RICE LAKE, Wis. — The Street Stock Little Dream Race is set to be run on July 30 at Rice Lake Speedway.
The event is one of the most highly anticipated races on the area racing calendar and this year’s edition, set to be run for the 13th consecutive time, looks to break a number of records this year.
The event will be broadcast live by SPEEDSPORT.tv.
Famous for its unique concept where fans and area businesses contribute to the purse and primarily to the winner’s earnings, the dream started back in 1995 as a modest race where a few fans started throwing extra money into the purse and winner Eric Olson went home with $780.
What was perhaps most unique about the race was that fans also threw in money for other reasons, such as the first finishing Ford, the first driver to flip or wreck and for various other crazy and unusual happenings that might occur during the race.
The idea caught on and the race grew. The second year the winner’s share went over $1,000 and it has climbed ever since. In 2023, winner Keith Tourville took home $29,411 as an event record was broken once again.
Tourville is one of three multi-time winners of this event expected to be in Tuesday night’s field. Tim Johnson, the race’s only three-time winner expected to race on Tuesday, has taken home over $42,000 from race winnings in this race while Nick Traynor, winner of this race in 2020 and 2022, has banked over 54,000 in feature race winnings alone. One-time winners Jay Kesan, Sam Fankhauser and Danny Richards are also expected to enter the race.
With this being the 13th edition of the event, race organizers Chris Stepan and Scott Tiefs, along with FYE Motorsports Promotions and Rice Lake Speedway LLC, the new owners of the track, are all working very hard to ensure that the event record is broken. The goal is to pay 30 for 30 in 2024.
The event record for entries, set at 66 in 2019, is also expected to be challenged.
The event for the WISSOTA Street Stocks will see the drivers qualify for the main event using passing points earned in two rounds of heat races. Last chance races will be held to complete the field before the 35-lap main event decides the winner. A non-qualifier race, for those that don’t make the main will also be held paying $500 to win with the winner having the option of forfeiting that money and starting in the back of the main event.
Only street stocks will be racing on that night as they take center stage.