Familiar faces dominated the winner's podium at the season opener for North Central Speedway Saturday.
Mark Johnson, Dave Read, Justin Jones, and Danny Vang won their features in the first set of races under the umbrella of the International Motor Contest Association (IMCA).
Read was the winner in the Super Stock feature event, finishing in front of Mike Frolik and Eric Martini. Read started from the front row and was a leader for the entire 20-lap event.
"Any race that you win is a good one," Read said. "It did have a different feel in the air tonight missing a few guys. It was nice to see new faces too. Our main goal was to come here and win tonight. The car is working really well so once I started up front it was a matter of being able to stay up there."
One of the changes with the switch to IMCA is in the tires as all cars need to use the same style and brand. Read explained that wasn't a huge difference for him as he is used to racing on those tires.
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"For me, I am still on the Hoosier W tires so it wasn't that big of a deal," he said. "I dabbled with some spring and shock changes and the car really seemed to rotate well through the corners and I was able to pick up the throttle very quickly."
Vang has had a large amount of success at NCS driving in the former Midwest Modified Class. He continued that tradition with a win in the Northern Sport Modified 20-lap feature finishing in front of David Siercks and Alan Bohlman.
"We are going to be running a limited schedule this year, but we will be running at the speedway here whenever I get the chance," Vang said.
He also started from the front of the pack for the feature but did need to work his way through some traffic to run out front. The race was also marred by several cautions.
"The tires were a little bit different than what we have run on in the past, but everyone is on the same thing," Vang said. "We have seen this before on opening night. There are a lot of people getting their cars turned up after the winter, and getting things figured out again."
Mark Johnson's car is for sale and he may be getting some calls soon as he was a winner in the Street Stock feature. Justin Jones raced to the checkered flag for the Modified feature win.
Other winners were Brendon Yamry in the Sport Compact class and Corey Hill in the Pure Stock class. The Mod 4 trophy went to Mitchell Hribar.
Sport Compact
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Feature: 1-Brendon Yamry, 2-Markia, 3-Peyton Nelson
Heat 1: 1-Brendon Yamry, 2-Trista Pankratz, 3-Markia
Pure Stock
Feature: 1-Corey Hill, 2-David Dosh, 3-Tom Anderson
Heat 1: 1-Devin Larson, 2-Corey Hill, 3-Chris Seidel
Heat 2: 1-Tom Anderson, 2-David Dosh, 3-Jake Hagemann
Street Stock
Feature: 1-Mark Johnson, 2-Billy Kendall, 3-Wade Blumke
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Heat 1: 1-Mark Johnson, 2-Aaron Johnson, 3-Billy Kendall
Mod 4
Feature: 1-Mitchell Hribar, 2-Luke Johnson, 3-Bryce Bjerken
Heat 1: 1-Bryce Bjerken, 2-Luke Johnson, 3-Jess Geesey
Heat 2: 1-Mitchell Hribar, 2-Jerry Esler, 3-Chad Funt
Northern Sport Modified
Feature: 1-Danny Vang, 2-David Siercks, 3-Alan Bohlman
Heat 1: 1-Josh Larsen, 2-David Siercks, 3-Chris Vanmil
Heat 2: 1-Danny Vang, 2-Craig Paul, 3-Dustin Joel
Heat 3: 1-Ashley Mehrwerth, 2-Alan Bohlman, 3-Mike Brenny
Modified
Feature: 1-Justin Jones, 2-Lance Schilling, 3-Shawn Fletcher
Heat 1: 1-Eric Martini, 2-Justin Jones, 3-Lance Schilling
Heat 2: 1-Rob Vanmil, 2-Troy Jordan, 3-Shawn Fletcher
Super Stock
Feature: 1-Dave Read, 2-Mike Frolik, 3-Eric Martini
Heat 1: 1-Seth Kramer, 2-Dave Read, 3-Erick Thiesse
