Wade Nygaard Kicks Off 2017 with Top Five at I-80 Speedway!
GREENWOOD, Neb. (April 11, 2017) – Last weekend Wade Nygaard commenced his 27th year behind the wheel of a Sprint Car at I-80 Speedway’s Bugeater Bash. After making the haul to Wichita, Kansas two weeks prior, just to get rained out at 81 Speedway, the team was itching to get the season started.
The weekend marked Nygaard Motorsports’ first trip back to I-80 Speedway since the 2015 season.
“Friday night in hot laps and the heat race, everything was great,” said Wade. “The car was working perfectly.”
Things got off to a good start out of the gate as Wade won his heat race from the pole position.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t get enough passing points to get us in that top eight redraw, so we started ninth. We kind of made the wrong decision on stagger for the feature. We pretty much just hung out where we started. We started ninth and finished 11th and had some good battles between a couple different guys, but nothing spectacular. After the race, we rolled it in the trailer and knew what we had to do for the next night.”
On Saturday night, a couple slight changes to the car made a big different in the end result.
“We just kept watching the track and the only change we really made was a gear change,” said Wade. “The track was really awesome both days. We had a top, bottom, and a middle groove.”
Wade started the night seventh in his heat and advanced up to third, which made him second in overall passing points. The redraw placed Wade sixth on the starting grid for the 25-lap main event.
“Thomas [Kennedy] won it from 11th the night before so we knew it could be done. The car was awesome, the motor was awesome and TJ [Kennedy] went flying by so I thought, ‘Well, I’m going to latch onto him.’” Wade laughed. “I followed his line, our car was still perfect, and I watched him steadily drive away.”
Wade crossed the line in fifth to score his first top five of the season.
Looking ahead, Wade’s next event will come Friday, April 21st at River Cities Speedway in Grand Forks, N.D., which will kick off the 2017 NOSA Sprint Car season. Wade comes in as the nine-time and defending series champion and has won the last two River Cities season openers.
Wade and the entire crew would like to thank all of their new and returning sponsors for their continued support including, Auto Finance Super Center, C&M Ford Sales, Inc, ICON Architectural Group, Valley Oral & Facial Surgery, Ground Round Grill & Bar-Grand Forks, ND, Tammy Howard, Greenberg Realty, Dahlstrom Motors Inc., DeMer’s Stor-All, J&J Const. Inc., Energy Release, Northland Custom Woodworking, Bosh Enterprises!
Season Stats:
Races: 2
Wins: 0
Top Fives: 1
Top Tens: 1
Heat Wins: 1
Next Up:
April 21: River Cities Speedway – NOSA Sprints
April 22: Cedar Lake Speedway – UMSS Sprints
