OMAHA, Neb. (AP) – A new survey of business leaders suggests the economy will continue growing in nine Midwestern and Plains states in the months ahead.  The monthly Mid-America Business Conditions Index rose to 57.7 last month, compared with 53.2 in December.  Looking six months ahead, the business confidence index dropped to a still strong 62.2 from 66.5 in December.

The survey results are compiled into a collection of indexes ranging from zero to 100. Survey organizers say any score above 50 suggests growth, while a score below that suggests decline. The survey covers Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

JOHNSTON, Iowa (AP) – A 120-pound Nebraska woman has set another record during the Adam Emmenecker Challenge at Jethro’s BBQ n’ Pork Chop Grill in Johnston.  The Des Moines Register says Molly Schuyler, of Bellevue, Neb., on Sunday downed the 5-pound championship meal in four minutes and 50 seconds, paring more than 2 minutes off her old record. The competition is named for a former Drake University basketball player.  Schuyler says she wasn’t feeling so well after so much competition over the past few days.

On Friday she won $22,000 at Philadelphia’s Wing Bowl by consuming 363 wings in 30 minutes. On Saturday she won the Pancake Bowl at the International House of Pancakes in Urbandale. Later in the day she won again at the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival.

Two people were arrested over the weekend on separate charges, in Red Oak. Authorities say 43-year-old Shelby Joann Olivares Carmack, of Red Oak was arrested on a Trespassing charge.  And, 43-year-old Clinton Joe Hans England was arrested Sunday night on a Public Intoxication charge. Both persons were being held in the Montgomery County Jail and held on $300 bond each.

A 24-year old woman from New York was injured during a collision Sunday evening in Fremont County, after the vehicle she was driving hit a horse that escaped from a fenced-in field. The Iowa State Patrol says a 2003 Nissan Murano driven by Jessica Strope, of Addison, NY, was traveling south on Interstate 29 at around 6:40-p.m. just north of Exit 20, when two horses in a field west of the Interstate got loose and ran onto the traveled portion of the road. Strope was unable to avoid hitting one of the animals. After the collision, her vehicle drove off the road to left and came to rest in the median.

Strope, who was wearing her seat belt, was transported by Tabor Rescue to the UNMC in Omaha.

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press….

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — As the 2014 election cycle takes shape, no clear leader has broken out in the Republican race to take on Democrat Bruce Braley in the fall. At least six candidates are competing to run against Braley, a congressman from Waterloo and the only Democrat in the field to replace retiring Democratic Senator Tom Harkin.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Muscatine County officials are refusing to release the medical records of a woman who was shocked with a stun gun four times last fall as officers tried to get her to change clothing. The Des Moines Register reports the woman, Marie Franks, has asked officials to release the records to the newspaper but so far officials have refused. Franks suffers from bipolar disorder and was off her medication at the time of the altercation.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Two Iowa couples decided to tie the knot at this weekend’s bacon festival at the state fairgrounds. The Des Moines Register reports Tricia Snider and Tom Watson were the first to wed Saturday at the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival. Craig and April Rouch got married a short while later.

WATERLOO, Iowa (AP) — One man was hospitalized and another suffered less serious injuries in a house fire in Waterloo. The Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier reports firefighters were called to the fire late Friday and found flames in a basement. The cause of the fire hasn’t been determined.

The victim of a two-vehicle crash east of Treynor Saturday afternoon has been identified. The Rieken-Vieth Funeral Home in Oakland says 31-year old Joshua Alan Fritz, of Oakland, died in the crash that injured three other people. Additional details about the crash have yet to be released, but authorities say two vehicles collided head-on about 12:45 p.m. on 360th Street, just south of Iowa Highway 92. The Jaws of Life had to be used to remove at least one of the victims. The injured were transported to hospitals in Omaha.

An announcement from the funeral home says Fritz graduated from Riverside High School with the class of 2000. Afterward, he enlisted in the National Guard where he served until 2008. While in the Guard he was stationed in Afghanistan from 2004-2005 during Operation Enduring Freedom. On February 14, 2008 he was married to Melissa Ann Miller. The couple has one son.

Police in Council Bluffs report a convenience store was robbed Sunday morning. Officers responded to “The Filling Station” at 1531 2nd Avenue, where the clerk informed them a man wearing a bandana around his face came in and pointed a handgun at her while demanding money from the cash register.

The clerk complied and the suspect fled the store on foot with an undetermined amount of cash. Additional information concerning the suspect is not available. The Council Bluffs Police Department’s Criminal Investigation Division is handling the incident investigation.

One person was killed, another injured during a collision Saturday morning in central Iowa’s Story County. The Iowa State Patrol says a 2004 Ford pickup truck driven by 53-year old Gregory Shaa, of Steamboat Rock, was traveling south on Interstate 29 at around 9:40-a.m., when the vehicle went out of control due to icy roads. The pickup crossed the median, spun around and slid south in the northbound lanes of I-35, where it was rear-ended by a semi traveling at about 45-miles per hour.

The force of the impact sent the pickup back into the median, and it caused Shaa to be ejected from the vehicle, even though he was wearing his seat belt. Shaa was transported by ambulance to Mary Greeley/Methodist Hospital, in Ames. A report on his condition is not available. A passenger in the pickup, 52-year old Stuart Leslee Pettigrew, of Eldora, who was wearing a seat belt, died from his injuries at the hospital in Ames.

The driver of the semi, 71-year old Wayne Hurtig, of Eden Prarie, MN, was not injured.

Police in Council Bluffs say two men wearing bandanas robbed a convenience store around 1 a.m. Saturday. Officials say one man was armed with a knife and the other had a club, when they demanded money from a clerk at the Kum and Go near 21st Street and Fifth Avenue in Council Bluffs. Footprints in the snow led to a getaway car. Authorities are still searching for the suspects.