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Simpson Cruises at Dubuque

Photo: Mike Ruefer

August 13, 2022 (Dubuque, IA) Round 9 of the Mars Racing Series took place at the Dubuque Fairgrounds Speedway on Thursday night. The pits filled up with 23 cars on the beautiful summer evening in the state of Iowa.

In Allstar Performance qualifying it was McKay Wenger who laid down the quickest lap at 14.492 seconds. This set the stage for three heat races to set the field for the 40 lap event.

In Arizona Sport Shirts Heat Race #1 Spencer Diercks took the win to start on the pole for the nights main event. Fast qualifier McKay Wenger had issues on lap seven and did not finish. Kye Blight and local driver Jeff Tharp were the second and third place finishers.

Heat Race #2 presented by Dirt Track Bank went to Oxford, IA driver Chris Simpson. Mars points leader Jason Feger and Chad Simpson came home second and third.

O'Reily Auto Parts Heat Race #3 went to driver Tyler Bruening. Jeff Larson was second and Paul Parker rounded out the top three.

Chris Simpson took the lead early in the 40 lap $5,000 to win feature event. Their was intense battles in the top five early on. Tyler Bruening, Chad Simpson and Spencer Diercks swapped positions throughout the first half of the race. Ryan Unzicker had to start 17th after a flat tire in his heat race, and he made a hard charge through the field. By the halfway point he had moved into the top five. On a midrace restart Ryan was able to use the top line to advance to the second position.

Unzicker tried to chase Chris Simpson down as they fought through lap traffic. With six circuits remaining Unzicker was closing in on the back of Simpson, but a caution came out as lapped cars spun right in front of the leaders. On the final restart Chris Simpson was able to pull away and take his second career Mars Racing Series victory. Ryan Unzicker was the Keyser Manufacturing Hard Charger of the night after improving 16 positions.

Spencer Diercks came home third but was disqualified after being light at the scales. This gave the final podium spot to Chad Simpson. Ryan Unzicker cut into Jason Feger points lead that now stands at 7 points as the series moves to Kankakee County Speedway on Friday night. 

The Mars Racing Series now looks to its Friday night event at the Kanakakee County Speedway. The weekend will finish up Saturday night at Lafayette County Speedway. Every lap of action can be seen LIVE on FloRacing.

Full Results:

A Feature 1 (40 Laps): 1. 32S-Chris Simpson[2]; 2. 24-Ryan Unzicker[17]; 3. 25-Chad Simpson[8]; 4. 25F-Jason Feger[5]; 5. 16-Tyler Bruening[3]; 6. 4G-Bob Gardner[21]; 7. 21M-Luke Merfeld[12]; 8. 31-Kye Blight[4]; 9. 42-Mckay Wenger[22]; 10. 38-Thomas Hunziker[11]; 11. 99-Luke Pestka[13]; 12. 40-Joel Callahan[10]; 13. 10-Paul Parker[9]; 14. 10T-Jeff Tharp[7]; 15. T22-Tegan Evans[14]; 16. 99L-Jeff Larson[6]; 17. C15-Brandon Hamburg[16]; 18. 14-Logan Duffy[18]; 19. P7-Eric Pollard[15]; 20. 44-Luke Goedert[19]; 21. 12-Ron Klein[20]; 22. 29D-Spencer Diercks[1]; 23. (DNS) 44W-David Webster

Arizona Sport Shirts Heat 1 (10 Laps): 1. 29D-Spencer Diercks[2]; 2. 31-Kye Blight[3]; 3. 10T-Jeff Tharp[4]; 4. 40-Joel Callahan[6]; 5. 99-Luke Pestka[7]; 6. C15-Brandon Hamburg[8]; 7. 44-Luke Goedert[5]; 8. 42-Mckay Wenger[1]

Dirt Track Bank Heat 2 (10 Laps): 1. 32S-Chris Simpson[1]; 2. 25F-Jason Feger[2]; 3. 25-Chad Simpson[3]; 4. 38-Thomas Hunziker[5]; 5. T22-Tegan Evans[7]; 6. 24-Ryan Unzicker[4]; 7. 12-Ron Klein[6]; 8. (DNS) 44W-David Webster

OReilly Auto Parts Heat 3 (10 Laps): 1. 16-Tyler Bruening[1]; 2. 99L-Jeff Larson[2]; 3. 10-Paul Parker[4]; 4. 21M-Luke Merfeld[5]; 5. P7-Eric Pollard[6]; 6. 14-Logan Duffy[7]; 7. 4G-Bob Gardner[3]

Allstar Performance Qualifying 1: 1. 42-Mckay Wenger, 00:14.492[12]; 2. 32S-Chris Simpson, 00:14.638[23]; 3. 16-Tyler Bruening, 00:14.647[17]; 4. 29D-Spencer Diercks, 00:14.736[4]; 5. 25F-Jason Feger, 00:14.737[7]; 6. 99L-Jeff Larson, 00:14.762[15]; 7. 31-Kye Blight, 00:14.780[5]; 8. 25-Chad Simpson, 00:14.962[2]; 9. 4G-Bob Gardner, 00:15.062[10]; 10. 10T-Jeff Tharp, 00:15.174[11]; 11. 24-Ryan Unzicker, 00:15.196[8]; 12. 10-Paul Parker, 00:15.208[3]; 13. 44-Luke Goedert, 00:15.342[13]; 14. 38-Thomas Hunziker, 00:15.373[22]; 15. 21M-Luke Merfeld, 00:15.421[9]; 16. 40-Joel Callahan, 00:15.474[20]; 17. 12-Ron Klein, 00:15.589[6]; 18. P7-Eric Pollard, 00:15.791[18]; 19. 99-Luke Pestka, 00:15.834[1]; 20. T22-Tegan Evans, 00:15.860[19]; 21. 14-Logan Duffy, 00:16.218[14]; 22. C15-Brandon Hamburg, 00:16.442[21]; 23. 44W-David Webster, 00:16.442[16]

Hot Laps 1: 1. 31-Kye Blight, 00:16.492[5]; 2. 24-Ryan Unzicker, 00:16.938[8]; 3. 99-Luke Pestka, 00:17.127[1]; 4. 29D-Spencer Diercks, 00:17.177[4]; 5. 12-Ron Klein, 00:17.212[6]; 6. 10-Paul Parker, 00:17.309[3]; 7. 25F-Jason Feger, 00:17.800[7]; 8. 25-Chad Simpson, 00:17.800[2]

Hot Laps 2: 1. 42-Mckay Wenger, 00:15.753[4]; 2. 10T-Jeff Tharp, 00:15.821[3]; 3. 99L-Jeff Larson, 00:15.988[7]; 4. 4G-Bob Gardner, 00:16.057[2]; 5. 44-Luke Goedert, 00:16.064[5]; 6. 21M-Luke Merfeld, 00:16.649[1]; 7. 14-Logan Duffy, 00:16.909[6]; 8. 44W-David Webster, 00:16.909[8]

Hot Laps 3: 1. 16-Tyler Bruening, 00:15.045[1]; 2. 32S-Chris Simpson, 00:15.301[7]; 3. 40-Joel Callahan, 00:15.810[4]; 4. 38-Thomas Hunziker, 00:15.881[6]; 5. T22-Tegan Evans, 00:16.362[3]; 6. C15-Brandon Hamburg, 00:17.074[5]; 7. P7-Eric Pollard, 00:17.074[2]

Stay informed on all the news and results of the Mars Racing Series at www.marsracingseries.com.

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