Rockford’s Bilderback makes triumphant return
Rockford visitor receives tip of hat from Grundy regulars after winning Bettenhausen Classic 100
Michael Bilderback earned $5,900 and the lion’s share of the lap money while winning Saturday night’s Bettenhausen 100 Classic at Grundy County Speedway.
He also earned something quite enriching in its ownright— respect fromhis peers.
Like from runner-up and two-time race winner Ricky Baker.
“Mikey’s a good kid,” Baker said. “He’s a good racer. I’ve knownhima long time. He’s come down here quite a bit and never had really good luck. I’m glad for him.”
Like from two-time winner and Grundy late model points leader Paul Shafer Jr.
“We weren’t going to beat Bilderback,” Shafer said. “He had a class act going out there. I’m happy for him. He’s a good guy.”
Call it icing on the cake for a very happy race winner.
“We definitely try to race people like we want to be raced,” Bilderback said. “Those are great words to hear from great people who have both won this race. For us to be able to get this race is definitely at the top of our list.”
Bilderback, a three-time champion at Rockford Speedway, made it look easy after taking the lead from Jake Gille on lap 15.
Several yellowflags stopped the race and erased comfortable leads, but each time Bilderback eased away after the restart.
“I was biting my nails every caution,” Bilderback said. “They definitely made us work for it. WithBaker and Shafer and Rich Bickle, every time we got to a caution, we’d struggle for about three laps and then it kind of came to us.
“As long as we could hang on for those three laps, Iknewwehada goodenoughcar to at least get to a pointwhere they’dhave to maybe burn themselves up to catch us. To beat these guys here, I don’t havewords for it.”
Several skirmishes resulted in half of the 26-car field losing several laps or dropping out early.
One of the survivors was Baker, who finished second ahead of Eddie Hoffman, Blake Brown, Bickle andNathanKelly.
Tough night: Shafer went into the night looking to be only the second driver to win the Bettenhausen Classic three times in a row
He found grief during the afternoon when he broke a rear end during practice.
“Yeah, the day started off bad,” Shafer said. “We had to have one of the guys from the shop in Portage bring us one.”
Shafer was running second on lap 73 when a tangle with Baker resulted in a spin and an exit fromthe race.
Hewas less than pleased.
“Baker wrecked us, he wrecked Bickle, he wrecked three-quarters of the field,” Shafer said. “He hooked it left hard on Bickle and he hooked it left hard on us getting out in the corner.
“When that happens, it rips the wheel out of your hand and around you go. No big deal. Just a ton of money. Hopefully, he can look at a video and realize he made a big mistake and maybe he can figure it out.”
From Baker’s view, he felt as much contact as he gave.
“We were racing hard, I thought,” Baker said. “I’ve never had people run into the side of me during a race, spin out, and then try to say it’smy fault.
“I watched Rich Bickle get loose in the mirror, run into the side of me and take off. I’ve never been a guy to come out here and wreck people. I just don’t race like that. I’ve got to fixmy own race car.”
Top dogs: Tim Stewart was a runaway winner in the 25-lap feature for street stocks. Eddie Ligue rallied from middle of the pack to finish second ahead of Scott Gardner and RandyWeese. Garrett Braden survived a late challenge from Dan Schmeissing to win the 4-cylinder feature.
Last laps: The division championships will be decided on the final night of the seasononSaturday, Sept. 26. Starting time is 7 p.m. The rain date is 3 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 27.