Published: July 26, 2016
Egan’s growth shown in shift to Midwest Truck Series
SLINGER — Nick Egan has good and bad memories at Slinger Super Speedway. The good, in his case, far outweighed the bad.
The last time he was at Slinger prior to the 37th annual Slinger Nationals on July 19, he walked out with a season championship trophy in the area sportsman division. He also walked out with a wrecked truck with the American Ethanol Super Truck Series.
This season, while a rookie with the Midwest Truck Series, the Slinger native is making better memories as he continues his ascension through local shorttrack racing.
Egan won a division-leading five features in the 2015 area sportsman division en route to the season championship, including three straight victories (June 7, June 21, June 28). He also set the fastest time six times, which also leads the division.
“It was pretty awesome,” Egan said.
After more than 20 years of racing, the Egan family also celebrated Nick’s accomplishment.
Mike Egan has never won a track championship. He did win the three-race Pepsi Challenge Series in 2010.
“It was a pretty proud moment,” Mike said.
Nick was proud to win against what he thought was a “good level of competition week in and week out.” He didn’t get to savor it for very long.
The next day, that car was gone. The focus quickly shifted to the next challenge.
“It hit me really quick when we got rid of the car the next day,” Nick said. “That was kind of the end of it.”
His new challenge was the Midwest Truck Series, which competed Tuesday during the Slinger Nationals.
“We wanted to get away from the weekly Slinger deal,” Nick said. “We wanted to travel and instead of get used to the shorttrack, high-banked, high-speed deal. It messes up all your lines and all your skills at other tracks.”
Outside of Slinger, he struggled. He wanted to change that.
There was consideration to move into a limited late model in 2016, but the Egans went against it.
That division runs on an 8-inch tire, while the trucks and the super lates are on 10-inch tires. The jump into a super late model was too much, at least for now.
“It just a way to learn and build and move on, instead of sticking with what you know, try to learn something,” Nick said.
He appears to have caught on.
Egan is fifth in the series’ championship points standings and leads the Rookie of the Year standings. On July 1 at La Crosse Fairgrounds Speedway, he won his first career feature.
The Egans also liked the direction the Midwest Truck Series was going. Last year, there were 12 trucks on average at a race. This season, it’s up to 17. What also helped the decision was finances. It is an affordable series where almost the entire truck — engine, chassis, etc. — is near the cost of an engine in a super late model, about $25,000.
“I thought it would be better experience than race in one place every week,” Mike said. “It pays pretty well and it’s a well-run series.”
The Egans love Slinger. They spent years turning laps on the high banks. But the weekly grind got to be too much.
“It’s fun to go to all these different tracks,” Nick said.
He added it’s also fun to have some down time. He works three jobs to help offset expenses.
“Work, school, racing and a girlfriend,” Nick said. “It’s a lot of people to keep happy; it’s hard to keep (them) all happy at the same time.”
It is Egan’s first full season in a truck series. He finished 10th in last season’s championship with the American Ethanol Super Truck Series, competing in five events.
He finished fifth in the Slinger Nationals feature.
“We’re just shooting for solid, topfive finishes,” Nick said.
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Steve Apel ended his 12-race drought Sunday in the 60-lap super late model feature at Slinger Super Speedway.
Apel, the three-time defending track champion, last won a super late model feature Aug. 30. It was his longest drought since going winless in 16 races in 2010 – his second season in the super late model division.
It was also Apel’s 25th career super late model feature victory at Slinger.
Apel leads Dennis Prunty by 80 points in the standings. Chris Blawat is third, 98 points behind Apel.
Blawat was second, followed by Dennis Prunty, Alex Prunty and Mitch McGrath.
Ryan Farrell stayed hot in the limited late model division, winning Sunday’s. He also won the 35-lap feature at Slinger Nationals. Mike Held was second, followed by Ryan Gutknecht, Brian Holtz and Jordan DeVoy.
Held retook the points lead, and leads DeVoy by six. Kyle Chwala is third, 36 behind.
Paul Wagner won the area sportsman feature for his second victory of the season. Jakob Hassler won his second straight Slinger Bees feature. Rick Bruskiewicz won the Figure 8 feature, and Kyle Quella won the sport truck feature.
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Ty Majeski, who led the most laps at the Slinger Nationals, finished 12th in Friday’s ARCA Series’ Sioux Chief PowerPEX 200 presented by Jive and Lucas Oil Raceway in Brownsburg, Indiana.
Chase Briscoe of Mitchell, Indiana, won.
It was Majeski’s second career start in the series. The 21-year-old Seymour native finished fourth in his series debut June 19 at Madison International Speedway in Oregon, Wisconsin.
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Hartford’s Jeff Courtney is set to compete in the Pirelli World Challenge’s GTS doubleheader Friday and Saturday at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio.
Courtney finished second in his last series race June 26 at Elkhart Lake’s Road America.
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