Winnemucca, NV Auto race fans in the area should know of Ken Howard, if they didn't knew him they had heard of him. Ken was the catalyst in making Winnemucca Regional Raceway a reality for the drivers and fans. Until he spearheaded the effort to build that one-third mile clay oval out on Jungo Road, the area was devoid of circle track racing since the mid-80's.

Ken passed away last year and in his honor the Winnemucca Stock Car Division of WRR scheduled a two-day show to kick-off the 2008 racing season here in his name. The first half of that two day event on Friday night April 18 went on without a hitch, but the second part was blown away by the ferocious winds that preceded a healthy rain which postponed day two. The rescheduled day two is tonight at the Jungo Road power plant, with all of the division will be in action.

The perpetual Ken Howard Memorial trophy will be presented to the winning IMCA Modified driver of the combined point totals of both races. That is, points from early April will be added to tonight's feature finish. As you might remember, Battle Mountain standout Randy Artz won the first leg over 14-time northeastern Nevada champion Ward Amberson and local star Cory Sample.

Amberson and Sample have been battling it out to see which of the two will be crowed the 2008 IMCA track champion. Currently Amberson has a seven-point cushion over last year's titleholder, with only tonight's race and the September 12 event left to pick up points.

In a full field of cars of 10, points start at 40 for the winner of the feature races and the points descend at one point each finishing position, i.e. 40, 39, 38, etc. For championship consideration are also Winnemucca drivers Chad Farstveet, the defending state of Nevada champ, and Tim Mazour who has never won a feature at his home track, he's done it at Elko but not here yet.

The WSCD Pro Stock drivers should have their hands full tonight as it will be joint point night for the class along with the Pure Stock division. Point leader Shawn LaRocque goes to the track with a 22-point advantage over Travis Roysdon. LaRocque has been plagued with a myriad of engine issues in recent weeks and with the big guns from Battle Mountain and Elko, big points should be on the table. Roysdon needs to take advantage of any problems that LaRocque should encounter to slice that big lead of the leader. Some of Elko's finest towing to Winnemucca should be point leader Jay McLeod, second place in points James Ogden, Teri Kellum, Bobby Brown, and Brian Thorp, the biggest winner in WRR history. This should be interesting.

The Pure Stocks should see some different cars and drivers in their part of the joint point affair. Current point leader Shaylin Sample leads Dale Schofield by 21 with two races to go, but should enough outsiders show up at the pit gate, the final race in September could be for all the marbles. Some of the Elko drivers in action tonight could be point leader Dustin Greenwood, James Lister, Bernie Sethaler, Geoffrey Bullock, and Valerie McLeod. The top three drivers are so close in points that you could cover them with a small blanket.

In the Mini Mod division, former champion Tim Garner leads veteran driver Dominick DeGrazia by five markers and should not see any Elko cars in action, but several from Lovelock and Fallon might pop in. No one else in contention for the title but those two at the top should be wary of those spoilers.