[illiNOISE]

We're going 100% open wheel this Friday, as the POWRi midgets and micros make their second visit of 2009 to the Morgan County Speedway. Joining the midgets and micros will be the Ideal Ready Mix Sprint Invaders and the 1200 cc winged "upright" IMSA mini-sprints.

The Sprint Invaders contingent will be gunning for '07 SIA points champion Kaley Gharst. The Decatur, IL racer has started the '09 campaign on a tear. After taking the checkers in the SIA season opener at West Burlington, Iowa's 34 Raceway, Gharst then made mincemeat of the O' Reilly Midwest All Star Series field last Saturday at Lawrenceburg, Indiana, as he lapped the entire field in the feature.

Speaking of domination, the micro sprint contingent continues to chase 2008 POWRi micro sprint points champion Derek King. The Viena, Illinois racer has already opened up a sizable 230 point lead over second place Ryan Guyett. King also holds a staggering 415 point lead over 3rd place Jeremy Camp, who picked up the feature win when POWRi visited Jacksonville on April 24. But don't expect the rest of the field to roll over and play dead, as 56 micro drivers signed in the last time POWRi visited Morgan County. Additionaly, Etter, Pennsylvania's Mice Dicely, driver of the Hyper Racing "house car" plans on making the trip west to take on the POWRi competitors.

Over in the midget division, the early season points battle looks to be a bit closer, as Ryan Criswell holds an 80 point lead over both Andrew Felker and Nick Knepper, who picked up a very popular "home town" win on May 2nd at the last POWRi event at Belleville, Illinois' Belle-Clair Speedway.

Finally, the 1200cc winged mini sprints will continue to chase Austin Archdale, as the Brimfield, Illinois racer picked up the win when the IMSA racers last visited the Morgan County Speedway on April 24.

My choice for Midget feature winner is Loyet since he will be running Friday night at Morgan County. Time to go get another Powri win.

That is, if he sticks around and decides to race, eh? :2:

[Sandy Lowe]

Just a little correction since the MASS press release was wrong.

Gharst didn't lap the entire field, he lapped up to 5th place. We stopped scoring when the red came out for Kerry Kinser's flip, so only 3 cars were able to cross the finish line on lap 30. Gharst who won, Todd Kane who he had just lapped, and Geoff Dodge who had been lapped twice. (I think it was Dodge.)

Ronnie Blair, Jordan Goldsberry, AJ Bruns and Paul May were on the lead lap but only completed 29 laps. Had Kinser not flipped they would have had 30 laps also.

If Gharst is anywhere near as fast at Morgan County as he was at Lawrenceburg the rest of the Ideal Ready Mix Sprint Invaders better head back to the garage and tune their cars up some more. Gharst was flying!

[illiNOISE]

Sandy, thanks for the clarification. I'll be sure to change what I wrote on the other sites.

That said, lapping up to 5th place still qualifies as a butt kicking in my book.