By Laurence Heinen
Chanse took a chance and it paid off for him in spades in Grande Prairie on Sunday.
Despite incurring a two-second penalty for creating a false start, Chanse Vigen guided his Sundown Oilfield Services Ltd. outfit around the Evergreen Park track in a time of 1:16.27 to win the Grande Prairie Stompede Championship.
“Hell of a race,” Vigen told Arnie Jackson in an interview shortly after winning his first-ever title in his hometown in front of an appreciative crowd. “I knew the penalty was probably coming to me, so I knew we had a lot of ground to make up, so it’s a tall task to outrun those guys by two, three seconds.
“Three really tough competitors, but it’s a special outfit,” Vigen added, while giving credit to his final heat combatants, Kurt Bensmiller, Ross Knight and Rae Croteau Jr. “When you get into the barrels, you always have a chance – even with one or two (seconds in penalties) hanging over you – when the horses are that good.”
It was only one night earlier when the 39-year-old reinsman accepted the Ralph Vigen Memorial Award, named in honour of his grandfather, for compiling the best four-day aggregate time of 5:11.72, which was an impressive 5.38 seconds ahead of Bensmiller.
“I’ve never really come close to being tough at this show,” said the third-generation driver, who now resides in Calgary with his wife Brie. “We’ve never come really cranked in the spring, so to win the Ralph award and have some family present it was a special day, for sure.
“It’s always huge to win this show. This is a big show. This is one of the shows guys aim for. Chuckwagon racing’s prominent in Grande Prairie. The crowd was into it all week long, so it was an exhilarating atmosphere to compete in.”
Although Bensmiller finished second in the aggregate standings, luck was on his side in a random draw as he won the right to choose the No. 1 barrel in the $35,000 championship final heat.
“I was actually going to go with the No. 1, but Bensmiller got first pick,” said Vigen, who selected second and decided to take a bit of a gamble. “He took one and then it was a no-brainer from there. I didn’t think I had the outfit to get him off of two, but from four they’ve been good all week and so we stuck to our guns.”
Lining up on that No. 4 barrel in the final, Vigen had some trouble with his horses and wound up taking the false-start penalty. When the competitors – all of whom had won a WPCA Pro Tour show title in 2022 – lined up once again, Vigen didn’t have any trouble guiding his impressive outfit around the figure eight in a quick enough manner to get the rail and keep it all the way to the finish line ahead of Croteau Jr. and his Cinch Oilfield Hauling Ltd. outfit.
“The horses were acting up before the race and it almost cost us,” said Vigen, who enjoyed a decorated career as an outrider before taking up driving in 2008. “When we got ’em in the second time, they were ready to rock. It was a quick horn and we made a good turn and the rest is history.”
Although he crossed the line in second spot, Croteau knocked down a barrel for a five-second penalty which bumped him down to a fourth-place showing in 1:21.74. Meanwhile Bensmiller and his Half a Dime Contracting/Summit Fleet rig ended up in second spot in 1:18.80, while Knight (The Outrider Posse) finished third in 1:19.72.
Following his momentous victory, Vigen commended his outriders Rory Armstrong, Ryan “Mad Dog” MacNeill and Ethan Motowylo for their efforts in helping out his cause.
“The boys did their job all week,” said Vigen, while noting that Armstrong filled in for injured outrider Cole Somerville, while Motowylo replaced MacNeill in the final heat. “Rory filled in for an injured outrider. Mad Dog did his job. Ethan Motowylo stepped up tonight. It takes a team to win this. It takes a crew back at the barn. It’s a lot of moving parts and I’ve got the best team on the grounds, I feel.”
Next up for Vigen and his fellow drivers on the WPCA Pro Tour is the Bonnyville Chuckwagon Championship, which gets under way on Thursday evening. After three nights of racing, the top four drivers in the aggregate standings will qualify for Sunday afternoon’s championship heat.
Vigen just so happens to be the defending champion in Bonnyville. Aboard his KUDO Energy Services wagon, Vigen raced around the track a year ago in a time of 1:18.21 to beat out rookie driver Cruise Bensmiller for the title by 56/100ths of a second.
In order to have a chance to win his second show in a row, while in the process defending his title, Vigen said it will all depend on how he manages his barn.
“We’ll get to Bonnyville and reassess and probably switch some horses up – maybe go with the third outfit a little bit more and give those guys a rest,” he said, while commending his outfit that raced to victory on Sunday in Grande Prairie. “Like I say, I’ve got to get a third outfit going in Bonnyville to try to rest some of these guys that have been putting out pretty hard in Grande Prairie, so we’ll see what happens.”
PHOTO CREDIT – Shellie Scott Photography