by Lori Cimmiyotti

CRESCO, IA (May 2, 1999) - A beautiful evening greeted fans and racers to the opening night of the 1999 Racing Season at the Cresco Speedway in Cresco, Ia Sunday night.

Kevin Bidne and Jake Ludeking started the nights racing action out with heat wins in the Stock Car class. Tim Gebul, Mel Tieskotter and Jeff Vsetecka followed picking up heat wins in the Hobby Stock class. Curt Martin and Chris Adams picked up heat wins in the opening heat races for the IMCA Late Model class, which is new to the Cresco Speedway this year. In the Modified class, Dan Bohr, Scott Bauer and Troy Hale picked up the heat wins.

Ron Konkel pulled away late in the Stock Car feature race to pick up the feature win. Steve Holtaus made a successful step up from the Hobby Stock class from which he was the 1998 Points champion, to take home second place honors followed by Jake Ludeking, Troy Hansmier and Dan McMillan.

In the Hobby Stock feature, Jeff Vsetecka worked his way up from the middle of the pack and never looked back to pick up the win. Tim Gebul, Mel Tieskotter, Jason Schlangen and Rick Stockman rounded out the top five.

In the IMCA Late Model feature, Curt Martin took advantage of his front row starting position and lead flag to flag to pick up the win. Greg Kastli, Darren Ackerman, Chris Adams, the 1998 Modified points champion, and Kevin Kirkpatrick followed to the stripe.

Dan Bohr lead a five car battle around the Cresco oval, holing off Ken Hofner, Larry Schmidt, Troy Hale and Kyle Chiglo who finished 2-5.

Join us next week at the Cresco Speedway with hot laps starting at 5:30 and racing action starting at 6:00. See you there.