Normally a second place finish wouldn't sit real well with Brian Mullen. After all, Mullen, who's closing in on 100 career feature wins, has won several track championships at Luxemburg Speedway and Seymour Tri-Oval Raceway. He's a threat to win at any track in the area when he shows up. But over the weekend the Seymour driver did Wisconsin proud down at the 20th annual IMCA supernationals in Boone, Iowa. Boone is like the Daytona 500 for the weekly, IMCA-sanctioned racer. Against 367 of the best IMCA modified drivers from coast-to-coast, Mullen, the only area modified driver to qualify into the 33 car starting field, started from his tenth spot and scratched and clawed his way up into second, taking second at the pay window to Phoenix, Arizona's Darren Williams in IMCA's most prestigious event.

"It was funny because the track promoter (Bob Lawton) came up to me after the race and thanked me for not spinning to guy out," said Mullen. "I didn't know this guy from Adam. I'd never raced against him before. I got down underneath him a couple of times. It was up to me to get by him and I just couldn't pull it off. If it had been a guy I'd had a run-in with somewhere down the road it might have been a different story. But we had fun."

Perhaps the real story with Mullen's run happened the weekend prior to Boone. Mullen rolled his car on Saturday night down in a non-sanctioned race at Powercom Park in Beaver Dam. "I had some engine problems I wanted to sort out before we headed for Iowa," said Mullen. "All hell broke loose and we rolled over pretty hard. The roof was gone, the radiator was junk, the frame was bent and the decking was all tore up. It didn't look good. I wasn't real happy."

So that Saturday night Mullen and his crew loaded the battered racer and drove home to Seymour, where they unloaded the car and went to work. "We had six or seven guys working on this thing from 5 a.m. Sunday until 10 p.m. that same night. We straightened the frame and replaced a lot of pieces and parts, just to be safe. We left for Iowa at 7 a.m. Monday." This was Mullen's second runnerup finish at Boone. The Seymour driver wound up second in 1997 as well. To prove that Boone is about the prestige and not the money, Mullen took home a modest $2,000 for his runnerup finish. He's made more money running other series and independent, non-sanctioned shows. "I got $1,500 for second plus $500 for giving up our engine (top four finishers motors get auctioned off). There are some other bennys, too. MSD gave me an entire ignition system. I got some new tires from one company and Bassett Wheels put some new wheels on the car prior to the feature. I've got some more contingency stuff coming my way in the next few days, too. So it does help for the product deals, too."

MORE BOONE NOTES - Trevor, Wisconsin's Mike Sullivan, a regular down at Wilmot Speedway near the Wisconsin/Illinois border, also qualified for the 40 lap modified A main. Sullivan finished 13th. The local IMCA stock car contingent certainly has something to be proud of. Four local drivers made the big show on Saturday night, with Pulaski's Brandon Czarapata faring best among the locals with a fifth place finish. Horicon's Jeremy Christians, the 2002 state IMCA stock car champion, took eighth, Kewaunee's Shawn Kilgore finished 10th while Luxemburg's Benji LaCrosse placed 24th. Christians also placed fifth in the IMCA stock car race of champions. In IMCA modified action, Eddie Muenster was the lone qualifier for the modified race of Champions. However, Muenster drew a poor starting spot (16th) and wound up 19th after breaking a trailing arm. "After I qualified for the Race of Champions we had motor problems," said Muenster. "Wayne Larson, who builds our race cars, drove his car up by our hauler and said, "use my motor". We pulled his motor out for the Race of Champions and it had some power, but we broke the trailing arm."

OH, SO CLOSE - A couple of area drivers came oh so close to earning a starting spot in the big show. Frog Station's Dan Ratajzcak was leading his qualifying race when he suffered a flat tire with just three laps remaining. And Green Bay's Art Siefert appeared to have a lock when he lost control of his racer late in the race, dashing his chances for landing a spot in the big dance.

JIM PAGEL MEMORIAL - The final oval track race of the 2002 season will take place at Wisconsin International Raceway in Kaukauna. The Jim Pagel Memorial race for super late models will take place. The race honors the late model driver who died in a crash during a qualifying lap at WIR's season opening race in 1997. A $2,000-to-win 100 lap Planet Pages MARS late model race is on tap. Lap leader awards will bump up the possible- to-win to $2,875. Joining the late models will be the the Mid-Am supertrucks, with a 50 lap feature slated for the trucks. The limited late models have been added to this year's program. A 15 lap figure 8 feature race at the end of the program is also on tap. Qualifying begins at 5:15 p.m. with racing getting underway at 7 p.m.

OSHKOSH LATE MODELS - For the first time this season dirt late models are slated to make a return to Powercom Speedzone in Oshkosh tomorrow night. Plans call to blend the area WISSOTA-sanctioned cars along with the Milwaukee-area UMP sanctioned racers. Racing gets underway at 7 p.m. Modifieds and street stocks will also compete.