Veteran takes overall title at Slinger Speedway

Rich Bickle continued his strong start to his 45th and final season of racing by winning the first 50-lap super late model feature Sunday afternoon at the Slinger Super Speedway and then finishing fourth in the nightcap to take the overall title in the Miller Lite regular season opener.

For the recently turned 60-year-old, Sunday’s win marked Bickle’s second trip to victory lane in the young season as he conquered the prestigious Joe Shear Classic in Madison two weeks earlier.

“I won the week before I was 60 and now I won the week after.” Bickle said from victory lane, “I’ll take it, and I’m just glad 2020 is over for everybody because last year was a disaster for me. After that, we had to come back and keep running and you never know — we may run here all year.”

An added caveat to Bickle’s follow-up win to the race honoring Joe Shear was that Sunday was the eight-year anniversary of the passing of renowned driver Dick Trickle. Bickle cut his teeth racing weekly against both legendary short track stars.

“That day was kind of a crazy day for me with how close me and Dick (Trickle) were,” an emotional Bickle said. “This is for him … and here we are again.”

Dennis Prunty followed up his fifth-place result in the first 50-lap super late model feature with a win in the second event.

“The track gets greased up when the sun is shining like this and Rich left a lot of rubber on the outside lane so when I got up there I couldn’t go,” Prunty said. “But we just added a shim to the right front and went for it.”

During the first 50-lap feature’s final lap, Luke Fenhaus and Steve Apel rubbed doors at the start-finish line and, as Apel tried to complete the pass and clear Fenhaus in turn one, slight contact sent Apel looping around off turn two ending the race with the yellow and checkered flags waving.

Bickle was declared the winner and track rules concerning last lap incidents with contact dictate the spun driver maintains the spot, thus Apel was credited with a second place finish. R.J. Braun finished in third while Alex Prunty and Dennis Prunty rounded out the top five. Ryan DeStefano finished sixth followed by Brad Keith, Rich Loch, Mark Eswein and Nathan Matz.

In the second race, Dennis Prunty took a lead and raced to victory followed by Alex Prunty and DeStefano. Bickle’s fourth-place finish secured him the combined overall title between the two features. Loch was fifth, followed by Apel, Braun, Keith, Matz and Eswein.

Dennis Prunty won the super late model fast dash and Fenhaus was the fastest qualifier after touring the speedway in 11.191 seconds.

Ryan Gutknecht won the 40-lap late model feature. Jacob Nottestad was second, followed by Brian Holtz, Ryan Craine, Jordan DeVoy, Zach Prunty, Cole Thomas, Jack Stern, Jerry Eckhardt and Tom Berens.

Zach Prunty and Tyler Schley were the winners of the late model heat races. Jacob Nottestad topped qualifying with a lap at 11.906 seconds.

Dale Lecus Jr. took the lead on lap 24 of the 35-lap sportsman feature and drove to his second main event victory of the season. Paul Wagner was second, followed by Andrew Meyerhofer, Dan Calhoun and Bobby Gutknecht.

Tytus Helgestad won the sportsman heat race in his first Slinger appearance, and Gutknecht set fast time at 12.777 seconds.

Zach Geer won the 25-lap Super Beez feature over Brandon Tackes and Mitchell Strobel. Then came Dale Kiley-Schaefer and Colin Saegert.

Dale Kiley-Schaefer won the Super Beez heat race and Todd Buckley was the fastest qualifier with a lap at 13.502 seconds.

Ricky Gebhard outdueled Brady Held to win the 25-lap Slinger Bees feature. Tom Elsinger Jr. was third, followed by Misty Benn and Billy Bruan.

Slinger Bees heat races were won by Marty Tackes and Paul Reagles. Benn was the top qualifier with a lap at 15.2 seconds.

Dave Gauthier in the Speedway Guest car race, driving the Sidetracked entry, and Ryan Lovald won the Figure 8 feature, which ended in spectacular fashion with a meeting in the “X” between Shane Becker and Nick Ostberg.

Racing resumes at 2 p.m. Sunday, May 23, with the Alan Kulwicki Memorial 77/Kim Parsons Memorial Trophy Tour.

For information, visit slingersuperspeedway.com.