It’s been three years since the Southern Thaw presented by RaceON for USRA stock cars was set to take place. Ironically, a foot of snow cancelled the original series. However, the tour is set to return Friday, March 15, with much better weather in the forecast.
“The tour sat dormant,” said Kevin Rogers, who along with Kevin Sustaire, promote the miniseries. “The weather was better the past few years, so we decided to bring it back.”
The three-track, two-state, six-race tour (plus three practice nights) starts with a practice on Thursday, March 14, and ends on Saturday, March 23.
The series makes it first stop with the Eiffel Tower Classic. It occurs at Rocket Raceway Park in Petty, Texas, on March 14-16. The features pay $1,000 to win, $100 to start on the March 15, and then $2,000 to win, $200 to start on March 16.
It then moves to the St. Patrick’s Clash. That takes place at Hunt County Raceway in Greenville, Texas, on March 17-19. The features pay $1,000 to win, $100 to start on the March 15, and then $2,000 to win, $200 to start on March 16.
The tour wraps up with the Stand On it Classic. Arrowhead Speedway in Colcord, Oklahoma, hosts the event on March 21-23. Both features, on March 22 and 23, pay $5,000 to win and $500 to start.
Rogers said the Southern Thaw already has entries from 15 states. Among them include the USRA national stock car champion Derek Green, of Granada, Minnesota. He added that the miniseries welcomes IMCA stock cars, too. They just have to run American Racer tires on the rear of their cars.
“It’s a good time of year to come to Texas,” Rogers said. “Get out of the snow and cold and come to where it is warm. You’ve got three really good racetracks to race on, a good purse, and a decent point fund.”
To elaborate on the points fund, it pays $2,000 to the champion, $1,000 to second, $700 for third, and down to $300 for 10th.
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
