Nights at Benton Raceway Park bring people together

BENTON, Mo. -- A few participants in June 27's Jim Hall Memorial Race at Benton Raceway Park mentioned the "adrenaline rush" they get, and one could see what they were talking about when more than 50 drivers of A-modified, late-model and sprint cars began warming up.

With light chassis and engines souped up to over 400 horsepower, they zoomed around the high-banked, three-eighths-mile dirt track at astonishing speeds, shooting mud flecks into the grandstands on the pit-area side of the track and generating such a cacophony, the tendency was for spectators to put their hands over their ears.

Races start about 7:30 p.m. each Friday at the track on Highway 77, with the June 27 event held in honor of racer Jim Hall of Charleston, Missouri, who died in February 2012 at age 78 and whose descendants are mainstays at the track.

Tickets to the track are $12 for fans 13 and older and $7 for those ages 7 through 12. Pit passes are $35, and it's $15 to walk the eastern realm, where the teams rev their cars and, needless to say, it's loud there.

Set to drive an "A-mod," Jonathan Hall, one of Hall's grandchildren, described the patriarch as "a great man, very smart.

Scott Gibbs wins the heat in a crate late race at Benton Raceway Park on May 18, 2013. (Fred Lynch)

"He liked anything to do with racing and flying," Jonathan said. "There are a lot of good cars and people out here. It's a surprise every week who wins."

Debra Hall, 23, drove a "late mod" in one of the three 33-lap races honoring her father, whose number was 99.

"He put me in a sprint car by myself on this track when I was 15," said Debra, the youngest of Hall's 10 children. "Racing is a competitive sport and a family sport, and it's in my bloodline. We had 1,100 people here for the first annual memorial race last year."

Jonathan and Debra work in the family business, Taylor & Hall Transport of Charleston.

John Vogt of Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, is mechanic for a team on which his brother Tom drives the A mod. His son, Brian, and grandchildren "change tires, change gears" and do whatever else needs to be done.

The retired Union Pacific engineer said they also race vehicles at Wheatland, Pevely and Farmington, Missouri, and were attracted to Benton by the $40,000 in prizes.

"It's for the thrill of racing and winning, and we meet different people," Vogt said. "You might go out there tonight and the car is perfect and then come out next week and not be able to get around the track. A lot of it has to do with the track conditions. It's hard to hit it every time."

Dale Matney and Tony Graham help driver Cody Graham, who progressed "from a four-cylinder to an A mod in seven years."

"It's an adrenaline rush like no other," Graham said. "It's just something you've got to love. There is no better feeling that being behind the wheel, going around the track and hitting the turn at 70 mph. You can have a bad night or a good night. You never know until it happens."

Asked about his prospects, Graham said his 350-cubic-inch, 450-horsepower Chevrolet engine was overmatched by competitors with more than 400 cubic inches of displacement.

"I don't see it keeping up, but I'm going to try," he said.

Jared Dewrock, one of three men who drive for Sissom Motor Sports of Cape Girardeau, was here as part of the crew because Josh Sissom was driving the only car -- as most of the others colorfully festooned with sponsorships -- the team had brought.

"It's fun, but it's expensive," Dewrock said. "If it wasn't for our sponsors, we wouldn't be able to do it."

Referring to a well-known NASCAR driver, he said, "This car, the Skyrocket, was Kenny Schrader's old car. You don't make no money racing. You have a $30,000 engine, a $20,000 car, pay $130 apiece for tires that you change every night and then make $500."

As fast as the A-mods and late-mods are, the fastest are the compact but potent sprint cars, accelerating so powerfully, they need down-slanted wings on top to keep from flying off the track.

"Them guys, they don't play," said track spokesman Brad Lawrence, glancing at the area where the sprinters revved up.

The lively 78-year-old chief operations officer, Clyde Harrison, said he had helped establish the I-55 Raceway at Pevely, south of St. Louis, and he had a big job to reopen the Benton track after a long period of near-neglect, leasing the property from Vern Holiday of Barnhart, Missouri.

Harrison rejects advice that the enterprise would fare better with a beer concession.

"If it takes beer to make it, then I won't make it," he said.

Pertinent address:

100 County Road 505, Benton MO 63736