Eagle Valley holds 19th annual Lonnie Leu Memorial

Eagle Valley Speedway presented the 19th annual Lonnie Leu Memorial Friday night, presented by Krug’s Towing and Lisa Leu. Winners on the evening included Jake Hartung, Nick Oreskovich, Derek Haas, Danny Richards, Mike Schneider and Derek Krumrie.

The event is held in honor of Lonnie Leu, who lived in Medford and was active in stock car dirt track racing before his death at the age of 40 in a snowmobile accident in March 2002.

The WISSOTA Modifieds saw the heats topped by Zack Drews and Mike Knopps and the feature results were possibly dictated by a pair of yellow flags, one of which flew on the opening lap and a second which flew as the leaders were taking the white flag. On the opening lap, Sam Fankhauser, Dave Cain and Michael Truscott were involved in an incident in turn two. The pole sitter, Cain, was restarted on the pole, Truscott was towed from the speedway with left front suspension damage and Fankhauser was relegated to the rear in 14th position.

Back under green, Cain moved out into the lead, but third-starting Knopps eventually ran him down. Cain was not able to maintain his usual stout performance as Knopps worked him over in an attempt to move to the front. On several occasions, he appeared to be very near overtaking the point, but Cain, who struggled everywhere else on the raceway, was consistently able to get a strong run off of turn four. Meanwhile, sixthstarting Steve Hallquist was tracking the two down in his Lethal Chassis race car.

Behind the front three cars, the fastest cars on the raceway at the moment were Jake Hartung and Mike Anderson as they drove their SSR race cars from the fifth row and were closing rapidly on the leaders. At the white flag, it was still Cain in the lead but a caution flag for a spinning car slowed the pace. On the restart, the complexion of the race changed immediately. The challenging Knopps spun in turn four and his night ended. The restart saw Cain at the point, Hallquist in second on the inside and Hartung in third on the outside of row two.

In the green, white, checkered restart Hartung was able to move to the outside of the leader. On the final lap, he moved to the front driving off of turn two and drove to the victory in the first night out this season with a brand-new car. Cain was able to hold off a charging Anderson, who had passed Hallquist for third. Fankhauser completed his comeback from the first lap foul to round out the top five in his SSR racecar.

Perhaps the cancellation at Gondick Law Speedway in Superior, brought Nick Oreskovich and Willie Johnsen Jr. to the Eagle Valley Friday. Both won their WISSOTA Super Stock heats.

At feature time, it was Oreskovich on the pole and he led every lap of the finale. He initially drove out to a half of a straightway lead and maintained it through lap 17. As he was carefully working lapped traffic, Tommy Richards smelled blood and rapidly closed the gap in the final three circuits and actually got his nose under the leader coming to the checkered flag. He was forced to settle for second at the line. Curt Myers, Jesse Redetzke and Bart Steffen rounded out the top five.

The WISSOTA Midwest Modifieds ran three heats with Jake Sai, Jay Richardson and Shadow Kitchner each taking the checkered flag. The front row of the feature pitted Derrek Hass against last week’s winner, Richardson. Richardson chased in an attempt to grab his second win in two tries, but Haas was too tough. Haas raced his way, cover to cover, to victory lane. Shane Halopka drove to a third-place finish as Dylan Goettl and Kitchner rounded out the top five.

Parker Anderson and Danny Richards won the WISSOTA Street Stock heats and Richards followed it up with a victory from the pole in the feature. It was Adam Soltis with the lead early on a solid start, but Richards methodically ran him down and moved out front. Soltis ran a strong second over sixth-starting Andrew Hanson, who finished third. Travis Loew finished in fourth as Cole Richards drove home in fifth.

Mike Schneider swept the night in the WISSOTA Pure Stocks as he spent the evening running unchallenged for both wins. Fourth-starting Ryan Olson did close on him in the feature but was not able to mount a solid challenge for the win on his way to second. James Rahn drove home in third as Travis Hazelton recovered from an early flat tire to finish fourth over Karl Knopps in fifth.

It was Jason Junker in the EVS Hornet heat and after an opening-lap caution for a Randy Weiderholt crash in the feature, Derek Krumrie took over and drove to yet another win in the valley. Chad Halterman finished runner-up as Junker was third over Joslin Carothers and Craig Oas, who rounded out the top five.