7th Annual World Hornet Championship at Macon Speedway
By Brett Zerfowski
Macon, IL – (September 7, 2013) – In the 7th Annual World Hornet Championship event, the Outlaw Hornet feature winner was a familiar face to the world. Decatur’s Adam Webb claimed the top honor for third year in a row. Webb took the heat race and started on the inside of the second row to give him the chance at the lead and the trophy. Bloomington’s Brian Deavers was on his bumper for the majority of the race but couldn’t get enough to pass Webb. Jeremy Reed of Decatur had a remarkable feature after a miserable heat in which he did not finish. Reed was forced to start at the tail of the race among the 19 starts and dashed towards the front to finish third. Eldon Hemken started sixth and finished fourth and Jacob Rexing, a first-time visitor to Macon Speedway, finished fifth.
The Stock Hornet Championship race was won by Matthew Reed of Blue Mound. Reed was riding in second and looked to finish runner-up but leader and multi-time winner Thad Gee had a problem with the 4-cylinder and broke down in the race’s final lap. Reed took advantage and kept racing hard to finish in the top spot.
Another difficult finish for the leader came in the Billingsley Towing Modifieds as leader Tommy Sheppard, Jr. was unable to hold the lead with two laps remaining on a restart as his Modified was unable to keep going and he pulled into the infield. That opened the door for Springfield’s Ethan Schapp. Schnapp ran clean the entire race with the exception of an early restart on a caution flag where he lost the early advantage to Sheppard. Guy Taylor stormed to second place after starting 11th. TD Burger was the pole sitter and he finished third. Nick Macklin finished fourth after beginning from the 13th place position and Danny Smith finished the race in fifth.
It was another week in the Sportsman class and another win for Dave Crawley, Jr. Decatur native Crawley won his heat and started outside front row with Dennis Vandermeersch and quickly pulled away to a zero-caution, 15-lap A-Main event. Crawley led every lap. Mike Pickering held of Vandermeersch for second. Curt Rhodes was the fourth place finisher and Nick Macklin took fifth from Rick Roedel at the finish.
Gene Reed grabbed the checkered flag in the Street Stock division. Thanks to lapped traffic causing congestion and holding up leader Mike Pickering, Reed took the top spot early in the 15-lap feature race. Pickering stayed atop the race track and Kyle Waters took the bottom side to slide by for second place. Mike Pundt, Jr. was fourth and Bobby Beiler was the fifth place driver.
Macon Speedway welcomed a new circuit to the track in the USAC Ignite Midgets, a division similar to that of the USAC Silver Crown cars and the POWRi Midgets. The feature winner was local driver, Patrick Bruns of Champaign. The other finishers of the top five were from Ohio and Indiana.
The kids in attendance got a special treat during intermission as they were allowed to ride in a Meridian Unit District school bus on the race track for a few laps. There were so many kids that there were two trips necessary for all kids to get that opportunity.
Macon Speedway will prepare for the Dean Garland Memorial Race on September 14th, featuring Double-to-Win and Double-to-Start features. Dean Garland was a beloved figure to drivers, pit crew members and officials at many central Illinois race tracks and passed away in the early part of the 2013 season. Drivers participating must purchase a Dean Garland sticker to be eligible for the bonus. For more information go to maconracing.com or call 217-764-3000.
Category: Illinois, Macon Speedway
