SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- After much discussion and feedback from drivers, car owners and surrounding tracks, officials at the Springfield Raceway will sanction their popular and fast-growing B-Mod division with the United States Racing Association for the 2012 season.

Current track car specs and rules will remain the same.

The top 10 in track point standings recieve points fund money and stand a chance to recieve lucrative national points fund payouts also.

For B-Mod drivers the license fee is ony $90 and provides some strong values, including a $100,000 insurance policy and more. Drivers can go online at www.usraracing.com to download an application.

The Springfield Raceway has been very strong in B-Mod competition, and with the GM Performance Parts 602 crate motor bonus money available, drivers really have a chance to take home some extra money.

"Our car specs and rules will remain the same as to what we posted and handed out this season," said co-owner Jerry Hoffman. "The point fund available for these drivers is nice and USRA provides some other things with their license."

"About the only thing we will do different this season will be our points system," said race director Ron Williams. "We do checks and balances with USRA to make sure we don't have two different champions so we will use the USRA system (for awarding points). This will be great for our Springfield drivers overall as we normally use an inverted line-up by point average and that helps with passing points towards a shot at national money.

Last season, veteran Bobby Maggard Jr. won the title by a narrow victory over J.C. Morton as an average of over 20 cars entered the Transport Graphics Championship Chase.

Following a successful O'Reilly Turkey Classic last weekend, the Springfield Raceway is getting ready for its own version of March Madness on Saturday, March 24. It will mark the second night of racing for national points in the USRA Modified division but the first for the B-Mods under the USRA banner.

The USRA national points chase began on March 2 and will run through Oct. 21. Track points at Springfield begin April 21.

Also competing on the race card a showdown between the MLRA and MARS Late Models, Midwest Modz and the new Young Lions division.

Pit gates will open at 1:30 p.m. and grandstand gates open at 4 with hot laps to begin at 5 and racing to start at 6. The drivers meeting will be held at approximately 4:40 while the pill draw will cut-off will be 5:15.

Grandstand admission for adults will be $20 while kids ages 6-12 are $5 and children under 6 get in for free.

For more information visit the website at www.springfieldraceway.com or contact promoter Jerry Hoffman at 417-673-7426.