By anyone's standards, it's been a banner year for late model driver Eric Smith of Shirley. | Motor Sports page

Six feature wins in 30 starts, 18 Top 5 and 26 Top 10 finishes, and his second track championship at Farmer City Raceway.

The 41-year-old Smith, who began his career on the ARCA circuit, can add an exclamation point to his season this weekend beginning with tonight's fourth annual Farmer City 50 and Saturday's 19th annual Prairie Dirt Classic at Fairbury American Legion Speedway.

"I think my chances are as good as anyone else, but you don't ever want to get too confident," Smith said. "On a regular night you've got 10 cars that can win the feature. Friday night, everybody that makes the feature will be top-quality cars."

The Farmer City 50 will pay $5,000 to the winner, while the 60-lap Prairie Dirt Classic features a $10,000 first prize. Smith will also race in Sunday's twin $2,000-to-win, 30-lap features at Lincoln Speedway, where he will start on the front row in one of the races which was rained out earlier this summer as part of the Monster Midwest Tour.

Smith, who finished seventh in the points standings at Fairbury, will be among the favorites in all three events although he concedes the competition will be a "lot tougher" than a normal racing weekend.

"We've been real competitive," Smith said. "You'd always like to win more, but as long as I can be competitive and consistent I'm satisfied. If you're consistent you're going to win some races. We like to finish and we like to be consistent."

United Midwestern Promoters national points leader Dennis Erb Jr. of Carpentersville is the defending champion at Farmer City, and Brian Birkhofer of Muscatine, Iowa, will return to defend his title in the Prairie Dirt Classic. Jimmy Mars of Menomonie, Wis., the 2005 Prairie Dirt Classic winner, is also entered.

Besides Smith, other area drivers to watch include Fairbury points champion Daren Friedman of Forrest, Lincoln points leader Matt Taylor of Springfield, Derek Chandler of Pontiac, Wes Steidinger and Scott Bull of Fairbury, Kevin Weaver of Gibson City, Donnie Walden of Towanda and Junior Shickel of Bloomington.

Smith has run equally well at Farmer City and Fairbury, with three feature wins at each track. Smith undoubtedly would have finished higher in the points standings at Fairbury, but he missed several racing nights while racing at other tracks.

"Our goal is just to make the race," Smith said. "Once you make the race then you try to run as good as you can."