We are into the fourth week of May and Estevan Motor Speedway has yet to host its first race night of the season.
The track's original opening date of May 5 had already been washed out, postponed over 24 hours in advance due to heavy rainfall.
On Friday, everything looked good for the Speedway on its second try. The skies were clear, it was not raining and had not rained in the past 24 hours, and the track even posted the following on its Facebook page: "We are racing tonight! It is NOT RAINING!"
Mother Nature, being the sadistic enigma that she is, had other plans.
The rain didn't begin until after supper, but it didn't let up.
The race time of 7:30 p.m. came and went, the stands filled up, Gainer the Gopher entertained, but the weather continued to filibuster the plans for the evening.
Following a delay of 45 minutes, the race was postponed at about 8:15 p.m. as the rain continued to fall and gave track officials no choice.
Rainouts are not uncommon at the track, particularly early in the season, but this was the first time in recent memory that the races had to be called off after race time.
With some drivers and fans coming from Minot and even further away, and the track putting on a Riders promotion with Gainer and members of the cheer team in attendance, it was a shame that the weather again refused to cooperate.
On the bright side, many local drivers antsy to do some racing went down to Williston and Minot and placed well in those races later in the weekend.
A makeup date will be determined at the track's board meeting on Monday.
The Speedway already had to fight to get dates this year from the North Dakota tracks, so any more postponements and it will no doubt be tough to get all of their scheduled race nights in.
The track's third attempt at a season opener comes this Saturday with the McComb Automotive Fast 40, the annual $3,000-to-win feature.
Josh Lewis can be reached by phone at 634-2654, by e-mail at [email protected], on Twitter at twitter.com/joshlewis306 or on his Bruins Banter blog at estevanmercury.ca/bruinsbanter. OK, hands up if you thought Adam Lind would go from batting cleanup to being placed on outright waivers in less than a week.
