took the lead on lap two and Wolff was dueling with him for the spot by lap five. Two laps later, Wolff roared to the front with a high-side pass around turn four.

It didn’t take long for Wolff to open up a 1.3-second lead just 10 circuits into the 50-lapper. The leaders caught lapped traffic by lap 12 and Wolff was able to keep his lead at just over a second as a lengthy green-flag run continued.

Caution on lap 16 would wipe out Wolff’s 1.28-second lead over Bidinger, with Kyle Brown third and Joe Chisholm fourth. Wolff blasted away on the restart to lead by more than a second in just two laps over Bidinger with Chisholm taking over third.

Chisholm’s charge continued as he sailed around the outside of Bidinger on lap 22, but Wolff was still well ahead with a 1.4-second command at the halfway point on lap 25.

As the top duo navigated lapped traffic, Chisholm cut the deficit to one-half second by lap 35, while it was another five seconds back to third-running Bidinger. Wolff took to the high side in an effort to fend off Chisholm, but that’s when disaster struck the man who led 35 laps.

Wolff spun in turn two when he got over the cushion and headed for the pits for a tire change. That gave Chisholm the top spot over Bidinger and J.T. Wasmund with 11 to go.

“I started hitting my marks and was slowly reeling him in,” Chisholm said. “I drove a little hard to show my nose just to fluster him a little bit. I’m not sure what happened in turn two, but it was fixing to be a good race,” Chisholm said.

“It’s been a really good year. Win or lose, I’m happy to be standing here. I’ve had some terrible luck here and I’ve brought that on myself. I forced some issues the past couple of nights and put myself in a position I shouldn’t have been. Starting ninth wasn’t too bad. You just have to look at the positive.”

Chisholm dominated after the restart, opening a three-second command by lap 45. He took it home from there, finishing 4.45 seconds over Wasmund with Bidinger third, Henry Chambers fourth and Al Hejna fifth.

Sheets captures USRA B-Mods feature: Jon Sheets of Nevada made the decisive pass with 11 laps remaining and went on to beat Cody King for the $2,500 USRA B-Mod feature win.

Sheets tracked King for most of the first 20 laps before making the inside groove work to take over on lap 24.

King took the lead away from Franklin on lap two and rolled out to a 1.2-second lead by lap five. The first caution came out on lap nine, with King maintaining a one-second margin over Sheets with Morton up to third.

As green-flag action resumed, Sheets closed in on King but was not able to pull alongside. Meanwhile, Colson Kirk moved into third, 2.3 seconds behind the leader.

Sheets moved to the low side at about lap 20 and was able to pull alongside the lead and then make a pass coming to the start-finish line on lap 24. Those two drivers, who won preliminary night features, were well clear of the rest of the field.

Sheets soon began to pull away during the long green-flag run. He opened a 1.5-second command by lap 30 and held on over the final five laps and beat King by 1.6 seconds as the checkers flew.

Sheets said patience and taking care of tires was a key to the outcome.

“That’s a 35-lap race. I didn’t cut up a right-rear too aggressive because it was a longer race and this place is hard on tires," Sheets said. "I didn’t fire that great, but I knew if we could keep him in check we could probably reel him back in because that tire was gonna fire mid-race. Boy, it did. I could feel it come in and the car was really good.”

Morton finished third with Kirk fourth and Bobby Williams fifth.

Cain hangs on in USRA Stock Cars: Josh Cain of Rio Rancho, N.M., took the lead five laps into the USRA Stock Cars feature and held it the rest of the way, claiming the $3,000 victory with his 34th feature win of the season.

“It’s been a great year. It’s one of those years," said Cain, the USRA Stock Cars national points leader. "Some people don’t ever get the opportunity to win a race, let alone do what we do every weekend. We’re very fortunate. It’s just one of those years.”

Cain grabbed the lead away from Jaylen Wettengel on lap five, diving to the inside for the pass out of turn four. It didn’t take him long to open a 1.2-second lead, but a lap-eight caution took away his advantage.

Jeremy Vaughn took second away from Wettengel on lap 10 and Cain led by 1.4 seconds when action slowed again on lap 11 with a yellow flag. With the race finally getting into some rhythm with green-flag action, Cain stretched his lead to 1.8 seconds by the midway point on lap 20.

Cain was trying to turn the race into a runaway, extending his lead to 2.77 seconds by lap 23. That’s when Jaylen Wettengel and Johnny Fennewald, batting in the top five, got together and spun entering turn three.

Five more laps were run after the restart before another caution. This time, Cain had a 1.6-second lead over Vaughn with Waylon Dimmitt, Brandon Hare and Wettengel dueling for third.

Vaughn made a run at Cain on lap 30, but Cain was able to hold on as he continued the drive the extreme low groove. Debris brought out a lap-33 caution, with Cain holding a .887-second lead.

Cain handled the restart and held on the rest of the way, beating Dimmitt and Vaughn. The hard-charging Doug Keller advanced from 22nd to fourth and Pat Graham was fifth.

“I didn’t feel very good," Cain said. "I just got to the lead early enough and once I got there I kind of just stomped on the bottom. I could get off the corner a little bit better. They were out there in the rubber pushing hard, but I think they may have done it too early and got their tires burned up. Mine still look brand new.”

USRA Tuners win goes to Monson: Oliver Monson of Thornton, Iowa, dominated from start to finish in capturing the USRA Tuners feature. Monson earned $500 for the win.

Monson led from the start and had a commanding three-second lead over Leasure when caution flew on lap 13. When action resumed, Monson was able to re-establish his comfortable margin as the laps dwindled.

Monson took the checkers 3.3 seconds in front of Leasure with Cale Hancock third, Dustin Reeves fourth and Shawn Brownlee fifth.

"Down here I always have good runs and 90 percent of the time I screw it up myself," Monson said. "I felt comfortable. I saw on the board that I had a good lead and just tried to keep calm and it worked out."

Crimmins takes USRA Hobby Stocks victory: Jeremy Crimmins of Fort Dodge, Iowa, led the final 28 laps, holding off Bryce Sommerfeld over the final five laps, for the USRA Hobby Stocks feature win.

Crimmins, who earned $1,200, moved to the lead on lap three after Kolby Goepel showed the way the first two times around. Crimmins opened a two-second lead by lap nine with Scott Dobel having taken over second. The leader’s margin was up to 3.2 seconds when a caution appeared on lap 14.

Gulbrandson advanced into second on lap 16 and started to give chase of Crimmins. The leader was cruising with a 1.9-second command when a debris caution flew on lap 25, leaving Gulbrandson and others five laps to chase down Crimmins.

No one could catch him and Crimmins held off Sommerfeld for a .282-second victory. Gulbrandson finished third with Dobel fourth and Chris Hovden fifth.

"I love the jumbo tron. Every once in a while I'd catch my car going down the backstretch and see the lead," Crimmins said. "The quality of cars here, the top 10 of these guys, if you can run with these guys - it was a pretty good week."

LUCAS OIL SPEEDWAY UNOFFICIAL RESULTS (Sept. 21, 2024)

Summit USRA Nationals

USRA Modifieds

A Feature - 1. 25-Joe Chisholm[9]; 2. 51W-JT Wasmund[2]; 3. 3B-Nic Bidinger[1]; 4. 17-Henry Chambers[11]; 5. 7-Al Hejna[24]; 6. 98C-Jeff Cutshaw[16]; 7. 21K-Kyle Brown[6]; 8. 98-Kevin Stoa[18]; 9. 38C-Jason Pursley[8]; 10. 4W-Tyler Wolff[3]; 11. 15W-Wyatt Gaggero[5]; 12. 8L-Lyle Sathoff[12]; 13. 127-Paden Phillips[32]; 14. 151-Lucas Gibbs[22]; 15. 88-Sam Osman[23]; 16. 55-Nathan Hagar[25]; 17. 32-Derek Green[13]; 18. 10P-Dayton Pursley[14]; 19. 747-Colton Eck[26]; 20. 00S-Chris Spalding[29]; 21. 92-Tyler Grooms[31]; 22. 89-Tyler Hibner[30]; 23. 6-Jason Payton[20]; 24. 24-Donnie Fellers[21]; 25. (DNF) 97-Houston Johnson[4]; 26. (DNF) 9L-Vince Lucas[19]; 27. (DNF) 5D-Devon Havlik[17]; 28. (DNF) 21M-Ryan Middaugh[15]; 29. (DNF) 34-Weston Holman[28]; 30. (DNF) 7D-Davis Givens[27]; 31. (DNF) 68-Dean Wille[10]; 32. (DQ) 10B-Brandon Givens[7]

B Feature 1 - 1. 98-Kevin Stoa[2]; 2. 6-Jason Payton[4]; 3. 151-Lucas Gibbs[6]; 4. 7-Al Hejna[10]; 5. 747-Colton Eck[1]; 6. 34-Weston Holman[15]; 7. 21N-Ben Nading[8]; 8. 98K-Kenton Allen[5]; 9. 89-Tyler Hibner[14]; 10. 17B-Lee Beemer[7]; 11. 18-Brad Johnson[9]; 12. 12-Andrew Thomas[11]; 13. 33S-Ben Stockton[3]; 14. (DNS) 5*-John Briggs; 15. (DNS) 51-Eddie Martin

B Feature 2 - 1. 9L-Vince Lucas[1]; 2. 24-Donnie Fellers[5]; 3. 88-Sam Osman[13]; 4. 55-Nathan Hagar[4]; 5. 7D-Davis Givens[2]; 6. 00S-Chris Spalding[12]; 7. 92-Tyler Grooms[7]; 8. 03-Jason Sivils[8]; 9. 12JR-Jory Stotts[10]; 10. 718-Terry Beckham II[14]; 11. 21-Greg Scheffler[9]; 12. 9*-Troy Martin Jr[11]; 13. (DNS) 21D-Daniel Drury; 14. (DNS) 17JR-Drake Long