POSTED MARCH 25, 2025

WE had what I hope was our coldest racing night of the season Saturday night! Temperature of around 25 and with the wind it felt like it was 2! It was cold! I really have to admire those karters however! Zooming around the track in the open with the cold and wind! Wow! They really are dedicated and this terribly cold night we had 5 of them! Jessica Brown, now 15 years old as of March 20, won her first feature of the season and the kart racing was very, very close! Jessica certainly seems to be a well rounded individual, racing karts at Mottville Speedway and a cheerleader at Schoolcraft High School!

Our car count was about the same as last Sunday which is most pleasing considering the weather! However the weather channel now says for next Saturday the high will be 50 and low 40! Yes! But if you know the weather people like I know the weather people you will not be surprised to know that with the 50 they are saying –are you ready for this?-yes, of course, scattered showers! You will find anytime we get better temps and it is a Saturday or Sunday they will call for scattered showers!

I am sure we will race Saturday since we do not let scattered showers stop us! This past Saturday we never considered postponing to Sunday since Sunday was supposed to be as bad as Saturday and in point of fact turned out far worse! We had a lot of calls at the track asking if we were racing Saturday but those of you who read this column know that I had said I would not postpone unless Sunday was way better and I would not lose a night totally just because of cold!

We had hoped to turn on the water in front Thursday but a low of 18 coming up we decided against it! But Tom Pearson has everything hooked up and all we have to do is prime the pump and turn it on! So hopefully this Thursday!

Melissa Worthington, defending Bomber points champ, called and said she was coming but she never made it! Dick Groves, a past season points street stock champion and past Indiana-Michigan Challenge Cup champion, called and said he would at practice this Thursday to buy tires and his new no 77 street stock would be at Mottville this Saturday! Wade Owens, our number one fan for many years at Mottville, was passing around pictures of the car and , as usual for Dick Groves, is a beautiful machine! Will be interesting to see what kind of a challenge Dick can give Randy Morley who is going  for his 3^rd season points championship and 2^nd in a row!

Bob Aumack sends word that he has purchased the Bart Taylor MS44 and will be racing it this Saturday also! That car has always been fast and he should give Merle Yoder some comp!

Don Porter registered the first Mini-Thunder Car ever Saturday night after the races and is bringing it to Mottville this Saturday! He has a buddy with a MTC who is coming also and Bill Crapo says he may be bringing two of them! It takes 2 and we are ready to go! This should be an exciting and fun class!

Bill drove our new speedway push truck Saturday and did a fine job! It is a 93 GMC Sonoma with 73,000 miles and a big 6 engine and runs super! Tom Pearson put a terrific front push bumper on it using bleacher boards and scrap metal from the bleacher we tore down last December and the truck looks terrific!

Every year we try to make improvements to the track and I can tell you over the 11 years I have owned the track I have put far more money in improvements than I have ever made! Last year the major project was electrical upgrades and more lighting in the pits! Thursday we had another load of stone brought in and filled in the holes in side drive back to pits! We have decided that for the present there is no safe way to pour concrete where the old bleachers stood and for now at least will fill the area in with sand!

Bill Crapo took a survey on how many lights need replaced and found we need 5 on the track and 5 in the pits! We will be renting a lift truck soon and replacing them. David Schaefer will also be fixing the lights on the poles on the side drive back to the pits so we have two lights there again and that will certainly help that area a great deal! Then we are going to put up a 30 foot tower near the old pit concession stand and put lights on it which should be big help for those parking on the west side of the pits! We hope to get all this done during April if at possible! Right now our pits is not as well lighted as I would like, there are certainly tracks around with worse and definitely tracks around with better!

Heard several people discussing our new chat room at our web site and apparently a lot of people are getting in on  regularly! Very soon, like maybe Monday even we will pass 6000 hits on our web site since the end of June! This is remarkable in itself but  even more remarkable when you consider that to start with we had a long, long address for web site! Now we have a simple address and have gone through the off season and still almost 6000 hits! Each week we are now passing 200 hits and in the middle of the season who knows what it will? Webmaster David Schaefer deserves the credit for a fine, fine job well done!

Speaking of David, he drove for the first time Saturday night and looked like he had not missed a beat! Up to some of his old tricks again! Finished a very strong second and gave Merle Yoder a strong run for the money!

With the warmer weather finally coming you should see car counts begin to rise rapidly between now and April 28 when most of the other tracks finally open! Then there will be a decline for awhile and then a gradual increase after Labor Day. Generally our car counts are best in September, October and April in that order! But we are building a strong core group of drivers of our own at Mottville and this looks like another strong and successful and exciting season!

I am looking forward to April 22 when we go to Saturday and Sunday racing every week! I don’t mind Saturday only for about 3-4 weeks to get things started but then I start to feel like we are doing things in slow motion until the Sunday racing starts! I feel this season Sundays will be much strong for several reasons including 6 PM starting time(5 in Indiana), no other tracks close by racing regularly on Sunday and building a solid core group of drivers!

So a lot is happening at Mottville and I am excited and looking forward to it and hope to see all of you at Mottville this Saturday night for a warm night of exciting racing and hopefully the introduction to the Mini-Thunder Cars!