OPEN WHEEL NIGHT A BIG HIT!

The final Membership meeting for the 2009/2010 bench racing season was held on March 6 at Crehan’s Irish Pub in Belleville and was a great get-together.  Approximately 55 members, racers, fans and guests enjoyed catching up on various plans for the 2010 racing season in the area.

The night began with a trophy presentation to Steve Kempf for winning the “Daytona 500 Game” at the February Daytona Party. His choice of Jamie McMurray to win garnered Steve the most points for the day and earned him the Daytona 500 trophy and winner’s award FC cap.  Congratulations to Steve!

Eileen vonHatten reported on the 100 Acre Wood Rally held the last week in February. By all accounts it was a grand success with a 33% increase in spectators, volunteers and fun.  If you want to enjoy a bit of the experience, check in at the FC website: www.stlouisfanclub.com and go to the bottom of the home page and view the YouTube video.  Really neat!

The winning SuperFan Raffle ticket was drawn by Riley Terveer and the winner was Rick Russell from Cahokia, Il.  He won pairs of tickets to many races in the FC area worth a value of approximately $1000.  We want to thank all of our promoters for donating the tickets and all of the FC supporters who purchased tickets.  Many, many thanks.

Brian Eaves told us about the Full Moon Saloon Car Show which will be held on March 13 and invited us all to come and enjoy a day of “Car Viewing”.  Art Knepper representing the I-70 Quarter Midget Association presented Brian with 10 Drive certificates for kids to take test drives in a Quarter Midget and Eileen added a Lake Hill auction package donated by the FC. These items will be used at the car show to raise funds for Children’s charities. All funds raised by the car show are used for kids.  Thanks to Brian for coming to the meeting.

Scott Kuhn and his wife, representing the Highland Speedway, were in attendance and told us about how he got involved in racing and worked his way up to promoting and their plans for the season. They are looking for another good year.

Kenny Brown gave Eileen information about the plans of POWRi for 2010 and especially what he is looking at doing to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the first midget race in the St. Louis area. Midget racing has been held in this area continuously since 1935 except for the war years.  Plans to have a vintage car show, special races, the FC members only Pot-Luck picnic and media in attendance will be announced as they are finalized.

Belleville schedule information was presented by Jack Pugh and it seems Allied and BelleClair have joined in some new and interesting things for 2010.

An addition to the entertainment was the ability to view a couple of DVDs during the evening. Wally McDuffey donated a pair of DVDs, one containing some old films of MARA pit action at Granite City Speedway in 1988 and the other a slide show of photos from the old St. Louis Auto Racing Association yearbook published in 1979.  We were able to view some people and action by racers who are no longer with us.  A grand idea. Thanks to Wally for the DVDs and to Don Figler and Wanda Knepper for setting up their laptops to watch the action.     

The food was good—the drinks were good—and the people were better.  A great evening for Bench Racing and getting revved up for the 2010 area racing season.