Randy Nygaard takes feature as sprints return to Fairmont

<pre> Sioux Falls native and chassis builder Randy Nygaard took the checkers first as the Midwest Sprintcar Series brought their show into the Fairmont Speedway for the third MSS race of the season. This was the first time that the sprint cars had appeared in Fairmont since being dropped as a weekly class at the end of the 1998 season. Nygaard drew the pole position in his green #63 sprinter and immediately opened a wide lead over fellow front row starter and current MSS point leader, Kent Winters. Nygaard, who had drove all night just to make it to Fairmont following a NCRA 410 race in Grand Forks, ND, had stretched out about a 10 car length lead when Gordy Vogelaar of Worthington, MN spun in turn #2. The restart saw Nygaard jump back into the lead, which he held and built until lap 7 when Greg Kamrath stalled in turn 3. This brought Matt Spies, Winters, Jeremy Dronen, Rob Tvedte, and Mark Toews, who was piloting the #55 of good friend Joe Kouba, right up to the rear nerf bar of Nygaard's sprinter Following this caution period, the race went clean and green and it was the green sprinter that the entire field was chasing. Nygaard was simply too much for the pack as he stretched his lead through lapped traffic and blasted to the $1,000 victory. At the finish, it was Nygaard, Spies, Tvedte, Toews, and Jimmy Kouba, who used a cushion busting performance to move from 10th to 5th in the final rundown. Dronen, Bill Boles, last week's winner John Franzen, Brett Geldner, and Winters rounded out the top 10 finishers. Heat races for the 20 car field went to Spies, Dronen, and Nygaard, and Kent Winters was the victor in the Cash Dash. The MSS series now takes a few weeks off before returning to their hometrack, the Kopellah Speedway in St. Croix Falls, WI, on June 30th. The series then moves south to the Cresco Speedway in Cresco, IA for the 4th of July Spectacular.

HEAT 1: 1. Matt Spies; 2. Bill Boles; 3. Rob Tvedte; 4. Jimmy Kouba; 5. Ryan Voss; 6. Alan Gilbertson

HEAT 2: 1. Jeremy Dronen; 2. Tom Kamrath; 3. John Franzen; 4. Brett Geldner; 5. Gene Kelly; 6. John Jacob; 7. Joseph Kouba

HEAT 3: 1. Randy Nygaard; 2. Kent Winters; 3. Mark Toews; 4. Greg Kamrath; 5. Gordy Vogelaar; 6. Ehren Layton; 7. Jeff Johnson

DASH: 1. Winters; 2. Boles; 3. Nygaard; 4. Spies; 5. Dronen; 6, T. Kamrath

FEATURE: 1. Nygaard; 2. Spies; 3. Tvedte; 4. Toews; 5. Jimmy Kouba; 6. Dronen; 7. Boles; 8. Franzen; 9. Geldner; 10. Winters; 11. T. Kamrath; 12. Joseph Kouba; 13. Voss; 14. Layton; 15. G. Kamrath; 16. Gilbertson; 17. Johnson; 18. Vogelaar; 19. Kelly; 20. Jacob