Estelle takes Dean Bencsics memorial.

The first Dean Bencsics Memorial Meeting was a huge success at Paris, Ontario. It attracted both the largest rider turnout (24) and the biggest crowd of the season who were thoroughly entertained with 35 heats of exciting action.

The strong field of D1 riders produced some of the best racing seen this year with several shoulder to shoulder battles during the night. Kyle Legault went unbeaten through the qualifiers and was joined in the final by Nick Fafard, American Craig Estelle and Jeff Orosz all extremely capable of winning the event

With such a high quality field for the final the start was critical as evidenced by three riders touching the tape as the referee held them at the start. They must have been relieved when he ruled a full restart rather than penalize anyone. When the tapes did go up it was Estelle who just beat Legault to the first turn.

The four laps that followed were classic speedway. Legault was all over Estelle looking for the smallest gap on the inside at every turn. Often the lead was barely the length of a wheel but the American was unflappable. He soaked up the pressure and did not move from his race line and did not yield an inch to the youngster. Although there was no passing during the race it was pure excitement and well worth the price of admission. Third place went to Nick Fafard.

Phil Small led the D2 final for two laps but the race was halted and rerun due to a fall by another rider. John Perry took advantage of his second chance and led from start to finish to notch a very popular win and one that was fitting in view of his close friendship with Dean.

In D3 John Bennett went unbeaten through the qualifying heats but fell on the second lap of the final while leading. He got off the track but despite his bike being left on it the race continued and Shawn Morrison got the win. The result was protested and the outcome of this will not be known for some time.