NATIONAL LATE MODEL DRIVER VISITS LOCAL RACER

Brian Birkhofer of Muscatine Iowa was in Snyder County late last week, working on his racecar at the shop of two-time late model champ Donnie Schick. The two first meet at Volusia County speedway during the winternationals in 2006. Donnie helped Brian for the week and the two have stayed in contact every since. After Brian finished his weekend at Lowe’s motor speedway a few weeks ago, his plans were to race with the Lucas series last weekend at Bedford and Hagerstown. So Donnie suggested he could use his shop since his place was only two hours from either track. “ I figured if Brian was going to race local he could use my shop and he would not be that far from the track he was going to race at”. Mother Nature had other ideas and both events were rained out. Donnie who is racing a limited schedule this year hopes to help him out a few more times this year. “I helped him out at the Pittsburgher last year and will go to Eldora for the Dream weekend to help him out again”. “Any time he races close to the area I hope to pitch in and give him any help he needs”. Birkhofer has won some major events in his late model career that started back in 1997, his biggest the world 100, plus a $50,000 to win race at WVMS, and the first major late model event at Knoxville. The 36 year old driver has run in all the major series and won some against the best in the business, beating WOO and Lucas Oil drivers. His most memorable was beating Scott Bloomquist for the World 100. “Yea that won sticks out because any time you can even run with a driver like him makes you feel good, than to beat him was very special”. Brian for the first time in his career is racing a car he build and helped design. “Jim and Chris Mars and myself decided to build two cars, which took a couple of months to do”. “Its not a different kind of deal it is just the way we build the chassis, we have are own jig stuff”. “Right now were learning what they want because they seem to want a little something different than are other cars did”. First time out with the car at Davenport I ran second, and is not sure yet what to expect. “I just need time to test what we got and try to make money at the same time”. Brian is more on a comfort level on a bigger racetrack which is were he started. “Donnie showed me Selinsgrove and it is big, and if I can help him out with his new car, which he told me he is not liking right now I will”. Brian has no set schedule for the 2008 season and will not stick with any series. “I will race at some $5,000 to win events and $10,000 win event that work for me and keep my travel down some, with the price of diesel fuel you have to budget things more than before”. “I have a wife and two young sons who have became very important to me, and I want to be with them more, but I still have to race to make money”. “I just like that six to eight hour radius that I will stick to again this year, and will hit all the major races, like Cedar Lake, Batesville and maybe the Pittsburgher will see what happens”. Like allot of winning teams you can not do it without a good engine and Brian has allot of faith in his. “Bill Schlieper of Pro Power I have been with him since 2000 and there have been times he has bent over backwards to help me out”. “I own most of my equipment myself so sometime I may not be has agressive has I should be, so I have to race smart when I can. Brian has had some good sponsors that have been with him for some time and could not do this without they’re continuing support. “Johnny Johnson from J&J steel helps a bunch of racers out and this sport would be hurting without someone like him, Daufeldt transport has also been with me for sometime and ASI sportswear, and Simon trucking, without there help this would be tougher to do this”. Some fans in the region will like that fact that Brian has his helmet painted up like the Pittsburgh Steelers and is a big fan and even gets come to Pittsburgh to see some games in the fall. “ I was born in the seventy’s when they were winning allot and have been a fan since, and if you live in Iowa the Hawkeyes colors are the same so it fits”. “Brian Daugherty is a buddy of mine from Punxatawney and he got season tickets so I have gone to a couple of games with him and last year brought my wife and kids with and we went to the Jacksonville game and it was snowing and it was allot of fun. “When it gets close to the NFL season I just love it; I like racing but my mine will head in that direction”. “I have the Sunday ticket so I can watch everyone of there games if I'm not racing, for what ever time they are on that is my three hours of my time”. I wear my Steelers shirt and hope that helps to get it done”. Like any real football fan Brian was focused on the NFL draft last weekend. “Coming up here to vast with Donnie and his wife they are Cowboy fans I did not think they aloud that in PA”. Than I really like the next comment Brian gave. I guess living in Iowa if I was not a Steelers fan I would be a Green Bay Packer fan”. Brian then found out that I'm a big Packer fan wondered if I was over the shock of Brett Frave retiring. “There are fans of mine that like to see me race from Pa and they have sent me some cool collectibles, like a throwback Will Parker jersey a fan gave to me when I was in Pittsburgh, they have been other things also so it is good to be a fan of a team like Pittsburgh, especially when I'm around the area racing”. For the first time in many years Brian did not start his racing season off has early as in the past, because of building the new cars. “We missed racing in Florida but we decide to work on these cars, I might have been a little rusty at first but will get it”. The probably has been the longest stretch that I have ever been on not racing for five months”. “I take two month off at the most so going five months was a long time since I have been doing g this since 1998”. “I really wanted to go racing but I took the preparation over racing this time”. “I think were going to have a good season, me and Jimmy will keep working on these cars, and I think it will pay off in the next couple of months”. “It will all be worth it if I am standing in victory lane at the Dream with that $1,000,000 dollar check, that's when I will be smiling”. Brian would be happy if he just came close to the success that Billy Moyer has had so far this year with his Victory Circle chassis. “I don’t now all of it but Billy Moyer and Scott Bloomquist get talked about allot because the are real good race car drivers”. “He got something that he really likes in his cars, he cot to Florida and started winning and has not looked back since”. Brian and Jimmy have not yet come up with a name for the chassis they put together for now they will call it Birkhofer/Mars till they come up with a name. “ It has been allot of fun, but it was allot more work than I thought it would be”. Let’s see what kind of season Brian and Jimmy have and see what name they come up for their chassis design.

 

 

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A YOUNG STAR AND A VETERAN RACE AT SELINSGROVE

Saturday night at Selinsgrove found a 19-year-old driver making his first ever start, and a driver who was not in a car in over 22 years making a start. Young Randy Burkholder of Chambersburg Pa. is in his first year of racing the super late models, while Mike Romig is helping to get a car ready for his young nephew to get behind the wheel in the near future. Randy is the son of super late model driver Doug Burkholder and has an Uncle Daryl who also races, so it was only natural for Randy to be in a late model. He started off like most drivers today first with the go-kart, which he raced until he was 13 than hobby stocks for one year than to the limited late model class which he raced in until this year. “I raced the limited for four years and Dad and I thought it was the right time to make the move to the super late model class”. In his four year in the limited class Randy came away with 2 track championship at Cumberland and in the last two years has picked up eleven feature wins at Cumberland, Bedford and Hesston. “This year I'm just trying to get some seat time runs has many laps has I can, and bring the car back in one piece. Randy ended his season last year trying to qualify for the MACS show at Cumberland in the super late models but did not make it. This year when they were their he did make the show. “That was neat just to make the show with all the good cars that were there”. The team is using a 2003 Rocket chassis with Hershey racing engine power. Along with support from his Dad and Mom his girlfriend Alicia and crew Chief Brian McKrendrick. So far this year Randy has had three top ten runs with a seventh at Port Royal, a Second at Bedford and a fifth at Selinsgrove just last weekend. “That was a good weekend for us with getting two top fives, I like racing with the drivers in the super class and I feel with the help from my dad I can learn allot this season”. “We plan to race every Friday at Bedford, and move around on Saturday nights”. “We run Hoosier tires and I like the compound rule that Selinsgrove has it fits us”. “My goal for this year is to get as many good finishes as I can and would like to finish in the top ten in points at Bedford”. Randy’s Dad Doug is sitting back for now and letting his son drive the car he drove to a top five in points at Cumberland, but is does not mean he is done racing yet. “We may get Dad in are other car sometime this year it depends how things work out for me”. Dad and I communicate real well he sets the car up and we talk about what to do with the car”. “It is a whole family deal, along with my uncle who I raced against last year in the limited class a few times”. If the way things have stared out for this young driver is any indication what the future holds it looks very bright.

On the other end of that is Mike Romig who raced for the first time in over 22 years, when he jump into a car at Selinsgrove Saturday night. Mike is helping to get his nephew Nick stared and will be working on getting the feeling right for when Nick is ready to race. “The plans are for me to try and get the car going straight and work out some of the bugs”. “I may drive it most of the year we’ll just have to see how things go”. Nick Romig is the name that is on the racecar but for now Mike will be driving it. Mike started racing back in 1976 with the Dickson family Rick and Kenny. I would drive the car at Port Royal on Saturday and Rick would drive it at Hesston on Sunday. “ Then Rick wanted Kenny to drive so after that we did are own deal and the last time I drove was for Graham Taylor at Selinsgrove “.” I like what Kenny is doing for his son Nick he is going to be a good racer and is a very nice young man‘.“ I wasn’t going to be the driver, but they asked to help out with that part of it so I said yea”. “I do not want to but Nick in the car until we get some things figured out”. The car is a Lazer chassis with PFS racing engines. “I like the chassis it is very resalable and I’ve talk to Jim about it and he is helping us out and working with us”. I can not say enough good thing about the engine Pete Troutman builds a good engine, it is only a 358 motor, but with a little drier track conditions I think we can run Ok”. “I myself like a drier track it takes more to drive the car, which I like”. Jeff Romig will call the shots he has worked for a number of teams during the years and is a big help”. “The technology on these cars today is allot different from when I last drove, but is good for the sport”. “It will just take me some time to get use to things”. “I like the forward traction the car has but will have to get use to the rear steer, but we will work on it and get it”. “The front shock we had on last Saturday was all-wrong, and there is a few other things we will be working on, I'm looking forward to begin more compitive in a few weeks”. “To me it looks like Selinsgrove has about 10 to 12 drivers that could win a race, that is a very strong you have there”. Jim Bernheisel is planning to be at Selinsgrove this week so with some help from him on Saturday will be good for us”. “The cars are fun to drive and very different from the last time I drove, this is going to fun”. “Plus we are getting most of the old crew together like my brother Larry (Abe) Romig, some of these guys were not old enough to get into the pits back when I was driving, racing is a great family thing to do and it looks like that is what is happing with us”. Mike has one feature win at Port Royal and none at Selinsgrove, but he does remember the night it almost happened. “I was leading and Dave Robbins and me got together and I did a 360, but until I got going Robbie Smith got by me and won the race and I ended up second”. “That is one race I will never forget”. ‘It was great to be their and so some old friends and talk to some like Bob Croop; it looks to me like the senior citizens verses the young guns on the track”. “I know I have to keep inn my head that I could win if every thing goes right or why would I do this”. “Nick has drove the car for Practice twice and when the time is right we will put him in the car and let him go”. For now Mike feels like a kid again in this sport of super late model racing and should be fun to watch in the next couple of weeks.