#76 Yellow 1969 Mercury Cyclone is a car Roy Schmidtke drove in the Uncola races. (Dale P. Danielski photo)By Dale P. Danielski (Starmaker Multimedia)
Border States rivalries with Wisconsin and Minnesota sports teams are well documented. But not to be outdone or upstaged is the fact some of the most intense rivalries occurred between Wisconsin and Minnesota short track race drivers through the years. The 1970s produced a number of challenge races and with tracks in both Wisconsin and Minnesota hosting big events it was certain to draw all the top drivers from both states as they strayed from the weekly show in attempts to make some big money at these special events. I pick the ‘70s era as that is when this scribe was becoming more mobile and gaining a real interest in the sport both in my neck of the woods, Central Wisconsin and beyond. The paved speedways are where it started for this guy so that is what at least initially, we will focus on.

#99 Dick Trickle in his "Plum Crazy Purple" winning 1969 Ford Torino. (Dale P. Danielski photo)Of course when you mention Central Wisconsin pavement racing the names that immediately come to mind are Dick Trickle, Marv Marzofka, Tom Reffner, and Jim Back. Those guys as it turns out carved out some unbelievable careers in short track racing and collectively they astoundingly won nearly 2,000 feature races! Yes, you read that right 2,000. That’s not trophy dashes. It’s not heat races nor fast qualifying efforts but the featured, main attraction of the night. It’s no wonder these guys traveled like they did to events because more often than not when they got back home it was with most of the purse loot.

In 1971 stock cars were still being built in a very stock manner as in obtaining parts pretty cheap from a junk yard. The fabricated turn key race car was still some years in the future. Our Central Wisconsin gang placed themselves ahead of the curve technologically by literally building their race cars from the ground up. We know this as some racing friends of mine and I used to travel to the shops in the winter to witness the progression from a pile of metal on the shop floor to completed race car by spring. How cool to see first hand the creativity utilized by all these guys as they built from scratch a race car capable of hitting speeds of more than 100 miles per hour on any number of bull ring race tracks they competed at.

The "Built from scratch" photo. (Marv Marzofka collection) Before race cars were "Factory" fabricated this is how they were built literally from the ground up as Marv Marzofka is doing here.And race they did, as Thursday it was off to the newly reopened and paved ¼ mile State Park Speedway of Rib Mountain, WI., Friday night the just paved and reconfigured in 1970 5/8 mile La Crosse Interstate Speedway, West Salem, WI., or the ½ mile Capital Speedway of Oregon, WI., enlarged and paved in 1969, Saturday the 1/3 mile Wis. Dells, WI., Motor Speedway and Sunday at my home track, built in 1967 the Golden Sands Speedway of Plover, WI., which was a super high banked 1/3 mile oval. Those were just the weekly events they attended; keep in mind these tracks would rotate special events on Sunday afternoons and even sometimes during the week, creating a schedule that could consist of 6-7 events. Can you imagine racing that many times a week and still holding down a fulltime day job? All but Trickle did just that as Trickle at that time was already a full time racer.

And that brings us to one of the biggest showdown races between the Wisconsin and Minnesota contingents. Promoter Phil Stewart had a nice thing going with his Twin Cities Metro Circuit featuring the “Scat Pack” which was a group of drivers competing at the Elko Speedway on Saturday night and at Raceway Park of Shakopee every Sunday. The top hot shoes in that group included Bob Jusola, Dan Prziborowski, Bill Mueller, Larry Smith, Jon Chrest, Bill Oas, Norm Setran, Leon Duda, Larry Behrens, Don James and a relative newcomer making waves, John Boegeman. With a tidy season point fund to race for, Stewart was keeping his pack of stars together and putting on great shows at both tracks throughout the season. The 1971 season found a newly configured Elko Speedway oval built to a full 3/8 in length. That with new pavement was producing faster speeds and records to go with it. In preparation for future confrontations Minnesota racers Mert Williams, Behrens, and James, were sneaking down to La Crosse Interstate Speedway on Friday nights to see how they fared against outside competition. One driver down there who proved to be extremely tough was transplanted Minnesotan Jim Sauter who was winning everything in sight at the track. The experience had to help these drivers, however with the huge Uncola 7000 scheduled race at Elko Speedway July 5 featuring a record $7,000 payoff; the true test was just around the corner.

Newspaper article, Larry Behrens was honing his skills for the Uncola Rematches by racing and winning in Wisconsin.A great field assembled for the event and 7,222 fans were on hand anxiously awaiting the outcome. Almost immediately Dick Trickle became the favorite by setting a new track record in qualifying with a 15:61 lap. That feat alone was worth $500. It got better for the Wisconsin Rapids, WI., speedster, Trickle as after starting in the back of the pack for the 100 lap main he worked his way through traffic taking a lead on lap 50 he would not relinquish. Crossing under the checkered flag first was worth a cool grand for Trickle who took on all comers and captured the huge border wars win. Top Minnesota drivers tried to beat the cagey Trickle but Bill Oas and Bob Jusola were forced to settle for 2nd and 3rd at the finish. Jim Sauter followed in 4th and was followed by Jon Chrest, two more Wisconsin invaders, Bill Retallick and Marv Marzofka, Alex Metcalfe and Dick Grave. Top Metro Circuit point fund shoe, Dan Prziborowski made a gallant effort but smacked the wall on the 44th lap putting him out of contention.

Of course the cry for a rematch was heard from the Minnesota gang after the event and soon they would get their opportunity and hoped revenge. More on that next time.

Comments welcome to Dale P. Danielski, dale@starmakermultimedia.com 967 10th Ave N Ste A, Onalaska, WI 54650 608-783-5827.