Posted by Rockford Speedway on 7/25/2005, 12:50 pm
Board Administrator

BILDERBACK, SPARKMAN, NIELSEN GRAB ROCKFORD CHECKERS By: Kevin Ramsell Saturday, July 23, 2005 (Loves Park, IL) - Mother Nature tried to take to a feature win at the Rockford Speedway. But the weather slid off to the east and allowed Ricky Bilderback, BJ Sparkman, and Rick Nielsen to take home feature wins. Bilderback captures his fourth feature win in the NASCAR Late Model main event. Bob Kahler grabbed the early lead in the 30-lap event. He and Bill Hobson put on a great side-by-side battle with Bill Hobson for the top spot. Kahler would get the top spot while Hobson had to hold off a challenge by Jerry Gille. Gille would get that spot then challenge Kahler for the top spot. Gille would get the lead on lap 9. Bilderback started ninth and worked his way to second by lap 10. He would get on the inside of Gille on lap 13 to challenge for the top spot. A lap later, Bilderback would take over the lead. Gille would try to get back on the inside, but Bilderback was able to pull away. The only caution came on lap 18 when Bob Kahler made hard contact with the turn three wall. Bilderback would continue to lead at the re-start and take home his fourth checkered flag and gave the fans in the stands a chance to get half-price chicken at the Rockford area Popeye's on Sunday. BJ Sparkman picked up another feature win in the Budweiser American Short Tracker division. Steve Cavin grabbed the lead at the start of the 25-lap feature event. Sparkman worked his way towards the front. By lap 15, he moved from his seventh starting position to third. On lap 19, Sparkman got on the inside of Don Russell to take over the second spot. He then set his sights on Cavin. He caught Cavin with five laps to go. He made two attempts to get on the inside of Cavin. The second attempt happened with two laps to go. The two ran side-by-side all the way to the checkered flag with Sparkman nipping Cavin at the line by a foot. Rick Nielsen won the 20-lap Coca Cola RoadRunner feature event. Nielsen grabbed the early lead. The best battle was for second between Steve Hillary, Tom Flippo and Chad Smith. Smith would come out of that battle with taking second place. The caution flew on lap 9 when Derek Nichol made a hard contact with the turn two outside wall. He would walk away but was done for the evening. Nielsen would continue to lead at the re-start. As the laps wind down, Smith would get on get on the inside to try to challenge Nielsen for the top spot. But Nielsen was able to hold off Smith for the victory. Nick Schutkis won the 20-lap Legends feature. Kyle Lapier grabbed the early lead in the event. Schutkis got on the inside of Lapier on lap 5 to take over the top spot. The caution flew on lap 6 when Dave Cooter Jr. spun on the front stretch. Schutkis continued to lead at the re-start. A few laps later, Lapier spun in turns three and four to bring out the second caution. Schutkis was able to hold off a challenge by Michael Bilderback to claim the win. Ken Jones picked up the feature win in the SuperCup division. Jones jumped to the early lead in the 20-lap event. The only caution came on lap 16 when Jeff Myers and Brandon Scurto made contact in turn three. Myers hit the wall pretty hard and was done for the evening. Jones would lead the field to the re-start and go on to the win. Michael Cooter won a wild 12-lap Bandolero feature. It took three attempts to get the race started. Once it started, Cooter got the early lead. On lap 4, Kyle Lapier and Dwight Dunlap spun coming out of turn two with Lapier hitting the outside wall. Tyler Blume came out of turn two and hit Lapier. Cooter continued to lead at re-start and all the way to the checkered flag. Full Throttle Wednesday continues this Wednesday night with a Shine-N-Show Car show. The racing starts at 7:07 p.m. Next Saturday night, it's Christmas in July with a full racing program. The NASCAR Dodge Weekly Series action starts at 7:07 p.m. Tickets are on sale now for the World Famous Figure 8 Trailer Race of Destruction on Saturday, August 3rd. To order tickets, please call the track office at(815) 633-1500 or visit the track?s website at www.rockfordspeedway.com.