6/4/2024
WISSOTA
Western Minnesota; Eastern South Dakota Weekend Up Next
The 26th season of the Structural Buildings WISSOTA Late Model Challenge Series powered by Momentum Truck Group, Freightliner, Western Star kicked off with a trio of events in May with visits to the I-94 emr Speedway in Fergus Falls, MN on Friday night, May 10th, with a stop at the Viking Speedway in Alexandria, MN on Saturday night, May 11th and the series’ first of two appearances of the season on Sunday night May 12th, at the Granite City Motor Park in Sauk Rapids, MN, boasting $3,000 to prizes for the winner each of the three nights.
2022 Series Champion Cole Searing raced to wins at both I-94 and Viking before Tyler Peterson took top honors at Granite City to charge into the season ahead.
Up next for the series is a 4-night swing across Western Minnesota and the only stop in South Dakota, with scheduled dates at the KRA Speedway in Willmar, MN on Thursday, June 6th, followed by back-to-back nights on Friday and Saturday, June 7th and 8th at the Fiesta City Speedway in Montevideo, MN and a Sunday night event at the Casino Speedway in Watertown, South Dakota to cap off the western swing.
A year ago, KRA Speedway hosted the series for the first time ever and saw John Kaanta set a new track record in qualifying and then Pat Doar wrote his name into the history books at the first series winner in KRA history to cap off the night. KRA will host their second series visit with Doar hoping to race to consecutive wins to start off the weekend. The event will be sponsored by Nelson International and is driven by Minnesota Truck Headquarters.
Fiesta City has hosted 14 series events throughout the track’s history, but has only hosted more than one series stop in the same season one time before, back in 2005. Pat Doar won both series events that season at Fiesta City, and a year ago, Doar swooped to the win at the newly configured speedway in his first visit since the track was shortened several seasons ago. Doar’s win was his sixth series victory at the Montevideo, MN facility. Both events are sponsored by Monte Motor Sales, Outlaw Graphix, Kibble Equipment, Prairie’s Edge Casino and Ice Castle Fish Houses and are driven by Schweiters’ Ford of Montevideo.
Casino Speedway is looking to host it’s 24th series event this Sunday night, which will tie fellow South Dakota track Dakota State Fair Speedway in Huron, SD for the most series events held at one facility during the 26-year history of the Challenge Series. The event is sponsored by Cloud 9 Bar, Grill and Casino and is driven by Lone Pine Bar, Grill and Casino.
Defending WISSOTA Late Model National Champion Tyler Peterson raced to the victory during the 2023 visit and is looking to repeat on Sunday night. Other series winners at Casino in years past include: Jake Redetzke, Kent Arment and Curt Gelling (3 times a piece), John Kaanta, Scott Ward and Jeff Wildung (twice each) as well as AJ Diemel, Pat Doar, John Seitz, Steve Laursen, Jeff Provinzino, Marshall Fegers and current series point leader Cole Searing, winning once at the track dubbed as ‘The Jungle’.
All four events will offer a $3,000 winner’s paycheck nightly.
New Richmond, Wisconsin’s Pat Doar is the 2023 series champion and Huron, South Dakota’s Cole Searing sits atop the series point standings heading into the weekend. Searing leads Tyler Peterson, Jeff Provinzino, Ryan Mikkelson and Shane Sabraski in the top five.
Racing is schedule to begin at 7pm on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, and at 6:30pm on Sunday night.
All four events will be livestreamed on WISSOTA.tv for those unable to be at the track in person to enjoy the action.
For more information, please log on to www.WissotaChallengeSeries.com.
Submitted By: Nikki Cook