Craig Von Dohren Wins $10,000 Forrest Rogers Memorial at Grandview Speedway & Pit Notes

After threatening forecasts predicted once again; the skies cleared again at Grandview Speedway for the 51^st annual Forrest Rogers Memorial.   A $10,000 to win purse drew the attention of some 40 Grandview regulars who were on hand to take their shot at the second big check of the season at Grandview Speedway.

Craig Von Dohren patiently worked his way through 9 cautions to take the lead on lap 31 and cruised to nearly a 3 second margin of victory over Timmy Buckwalter to take his 9^th Forrest Rogers Memorial Title and the $10,000 winner’s check for the 2021 Forest Rogers Memorial. 

In victory lane Von Dohren commented “Timmy (Buckwalter) has been pretty good but we were able to make the move on the lap 30 restart from the outside to take over the lead.  From there I just rolled the bottom and didn’t want to slip up and make a mistake.  The car was good and Jason has it spot on again.  We have so many good partners behind and I’m am blessed to be here. The big money is the best part of these wins.  I don’t know how many more of these big wins I got left in me.”  

At the green pole sitter Ron Haring took the lead until lap 6.   Danny Bouc took over the lead on the 3^rd restart/lap 6 and was able to hold off Timmy Buckwalter and Craig Von Dohren through 8 restarts in the first 30 laps.  But lap 30 brought the 9^th restart where Von Dohren made a two for one pass move on both Timmy Buckwalter and Danny Bouc to take the lead that he would not give back.  From there Von Dohren drove the final 20 laps with only one more caution and took a comfortable 3 second lead right in to victory lane.

The top 10 was rounded out by Timmy Buckwalter in second place followed by Danny Bouc, Brett Kressley, Ray Swinehart, Duane Howard, Brett Gilmore, Jared Umbenhauer, Craig Whitmoyer, and Ron Kiline in 10^th place.

The heat races were won by Joe Funk, Brett Kressley, Ray Swinehart and Timmy Buckwalter.  The twin last chance consolations were won by Brad Grim and Kyle Merkel.

Forrest Rogers Memorial Modified Feature (50-laps):

 1. Craig Von Dohren, 2. Timmy Buckwalter, 3. Danny Bouc, 4. Brett Kressley, 5. Ray Swinehart, 6. Duane Howard, 7. Brett Gilmore, 8. Jared Umbenhauer, 9. Craig Whitmoyer (provisional), 10. Ron Kline, 11. Jesse Leiby, 12. Kevin Graver Jr., 13. Cory Merkel, 14. Carroll Hine III, 15. Joe Funk III, 16. Kevin Hirthler, 17. Kyle Weiss, 18. Kyle Merkel, 19. Ron Haring Jr., 20. Justin Grim, 21. Doug Manmiller, 22. Eric Biehn, 23. John Willman, 24. Brad Grim, 25. Mike Lisowski, 26. Glenn Owens, 27. Ryan Lilick, 28. Ryan Grim, 29. Jeff Strunk.

DNQ: Dylan Swinehart, Brad Arnold, Darrin Schuler, Chris Gambler, Mark Levy, Bobby Gunther Walsh, Mark Kratz, Brad Brightbill, Aaron Bowes, Jack Butler and Nate Brinker.

Modified Pit Notes

Craig Von Dohren continued his two consecutive race win streak at Grandview with his 9^th career win of the Forest Rogers Memorial.  Craig won the $10,000 check from his 16^th starting position.  His hot streak started with a win at Big Diamond on Friday night a few weeks ago and he has now won his last three races in a row and has another $10,000 race on the horizon at Big Diamond next Friday – “the Prelude to the Coalcracker”.  Craig has 5 Grandview wins this season and currently leading the 2021 season points championship by 8 points over Brett Kressley with four points races remaining. 

Timmy Buckwalter finished 2^nd from a 10^th place starting position.  Buckwalter arrived in 2^nd on lap 14 and never got past the leader as Von Dohren arrived on the scene on lap 30 and passed both the leader and Buckwalter at the same time for the win.  Back at the trailer Buckwalter noted “We were 2^nd and that’s the first loser and we didn’t get the $10,000.  We didn’t miss our tire call this time and looks like we missed on the setup a little and made a couple of early mistakes.  I was too conservative pacing with the 357 and it just got me.  I though the pace of the 357 would be good enough; but Craig got us both and it separated the race.  Then the car started blubbering with five to go and may have been running low on fuel.  We’ll regroup and see what we got; but overall any night you can roll into Grandview and make the invert and finish 2^nd is a great night and a solid night but I feel like I missed it tonight.  I’m a little disappointed because we been running really well lately and I feel like I let this one get away.  Tomorrow we’ll strip the car and find this gremlin and get ready to go take Big Diamond’s big money this week.”

Danny Bouc finished 3^rd from an 8^th starting positon.  Danny went from 8^th to 1^st in 7 laps and held on to the lead through 8 cautions and 30 laps.  But on the 9^th restart Danny lost the lead to Craig Von Dohren and never got it back finishing in 3^rd place.  Danny reflected “We had a real close call in the first turn of our heat race and if we were collected it would have changed our entire night; but we were fortunate to get through and keep moving so we got our spot back.  Tonight we went back to setups we were using earlier in the year and had a much better car than we have had in recent weeks.  We keep learning a ton every week this year.”

Brett Kressley finished 4^th from his 15^th starting position. Postrace Brett recalled “I won the heat race from 10^th and that was just an excellent start to the night.  When the sportsman feature ran before us it dried out the track and it had one lane on the bottom for most of the race.  In the feature I was in the wrong lane on every restart.  Just nothing went my way again tonight.”  Brett continues to stay in a virtue dead heat with Craig who leads the championship points by only 8 points which is less than one full finishing positon. 

Ray Swinehart finished 5^th and started 4^th in the feature.   Ray won his heat race from the 2^nd starting position and handicapped to the 4^th starting position in the feature.  In the feature Ray was able to stay up front for the entire 50 laps and bring home a solid 5^th place finish for his 2^nd top five finish of the season.

Brett Gilmore finished 7^th from his 5^th starting position and was thrilled to have such a great finish in the Forrest Rogers Memorial.  Back at the trailer Brett noted “Today I felt like I was fast and belonged up there with the top 5 guys.  I am ecstatic to be able to be 7^th in the Forrest Rogers Memorial with a 13 year old car and a tired motor.  I can’t wait to get my fresh motor back.  This was my best finish of the season and to think it was at the Forrest Rogers Memorial which means an awful lot to me since my grandfather won it two times in a row.”

Brett continued “Car was terrible in warmups and I was really nervous about the car.  In the heat we were tight but could run the bottom well and had some real good laps with Hine and Grim.  We made a few changes for the feature that we weren’t too sure about.  On the first lap; I knew we got the setup right and we went straight to 3^rd place.  Our car was instant fast in the feature and the fastest we have been all year.  I felt a vibration early on but it went away and everything seemed fine.  It is hard to believe; we could have our best car of the year on the day of the Forrest Rogers Memorial and run a solid 7^th but that’s what we did.  I’m real happy with today.”

Jared Umbenhauer finished 8^th from a 14^th starting position.  Jared continued his streak 14 of the last 15 starts being top 5/10 finishes.  Postrace Jared stated “We just flat out missed the setup for those track conditions.  I really couldn’t get comfortable all night in the car.”

Craig Whitmoyer turned his day completely around by exercising a provisional and finished 9^th from the 29^th provisional starting position.  Craig recounted “We broke our Cam a week ago; so we did not have that car or motor available for this week.  We just finished up this new car today before the race and this was our first time out on this car.  The car was loose for the heat race and we missed qualifying by 2 spots.  We made it better for the consolation but the car kept jumping out of gear and we did not qualify by 4 positions so we had to use a provisional.  We tightened the car up and it was really good for the feature.  We could have finished better; but contact on a stop and go restart pushed the quarter panel into the right rear tire which made the tire go away after only a few laps.”

Ron Kline finished 10^th from a 25^th starting position.  Ron finally decided to move away from his beloved Troyer with his one of a kind late model suspension.  Instead; Ron has replaced it with a 2017 Troyer from Pondish Motorsports and in the first two races the new car has recorded an 11^th and 10^th place finish.  Postrace Ron commented “We need to improve in the heat races but the new car was good on the slick today.  We were involved in a little jingle in the middle of the race and bent up the right front suspension a bit but we definitely got something to work with here.”

Jesse Leiby finished 11^th from the 28^th starting position.  Jesse Leiby recalled “In the heat race we had a right front flat but thanks to many sportsman teams and drivers we were able to get the tire changed but sadly just missed pulling back out to join the field.  We made some adjustments and went out for the consolation were we got in the show with the last available spot in the field.  We only had 10 minutes after the consolation to make changes for the feature.  We made a bunch of changes in less than ten minutes and thanks to a lot of help in the pits we got out in time for the feature.  We had a great handling car in the beginning; but underestimated how the track was going to change by the end of the 50 laps.  We had a real good side battle going with Craig Whitmoyer and Ron Kline before we blew the left front tire with 5 laps to go.  I just hung on to the finish; it was a battle with a flat tire; but we held up with an 11^th place finish even with a flat tire for the last five laps.”

Kevin Graver finished 12^th from his 24^th starting position.  Postrace Kevin stated “Our setup was absolute junk in the heat race.  We made some pretty big changes for the consolation and the car was really good and transferred to the feature.  It has been hard this year at Grandview to read the track and know what changes to make for the feature.  This week the track was very wet and not really heavy.  We added a few changes for the feature and they worked pretty well in the beginning of the race.  I took it easy in the beginning since it was a longer than normal race.  I spun out on an early restart; but had the good fortune of not making any significant contact.  I started losing brakes with about 15 laps to go; but we were still able to finish all 50 laps which was our goal.”  

It’s been a few years since there has been multiple Merkel brothers racing at Grandview.  A few years ago there were three Merkel brothers – Sean, Cory & Kyle all racing limited late models at Grandview.  For the past two weeks; there has been Cory and Kyle Merkel racing modified at Grandview.  This week was he first week when both Merkel brothers qualified in the field.  Sean is still running limited late models out in central Pennsylvania.

For the second week in a row; Cory Merkel had what appeared to be a top ten run going until a tangle bent the front axle but he still managed a 13^th place finish.  Cory recounted “The car was working really well until we got a flat front tire and bent the front axle  We could have probably been a lot better in the second half of the race if we did not bend the axle.”

Kyle Merkel has qualified in both of his recent visits to Grandview and today pulled off for an 18^th place finish in the feature.  Kyle noted “We missed last week while we repaired some motor damage from two weeks ago. The motor was just fine tonight.  We just missed a couple of tangles and had a good run going until I had to pull in for some loose bodywork that blocked my vision.”  

Nate Brinker and team made the attempt to qualify both their primary and backup cars for the Forrest Rogers Memorial.  Postrace Nate reflected “In the hear race got caught up in a mess and tore off the brake line which sent us to the last chance consolation.  In the consolation; we started 10^th and finished 5^th which was only one spot away from a transfer spot.  Aaron Bowes got his second outing in our 14A backup car and is continuing to shakedown the car for an appearance at the Freedom 76er.”

John Willman took last week off due to damage to his second frame of the season.  The first one was destroyed in late June and this second one was damaged in late July.  But after a week off; John was able to return this week and qualify the car in a field of 40 entries.  Back at the trailer John noted “We junked a frame in June and then damaged our new frame on the last week in July.   Bobby Stunk front halved the damaged chassis and that is the one we are using tonight. .  Later in the week our newest sponsor P J Auctions helped us purchase a brand new chassis.  We now have a backup chassis to go along with our backup motor.  I cannot thank all my sponsors enough for all their support.” 

John continued “The car was alright in the heat race; but in the feature I knew right away on the first lap that the car was not good.  I pulled off on lap 15 to save our stuff so we can figure what is going on with this frame next week.  We have as much straightness as possible back in this frame and either it is still bent or I missed something.  So we’ll go over the car again this week and see if we find anything that’s not right.”    

The Rest of the Story

Cautions were numerous but no “big ones” today.  The speedway fell under caution 10 times with only two being for multi car tangles with a total of 8 cars involved.

Jeff Strunk headed to the pits with only 5 laps in the books due to brake problems could not return and was the first DNF of the event.

Doug Manmiller was another early retiree to the pits who had high hopes after 2 consecutive weeks of top three finishes.  Manmiller made three trips into the pits but didn’t return after the 3^rd trip.

Next up at Grandview is a modified, sportsman and 602 crate mini-series tripleheader on August 21 with racing starting at 7:30 P.M