Artificial Heat Story by Mike Weaver DOUSMAN, WI - Cooler fall temperatures greeted racers for the final week of the Bridgestone Tire BKC Championship Points series. With the beautiful colors pronouncing the end of summer, it was up to the racers to bring the heat. And heat is what they brought! In 2-cycle Jr. Sportsman, three different karters had the championship within easy grasp. However, Travis Kosik suffered a mechanical DQ for a broken nose cone in the first heat and TJ Koyen lost in a chain in the 2nd. This put both racers near the end of the field for the feature, which left Ryan Schwister up front to set his own destiny. Although Schwister was up front most of the race, Eric Suttcliff ran the race of his life and tromped the field for his first career feature win. Rookie sensation Gage Schnieder marched through the field for a solid 2nd place finish. Schwister was relegated to a 3rd place finish and TJ Koyen managed to work his way back up to fourth which was just good enough to claim the championship by 13 points! HPV Sr. saw a horrific crash in heat 1 as Jesse Schwabe got tangled with rookie Paul Stephani on the front stretch. Schwabe, who already had the class championship won, took a hard hit in the hay bales on lap 1. The race was immediately red-flagged to verify that both drivers were OK. Crews made quick repairs to Schwabe's kart and he re-entered the race at the rear of the field. Apparently, the crash did nothing more than get his blood boiling as he ripped through the field to take second in that heat. Despite mechanical problems in the 2nd heat, Schwabe went on to win the feature race. Tom Schroeder and Aron Scalissi put on by far the most exciting feature race of the day. In the latter half of the race, the two swapped positions at least a dozen times and ran side-by-side lap after lap. On the final lap it looked like Schroeder would get the best of Scalissi, but Scalissi put a big charge on coming down for the checkers. At the line, only the computer could tell who won, giving Schroeder the win by .021 seconds. At the scales it was all smiles and handshakes as the two knew they just had the race of their lives. Other champions for 2003 included Derek Crane in Jr. Briggs, Tylor Wolfert in Briggs Lite, Ryan Lemmer in Sr. Sportsman Lite, Steve Mente - Sr. Sportsman Heavy, Matt Cota - Yamaha Lite, Mike Landeck - Briggs Heavy, Kelsi Bauer - Animal Jr., Erick Heling - Animal Sr., Brian Julian - 125cc Shifter, Ronny Graham - 80cc Shifter Jr., Zack Emmons - HPV Jr., Tommy Anderson - Briggs Jr. Sportsman, Joe Brenner - SSX Can Jr.