DENVER, Colorado -- In an unusual situation, Kelly Boen from Henderson spun his Late Model in turn 3 on the last lap and Brett Hallmark raced by to collect the win Saturday night at Rocky Mountain National Speedway. Hallmark who now drives the #1H Temco Trailers Late Model for Jim Clifton claimed his second CLMA win of 2003. Mike Davison was able to get by Shawn Bagby in traffic to claim the crazy Figure 8 main event. In the Econo Stocks, Chris Cox was unstoppable as well as Eric Pfeif in the Modifieds and Stan Baumgartner in the Dwarf Cars.
The CLMA group brought an awesome 18-car turnout for their first of several 2003 races. It didn't take long for Boen to maneuver his was to the front of the pack and pull away from the competition. Boen, who raced the night before in Rapid Falls, South Dakota with the Xtreme Series looked like he would be in position to win the main event, until his spin on the last lap. Boen's car sat helplessly in turn 3 as there was too much traffic to get going again, and Hallmark cruised to the win. Gary Dechant, Jeep Berry, Bill Brack, Dave Garmann, Kevin Wright, John Kuchar, Bill Sabin, Butch Clark and Mike Cox rounded out the top 10. Boen finished in 12th position.
The Econo Stocks had 35 cars in the pits ready to do battle. Bill Matthews put his Monte Carlo in the lead and tried holding it there as long as he could. Matthews put on a great race, but unfortunately it was Cox's night to shine, as he would eventually get around Matthews. Previous winner Lorenza Longoria got around Matthews late in the race and tried to catch Cox, but there was no such luck. Cox took his car to the win ahead of Longoria, Matthews, Ron McCullough, Brad Herch, Bobby Kuehl, Ken Livinghouse, Mikel Gerdes, Josh Bertram and George Bertsche.
The Dwarf Cars had a whopping 19-car turnout for their festivities. Leading most of the race was Baumgartner and he finished ahead of Robert Matschke, Jim Luckeroth, Fred Schneider, Brady Dilka, Leroy Dilka, Harvey Coxen, #62, Rick Muehlbauer, and Kent Morrell.
The Figure 8 main count started growing when the Econo main was over and a total of 10 cars were going through the X. Shawn Bagby took his car to the front and barely missed Lorna Webb in the X several times. When Bagby got stuck in traffic, it was Mike Davison who took advantage of it. Bagby tried everything he could to run with Davison for several laps until lapped cars played more of a factor and Davision cruised to the win. Bagby was second ahead of Stephen Webb, Lorna Webb, and Dwayne Bottcher. Steve Swansen, Kyle Carrasco, Chris Apodaca, Jarrod Frey and Jared Wall rounded out the main event.
The Modified car count went back up to 32 cars. Steve Lewis saw his night end with a horrifying crash on the backstretch in his heat race, fortunately he walked away. In the main event, Sten Johnson took the early lead, but he had Eric Pfeif, Chris Remetes, and Michael Daut on his bumper. Pfeif eventually took over the lead in the Windy Windholtz owned modified and was able to lead the final laps to his first win of the season. Daut was able to finish a close second ahead of Johnson, Remetes, Cliff Lawson, Eddie Edwards, Don Arnold Jr, Jeff Hunter, Brad Boyer and Michael Sigler.
On Friday May 23 at RMNS is a 100-lap enduro, along with Thunder Trucks, Econo Stocks, Mini Stocks, Tuff Trucks, and the annual Fastor Pastor race. On Saturday is the debut of the Sprint Cars with Modifieds, Super Stocks, and Figure 8.
