POSTED February 10, 2002

52 people attended our 11th Annual Mottville Speedway Awards Banquet and it was fantastic! We gave away 33 plaques and trophies and a bunch of neat 50-50 drawing prizes and had some great food and fellowship! Registered 5 more cars and heard people talking about last season and their hopes and  plans for this season!

Randy Morley and Merle Yoder each took home $500 checks while Jason  Schaefer and Bill Crapo took home $200! John Yoder and Wesley Schaefer fell  short of the 80% of the nights needed to qualify for points money but still received $100 each for coming close which certainly beats zip!

We passed out schedules for 2002, rules, registrations and Ray Beers Memorial race flyers! Besides having these available at our office and the track Tom Pearson also has them at his garage.

Paul Scott purchased the first set of Good Year tires for 2002 after the  banquet and he is in the process of building a 2nd engine for his pro-stock!  His car is race ready, Goshen Collision Center having just painted it! Paul should be a real threat for the 2002 PS season points championship! What's this with Randy Morley? He is talking not racing right at the start of the season, says the past two seasons have been hard on him! Can't believe I heard him say this but he did! By the way check out Randy's web site as it is really good! (for more details on banquet see the 2-10-02 press release elsewhere on this web site)

Now we are ready to move on to 2002 and I always consider the awards banquet a kick off for the next season as well as a wrap up of the last one! The Ray Beers Memorial race is now set for Sunday, April 21, 2002! Degoede Builders and Racing out of Mattawan is sponsoring the plaques and they will be given to all heat winners and top 5 in stock car division features plus
the kart feature winner! Susan Beers, Ray's widow, will present the plaques to all winners! I talked to Sue Friday night and she was thrilled with the plan to honor Ray! Since Ray was 33 years old when we died the PS will run a 33 lap feature paying $330 to win! Not bad for April 21!

Dee Degoede tells me he will have 4 cars of his own there! He and Jessica will drive Mottville Stock 4 cylinders, Sandy a Mini Thunder Car and Sonny a Thunder Car! Imagine little Sonny up against big Fred Collins!! Dee wanted me to be sure and mention that the "red hot" AJ Foote will be at Mottville April 21 hot lapping his LM 88, a brand new car that Dee is sponsoring!

Also more good news-Jenkins NAPA Auto Parts Stores in Nappanee, Wakarusa, Milford, Goshen and Bremen is again sponsoring a dash trophy each and every night at Mottville during the 2002 season! Also we will be selling NAPA 20 w 50 motor oil in the pits! Check our price!

If you need tires now is the time to buy! We have 8 13" tires on hand and 10 15" tires! First come and first served and we definitely will not order tires again until we are out of one size! We must order (and pay for) 50 tires at a time and that is a lot of inventory dollars to tie up when we start out racing only one night per week in March and with doubtful weather!

Speaking of weather I can assure you the Raymond Beers Memorial race will take place-rain, snow, sleet, hail, fog, cold or whatever as Ray was always willing to race in any weather and thus in his memory we will race regardless! 

By a show of hands we decided to open the track for HOT LAPS ON SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 24 FROM 1-5 PM! This will be the only hot lap session prior to opening night on March 2! The first Thursday practice is March 7. February 24 is only 2 weeks away so get those race cars ready!

I was asked about water for March 2! I feel confident that the water will be on in the pits but I really can not say about water in the front! I certainly want to turn it on at least that day but if its under 25 degrees and/or we have a prediction of sub 25 degree weather than probably not! Greater danger of pipes freezing in spring than fall! However we have and will use space heaters and we will keep the water running at a trickle during cold nights!

Certainly this was the warmest banquet we have ever had! It was 52 for a high and at 11 pm Saturday night was still 46! We could have been racing no problem! Probably will not be that warm March 2! 

All of our track officials really seemed anxious to get the season started! I know I am! The off season really bores me terribly! No excitement that can even compare to racing!

Want to end this column for now by mentioning that Lillie Pearson was inducted into the Mottville Speedway Hall of Fame as our 12th member and she joins her husband, Tom! Lillie will be starting her 12th season at Mottville as a track official and she has one of the "unglamorous" jobs! She gets to see almost no racing at all! But she does a terrific job in selling pit passes and tickets and photos and whatever else we need done! She is truly dedicated to the Mottville Speedway and its because of people like Lillie and Tom that we are so successful and will continue to be successful no matter what obstacles we face! Thank-you Lillie for all your work and dedication!

Practice is now only two week away and opening night less than 3 ! I'm ready are you?