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Florida Open Wheel
By Richard Golardi
A Few Driver Profiles from East Bay Raceway Park
The late race charge by Mark Ruel Jr. saw him go from fifth place at the last restart to nearly winning the feature on Saturday night at East Bay Raceway Park. The season’s first visit to the Gibsonton dirt track by the Eagle Jet Top Gun Sprint Series started with 21 cars, reduced to 19 cars only ten minutes into the evening. A pit fight before the cars had even taken to the track sent two competitors home for the night. It was still the largest starting field for the series this year, by far. Mark Ruel Jr. came up one car length short at the checkered flag to Tony Agin. It was the second time in three weeks that a dirt race in Florida ended with the late race leader holding on to the lead despite trailing smoke from an engine problem. Agin got his first sprint car feature win in Florida after three years of competition in the Sunshine State. He had won previously in Texas in a sprint car, telling me that the win was in Houston, Texas.
Mark Ruel Jr. has shown speed this year and proudly showed off his new Shaw chassis, which only retained the wing, seat, and steering from his old car. The car has already taken him to a second place finish in Top Gun series competition, and one win in Florida in a Putnam County Speedway FSCA race in April. He would not attempt to make a run at the Top Gun Series driver championship this year, as their plans did not include the races at Hendry County Motorsports Park (a six and a half hour drive one way from their Jacksonville shop). “That’s a little too far for us, unfortunately,” he said reluctantly. With East Bay as the only other track remaining on the Top Gun series schedule, Ruel told me that he will race there and the other events on the Florida Sprint Car Association schedule. FSCA will still apparently be racing at Putnam County Speedway, after Top Gun cancelled their races there. FSCA races in Georgia and has added Putnam County Speedway this year. Next up for Mark Ruel Jr. is a non-racing event – his best friend is getting married. He won’t be racing on the weekend of June 1st and 2nd, as that is when the wedding will take place.
At seventy four years old, Dick Byerly was behind the wheel of a race car for the first time in twelve years on Saturday night at East Bay Raceway Park. In the prior forty five years, from the age of seventeen up until his last race at age sixty two, Byerly had racked up over 500 feature wins in a sprint car. His last sprint car win came twelve years ago at the Talladega dirt track. This night he was behind the wheel of the number 05 Mayhem Motorsports car, with his son Rick Byerly, and Rick’s stepson, DJ Peeples Jr., driver of the number 30 team car. “I got this old car together. My son is going to drive this car,” Dick informed me. It would be renumbered to number 50 for Rick Byerly for future competition.
“I raced all over – Ohio and Pennsylvania, and also Alabama and Georgia and Tennessee, and the Carolinas. I was based out of Ohio, lived in Ohio. We dominated the Florida State Fairgrounds for about four years – from ’84 to ’87,” Dick Byerly told me. He still remembered the battles on the dirt of the Florida State Fairgrounds with Frank Riddle, in the number 11 car, while Byerly was in the seat of his number 50 sprint car. “I ran with Steve Kinser and all of those guys, and the Pennsylvania Posse. And, I worked every day. Right now, I’m in it for the fun of it. I’m not going to win anything. You know Jac Haudenschild – ‘Wild Child’? I gave him that nickname when he was sixteen years old.” For his sprint car racing comeback, Byerly said that he was just going to stay in the bottom groove, just feeling it out, as he didn’t want to be in the way. Of all his hundreds of wins driving a sprint car, not a single one of these wins was on an asphalt track. “Strictly dirt. Asphalt is to get to and from the race track,” he said, and then he smiled broadly, reveling in his dirt racing comeback.
Forty two year old Shane Kreidler was having a breakout year in Florida sprint car competition, so I asked him if his success (two wins and one second place finish in three races leading up to Saturday) made him the surprise story of the year so far. “This year, I’m surprising a few fellows out there, I’m sure. Last year, we had a hard time keeping it on all four wheels.” Why are you so fast, and why are you winning this year, I asked? “I think I broke the ice with that one win, and plus, I changed my number from 88 to 52. Last year I was 88, and 88 got upside down too many times, so we decided to change it. We went back to my number, and then we started running better. I don’t know how that works, but …” Well, it’s got to be partly you, I remarked. Did you change your driving style, or change something else? “Maybe. My crew is setting the car up a lot better this year, I think. We’ve got a handle on the set up. Once you get that first win, it gets you more aggressive, and you’re racing harder. It took a win to get me fired up, and wanting more.”
Kreidler had raced a partial schedule with the Top Gun series last year, but does intend to run the full schedule this year, in order to stay in the fight for the driver championship. He did have the points lead prior to the East Bay Raceway feature race on Saturday. Shane has fifteen years experience racing sprint cars, mostly in South Florida, he told me. He had been racing at East Bay since he was thirteen years old, first in a Pinto, and then street stocks and modifieds. With the tough year that he had in sprint cars last year, I asked if he had any injuries from the flips and crashes? “I was a little sore. A little whiplash. No broken bones, just a little bruising. These roll cages hold up good, and you got your HANS device. We’ve got all our safety gear that we need to be safe.” During the week, Shane is a Storm Water Inspector for the Town of Jupiter, running a crew that does inspections and makes repairs to drainage pipes. He has one son, who is eleven years old. The car owner is Danny Kreidler, Shane’s father. His main goal for the year is “to try to continue running good, and try to win this Top Gun series. I’m going to say I’ve got a dang good shot at it, and I’m not going to stop. As long as the crew keeps everything tightened up, and our motors stay strong, that’s my goal – to win this, and to do it this year.”
Full Throttle Speedway Grand Opening – Comebacks, Newcomers and Misfortune
Racing was back at Full Throttle Speedway (formerly Desoto Super Speedway) in Bradenton. The asphalt TQ midgets of the FMARA (Florida Midget Auto Racing Association) were back. Track owners and promoters Kevin Williams and Mike Chase were back promoting racing at their track. Sprint car drivers Tommy Nichols and Mark Gimmler were back in the seat of a winged sprint car in competition with the TBARA. The TBARA themselves were in comeback mode, after staging only two races since May 2012 (both in October 2012). Full Throttle Speedway and TBARA were now aligned to help both bolster their bottom lines. The TBARA saw another Florida teenager make his sprint car debut, this time it was nineteen year old Chris Gimmler. Gimmler is a veteran in TQ midgets, and drove a sprint car in competition for the first time on Saturday. Misfortune struck in the TQ midget race when a flip in the third turn put Geoff Styner’s car into the concrete wall roll cage first. The roll cage partially collapsed, and Styner’s helmet impacted the wall, causing serious injuries. He is currently recovering from surgery to repair a broken vertebrae in his neck.
Tommy Nichols told me that this was his first sprint car race since late 2011, when a crash injured his back, and required surgery to repair the damage. He sat out all of 2012 to allow his back to recover, and was at the track with his new car. The bright green and black number 55 car was operating out of Gary Green’s shop for the full TBARA race schedule. He had raced with the Premier Miller race team previously, but this was a new car that was not part of that team. Tommy started the feature on the outside of the first row and had a right front tire going down from the start. The tire was on the rim by the end of the feature, and he finished in sixth place. Tommy is even considering some races outside of Florida for later in the year.
Mark Gimmler was back, after running a limited TBARA schedule in 2012. This time, he was joined by his son, Chris Gimmler. Chris is a West Palm Beach resident, and is currently going to Palm Beach State College and working. He has three seasons in the TQ midgets with eleven total feature wins. Six of these wins came in 2012. Chris was making his TBARA debut, and put in a good performance on Saturday, a night that saw fast cars come up quickly on slower cars, while both used the track’s high and low grooves. This produced a few tense moments, but the thirty laps of the feature race went caution free.
The final result of the TBARA feature saw the same winner (Dave Steele) as all of the other asphalt sprint car races in Florida since the last TBARA race (save for a single Showtime Speedway win by Troy DeCaire in March). The level of absolute domination by Steele, with steady reserved aggression, while often waiting until near the end to pick off the leader, is a pleasure to watch for the pure fan. On this night, Steele made his move on the back stretch of the 26th lap, relegating Dude Teate to a second place finish. Teate had led every lap up until that point in the feature.
I spoke to TBARA Secretary and Publicist Joshua Wichers at the end of the evening, which was the first race for the series in over six months. Activity for the series will pick up over the next 45 days, with two races in June, a month that sees four asphalt sprint car races in Florida. “We went thirty laps in about five and a half minutes. I think everybody’s happy. Our guys put on a tremendous show,” Wichers told me. He also praised the track management, which had finished the bulk of the track’s renovation work in the past month, saying that it was a great facility and that they had “a tremendous success”. I noted that the crowd looked about twenty to thirty times larger than the last TBARA race at the track in May 2012. “Oh – absolutely. The warm body count at Desoto Speedway was maybe three hundred, and there was probably close to four thousand in the stands tonight, if not more than that. The pit road spaces were entirely taken. That says a lot for what they’ve done already, and it’s only the first night. I think they’ve got a very successful career here with the new track.” I asked Josh Wichers if he thought they could sustain this through the year, which includes three remaining TBARA races. “I think it’s up to them. As long as they continue to do what they’ve been doing, I think they’ll be fine.”
There are plans in motion to have the TQ midgets of the FMARA join the TBARA at every one of the races on the TBARA schedule. This would give the FMARA a new identity as a “stepping stone series” for drivers to move up to the TBARA sprint cars, as Chris Gimmler has done. “We have been working with, and talking to the President of the FMARA, Mark Gimmler. We’re trying to get them scheduled everywhere we go,” Wichers remarked. There is one schedule conflict, with FMARA at Full Throttle on June 1st, a date that TBARA is at Orlando Speedworld. Discussions are ongoing to get the schedule changes done, and I was told that several TQ midget drivers expressed their support to align their series with TBARA, and to race together.
I expressed my surprise regarding the size of the crowd, which was bigger than I had expected for new track owners. “Kevin Williams and Mike Chase have done a great job capturing their audience down there. They know how to entertain their people,” Wichers said. “The fans want racing, and that’s what we brought to the table tonight. I’ve told some people that it feels like Buff Fritz and I have inherited the Titanic. And at this point, we’re just trying to get it off the bottom so that we can make it float.” But you’re back, I remarked. “We’re floating. I think a lot of the other racers are going to say ‘hey – they did have twenty three cars, and it was a good race, and it was packed stands’. The racers want to race in front of five thousand people – that’s what it’s all about.”
Tempering the good feelings all around was the frightening crash that occurred during the second lap of the TQ midget feature race, a series brought over from Punta Gorda Speedway. With all four tires on the new asphalt patch entering turn three, Geoff Styner’s car took a sudden hard left turn, and when the front tires where turned to the right, the car flipped on its side. The roll cage impacted the wall at the right front corner, which collapsed the cage and caused the driver’s head to impact the wall. This impact caused Geoff’s major injuries, including a broken neck vertebrae and a broken sternum. I closely examined the helmet, and spoke to Styner’s car owner, Jay Stutz. The safety equipment that saved Styner’s life was a Simpson helmet with a 2010 Snell sticker, and a Hutchins head and neck restraint. The helmet was badly scraped on the top front, but not indented. The inside of the helmet was completely intact, and not deformed. A crack on the lower left edge revealed the attachment point for the head restraint. It is certain that this helmet saved Styner’s life during this vicious impact with a concrete wall at high speed.
My thanks go to Robin Sabourin Green, who helped with information on the helmet, and also Gary Green, who examined Styner’s car at the track. My initial analysis of the crash video led me to believe that the car suffered a right rear suspension failure entering the turn. The sparks from the car’s right side led me to believe this. Gary Green informed me that he did not see any visible right rear suspension damage. There had been an incident earlier in the evening at the track that might have damaged the right rear of the car, but I have no other details of this incident, or possible collision.
Styner did have successful surgery on Monday to repair the broken vertebrae, and fit him with a halo device to immobilize his head. He must wear this halo for several months, and will miss work during this time. He is already sitting up in his hospital bed, and has been told that he may go home once he is able to walk. He was smiling and waving from his hospital bed, and was reported to be in good spirits. Styner has a long road to recovery ahead of him, and a website has been set up to accept donations for his recovery (thanks to Todd Michaels of Floridasprintcarfans.com and Scotty Adema for setting this up):
http://www.youcaring.com/medical-fundraiser/help-geoff-styner-/57942
The videos from the Florida Open Wheel channel are here (TBARA feature race video, TQ midget feature race video, and video of the Geoff Styner TQ midget incident):
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSdPdgmUo6WfkfR6Eo__QBA
Q & A with “Joe Dirt” – Bubba Raceway Park Announcer Joe Linebarier
Who is “Joe Dirt”? Go to Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala, and you can hear his baritone voice boom out from the public address system. It is the voice of veteran racing announcer and radio show host Joe Linebarier. For Floridians, it is also something more than that. It is the most trusted voice of authority for dirt sprint car racing in the state. Calling races for the Top Gun Sprint Series and the Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series from his announcer’s station above the raceway’s front straight, he has become the voice of Florida dirt racing. On Saturday evening, the stock car feature race saw an infield melee that delayed the last feature race of the evening. That meant that the last feature, and Joe’s duties in the booth, were not over until 1 AM on Sunday morning. “If you are too tired, we can do this some other time,” I offered, glancing at my watch. “No, let’s do this. I’m not too tired,” he offered. He was accessible, he was friendly, and I knew he had some good stories to tell. I knew I’d enjoy my interview with “Joe Dirt”.
Q. Joe, tell me – where are you from originally?
A. Originally – upstate New York – actually Glens Falls, right in the Adirondack Mountains. Moved there at a young age. I have enjoyed some upstate race tracks – Saratoga, and Orange County. Most of my adult life has been in Florida.
Q. Have long have you lived in Florida then?
A. Gosh, I guess it’s been around 1972. So, I’d say a good solid forty years.
Q. How did you get to be a fan of racing?
A. Well, I remember my father always used to be a huge race fan. Watching television – Indy 500 and Daytona. He made sure my brother and I watched it. He had his favorites. Those favorites translated into ours. It was my father – his influence. He actually tested tires for Firestone. He’s from North Carolina, so he certainly knows the roots of the sport. My father really was my largest influence.
Q. What was your first job in racing?
A. I parked cars at Auburndale Speedway. This was back in the mid ‘80s. I was invited there by a gentleman named Tom Gray, a good friend of mine that I actually did some announcing with later on. He put a flashlight in my hand, and I parked cars at Auburndale Speedway.
Q. Were you doing some radio work at this time, or did that come later?
A. The radio career began, I guess, around 1990. It was a little AM station in Deland, Florida. Tom Gray, the same gentleman that brought me to Auburndale, had me sit in. We had a little motorsports talk show, and we did a couple of hours on Saturday morning. It was a very small market, but we would highlight the local race tracks and the local racers. That’s where it really began. And then it blossomed into quite a bit of TV work, some local stuff, and then the current radio show now.
Q. So, the radio work was before race announcing at tracks?
A. Yes, it really was. During my tenure at WXVQ in Deland, a little station that is now torn down, Days of Thunder was being filmed. Our station was actually used in the production of the movie. Our small little lobby was actually used as a Laundromat, if you remember the scene where Tom Cruise is doing laundry. They did a lot of their production at Volusia Speedway, and that brought me out there. I’d always been an asphalt fan, because of my Dad’s influence and everything. I really didn’t embrace dirt. Man, I went out there one time, and I was hooked.
Q. As a fan of short track racing, or dirt racing, or both?
A. Dirt racing – that’s when I really became a fan. When I was young, going to tracks in upstate New York, you don’t really have an appreciation of what you’re seeing. It was my first exposure as an adult – at Volusia Speedway Park.
Q. When was the first race announcing job?
A. The announcing came a season or so later. That was with a gentleman named Bob Watson from Lee Speedway, up in Connecticut. Gene Crane was doing the Hooters Pro Cup Series, and Gene didn’t show up one night, and Bob was in desperate need of someone, and he knew I was doing a little radio show. He invited me up to the tower, and that was it, man. I filled in for Gene Crane one night, and I never got up. That was like ’91, or maybe ’92. Then Dick Murphy, the original owner at Volusia Speedway, sold the track to Steve Ross. Dick Murphy later got the track back, and I began working for him. I was there (at Volusia Speedway) for eighteen years. In the meantime, Ocala Speedway was in need of a Friday night announcer. So, I was actually doing Friday nights here, and Saturday nights at Volusia. My weekends were totally dedicated to racing. Then, when Bubba bought the track, I was forced with a decision. He said, “Look, we’re going to Saturday nights.”
Q. So, this is 2011 now, right?
A. He said that we were going to Saturday nights, and said, “I’d love to have you, if you want to stay, so you’ve got to make the decision.” So, with a lot of prayer, you know – it was a tough decision to leave. Choosing between Volusia, and Bubba’s. I made the decision. It wasn’t really that difficult, because Dick Murphy had long ago sold the place, and World Racing Group was operating it. That helped in my decision, and I’ve been here ever since.
Q. The nickname Joe Dirt – how did that come about?
A. I love the movie. Everybody loves the movie. I think somebody called me that one day, and it just stuck. Those of you that haven’t seen a photo of me – I have no mullet.
Q. Tell me about the radio show that you have now.
A. It’s right here in Ocala. It’s on WMOP (900 AM), which is an ESPN station. It’s a weekly motorsports broadcast called Racin’ Nation. It’s every Saturday (10 AM to noon), and we’re looking at possibly changing the time slot to twelve to one. We highlight all motorsports. With this program – NHRA, IndyCars, and Formula One we put a big emphasis on. We do concentrate on the short tracks, and highlight our drivers, and promote this race track more than any other. Currently, that show’s going well.
Q. What was the most exciting race you have ever announced?
A. It was not so much the entire event was exciting, but one incident. It was during the Winternationals at Volusia Speedway. I don’t know if it was the World of Outlaws late models, it might have been the STARS. Tim Senic, I believe out of New York, the twenty five car. He launched his late model fifty, maybe even seventy five feet, in the air in turn three. His car went airborne, and I’ve never seen anything like it. It ended up outside of the race track, which is up on a hill. You see so much in motorsports, but for some reason, I see that image every day.
Q. Who is the track owner that you’ve admired the most, and why?
A. Dick Murphy, no question about it. Dick Murphy was an old style promoter at Volusia Speedway. People right here in this tower would agree, that if that man opened a race track, it would close other tracks. He gave me my shot. He was just such an interesting man. The guy was wonderful, and would always do anything for me. He would give me any resource that I needed. And that’s important to me, working for any track promoter, knowing that announcing is one position that they don’t have to worry about. One thing I pride myself on is being able to enable the track owner or manager to not have to worry about the announcing position. It’s all covered.
Q. What driver was the one that was the most exciting for you to watch?
A. Gosh, there’s just been so many. I guess we’ll keep that on the local level. Shane Williams – he’s a career driver that missed the shot, and remained a local driver that continues to put crowds on their feet. He’s driven just about everything, and currently, he’s in a dirt late model.
Q. And, what about in sprint cars?
A. Sprint cars? You saw him tonight – Danny Martin Jr. What he can do in that race car! Here he is on the last lap, and the car’s blowing up. He squeezes everything out of it, not knowing what’s going on, and he wins the race. Locally, you’ve got to give this young man credit – Danny Martin Jr. He’s so impressive.
Q. What do you think lies ahead for you in the next five years?
A. I have no delusions of grandeur that I’m going to perhaps be a national announcer, whether it’s TV or radio. You know, that opportunity presented itself a few times and for whatever reason, I’m a homebody. I’ve been married for twenty three years. I love being home. I don’t want to travel. I’ve done some work on the road with the Hooters Pro Series and the radio network.
Q. This was in the Southeast?
A. Absolutely. This was all in the Southeast. The radio network, we pretty much stayed in the Southeast. Those were good opportunities. In five years? As a matter of fact, the conversation was held a couple of weeks ago, and Bubba said, “Joe, you’ve got a job for life.” So, in five years, I plan on being here. It’s important to me to be able to stay somewhere for a long time. Only then I think you’re doing your job to the best of your ability.
Q. Excellent. That’s all my questions, Joe. Thank you very much for the interview.
A. It’s my pleasure.
Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series Marches into Florida’s Dirt Wars
Danny Martin Jr
On Saturday, the second Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series race of the year, and the first that I attended, saw drama unfold right up to the end of the feature race. The eventual winner, Danny Martin Jr., was not certain of a victory until the checkered flag fell. His engine started smoking heavily on the last caution. But with only one lap remaining, he stayed out, held off a charging Robbie Smith, and powered to the finish line in first place. Early leader Sport Allen looked strong, continuing his dirt and asphalt racing comeback, but was passed at mid-race by Martin Jr., and later had a top wing mount break, and fell back. Rookie sprint car driver Andy Cobb had a difficult first Bubba Army feature race and was looking for a better finish in his second trip of the year to Bubba Raceway Park. He had a spin coming out of the fourth turn, but kept it running, did a 360, and continued on to finish the feature race with a sixth place finish. After Martin Jr. was pushed into Victory lane, I asked him if his engine had died after taking the checkered flag, and he said that he shut it down on the cool-down lap to avoid blowing up the engine.
Overall, the newest sprint car series to debut in Florida had a trouble-free night, produced a feature race with drama and competition until the very end, and had a field whose size outnumbered the Top Gun Series races this year. The race might have seemed calm in comparison to the evening’s stock car race, which featured wrecks a-plenty and later saw fists flying in an infield melee that resembled a benches-clearing hockey fight. But, where that race featured mayhem and madness, the sprint cars put the spotlight on competition, with a field that included drivers with multiple championships to their names. Martin Jr. had pulled out to a sizable lead in the last ten laps, but the late race caution and his engine woes brought the field back in, and he held off Smith at the finish by one second.
Sport Allen
Two of the more experienced competitors that I spoke to, and who both headed north on I-75 from the Tampa Bay area, were Sport Allen and Johnny Gilbertson. Sport acknowledged that he seemed to be making steady progress toward getting his first win with his #88 team, and had even had a second place finish in the first Bubba Army race last month. He was uncertain if the team would be heading to the dirt on the following Saturday, at Volusia Speedway Park, or if he would bring the pavement car to the season opener at Full Throttle Speedway. On this night, he seemed to be on the way to another good finish until the broken part sidelined him.
For Johnny Gilbertson, the trip to Ocala would be his first Bubba Army series start, after missing the season opener on March 23rd. He had some uncertainty in the afternoon if the engine was running properly, and later finished the feature in fourth place. I asked about his plans for running the full TBARA series to defend his driver championship (Gilbertson was TBARA champion in 2011 and 2012), now that the full season schedule is known. He stated that he does need more sponsors for his pavement car, but that he will make plans to run the full season schedule, and go for a “three-peat”, in an attempt to earn his third straight TBARA driver championship. The only driver to have earned the TBARA driver championship in three consecutive years was Sam Rodriguez, from 1990 to 1992. Several other drivers have gotten three championships, but a championship for Gilbertson this year would put in him in elite company with Sam Rodriguez as the only two drivers with a “three-peat”. Gilbertson was still hoping to bring along BoatTrailersDirect.com as a sponsor for his pavement car in the upcoming TBARA season.
Andy Cobb
Coming from racing late models, Andy Cobb, with his father Ricky Cobb, was at Bubba Raceway Park for his second ever sprint car race, the first coming last month in the Bubba Army March 23rd race. The twenty six year old Trooper Specialist with the Florida Highway Patrol was racing in the number 111 car, as a teammate to Robbie Smith. The team has sponsorship from the family business, Cobb Auto Glass, and also Big 3 Pull & Save Auto Parts. The 360 limited motor in his car was soon to be replaced by a 360 USCS motor, and I was told the change should bring him an increase in power of about another 300 horsepower. Married for one year, Cobb told me that he is planning to run the Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series races for now, and may get in more practice laps at East Bay Raceway Park, where he has practiced with this car before.
As a team car to Robbie Smith, I listened in as Andy Cobb and Robbie Smith spoke in the afternoon sun about how his car was handling on the Bubba Raceway Park dirt that afternoon. The track was developing some large ruts and depressions, making it a tough place to learn for any newcomer to sprint cars. After a monster truck show during the prior weekend, the track was showing the effect of the wear, even with the track crew starting the dirt preparation at 9 AM that morning. That probably contributed to causing Andy’s spin in the feature that night, from which he quickly recovered and got back in the race.
Robbie Smith and Andy Cobb
Andy Cobb told me that he, Troy DeCaire, and Aric Almirola (current NASCAR Sprint Cup driver in the #43 Richard Petty Motorsports car) were childhood friends. Aric Almirola is also Sam Rodriguez’s grandson, and all of them are from the Tampa area. Andy admitted that since he knew so many people in the sprint car racing business, it made it almost a foregone conclusion that he would wind up racing a sprint car some day. His racing career arc had climbed to a peak that had been set in front of him years before, by so many other talented sprint car drivers to come out of the Tampa Bay area.
Florida’s Racing Rebirth – Tracks Across the State Come Roaring Back
By Richard Golardi
On Saturday, May 4th, Florida will have the good fortune of seeing sprint car racing return to two tracks that have recently been dormant. Other than the frenzy of activity during February’s Speedweeks, Volusia Speedway Park has been dormant. The track was unused for an extended period in 2012, and had weeds sprouting up through the track surface. The Eagle Jet Top Gun Sprint Series returns to the track on May 4th, after the return of weekly racing at the track on April 13th. At the other end of Central Florida’s I-4 corridor, specifically in east Manatee County, the debut of Full Throttle Speedway (formerly Desoto Super Speedway) takes place, with the season-opening TBARA race. The track, and its 38 acre grounds, was purchased by the duo that had recently operated Punta Gorda Speedway, Kevin Williams and Mike Chase.
Add the following to the mix:
· A new leaseholder at Showtime Speedway in Pinellas Park (Robert Yoho), and the return of regularly scheduled sprint car racing to the track
· Daytona International Speedway joining the fray with their own “short track”, and the addition of late models and modifieds to their own Speedweeks event
· Orlando Speedworld and New Smyrna Speedway named as “NASCAR Home Tracks” with regularly scheduled late models and modifieds racing at both tracks
· Putnam County Speedway toughs it out through delays to return in 2013 with sprint car racing staged by two different sanctioning bodies
· FSCA (Florida Sprint Car Association) stages its own resurrection and returns with sprint car racing at Putnam County Speedway (FSCA was dormant since 2011)
· Florida’s dirt sprint car racing split is initiated with Bubba Clem’s announcement of his intention to have his own sprint car series at Bubba Raceway Park, the Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series, which premiered in March
· Top Gun Sprint Series reinvents itself by racing in North Florida, and South Florida, in addition to the familiar Tampa Bay area dirt at East Bay Raceway Park, after being locked out at Bubba Raceway Park
· TBARA finds itself in a predicament similar to Top Gun, with being locked out of a race facility that could be its “home track” (Showtime Speedway), and decides to forge a relationship with Full Throttle Speedway’s management team in order to beef up its 2013 schedule
· Bubba Clem’s commitment to have sprint car racing at his track sees multiple sprint car series racing there during 2013 Speedweeks (3 different sprint series planned, and 2 of them raced), and he starts the Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series to bring back USCS/ASCS rules 360 sprint cars to Florida
· Full Throttle Speedway brings back the TBARA, after the series had not raced at the facility for nearly one year. Track owner Kevin Williams rejects a chance to start his own sprint car series (as Robert Yoho and Bubba Clem had done in the past year) and moves to renovate, motivate (fans to come from both the Punta Gorda area and Tampa Bay area), and instigate (new track, new relationship with the TBARA)
· Is Punta Gorda Speedway the next track to be added to the “Florida Comeback List”? The self-proclaimed “original track builder” LeRoy Davidson recently said that he planned on bidding to be the track’s next operator, and then thanked his supporters “in advance for the next twenty years I will be there.” The Charlotte County Airport Authority has put out a “Request for Bids – Former Speedway Facility.” It stated they will be accepting sealed bids for a land lease for the operation and maintenance of the facility formerly known as the Punta Gorda Speedway (approx. 24 acres leased on an “as is basis”). Current timetable – first tour of the track on May 15, 2013, then a Pre-Bid meeting, and then a second tour of the track on June 14, 2013. All bids required by July 26, 2013. When is the earliest date that the track will be operational again? The most logical scenario seems to be mid-year 2014, or possibly even later. The Airport Authority has stated that it may reject any bid, or reject all bids outright.
Changes Coming for DJ Racing and Troy DeCaire in 2013
Mickey Kempgens, L, Troy DeCaire, C, and Dick Fieler, R.
Upon seeing Mickey Kempgens behind the wheel of the DJ Racing / Dick Fieler owned 40:1 sprint car at Showtime Speedway on Saturday, I approached Mr. Fieler to ask about this sighting. I was told that Mickey was taking the car out for a few hot laps, while the team waited for Troy DeCaire’s arrival at the track. Troy was still feeling the effects of the flu, and had been sick since early in the week. He was still sick on race day, but told me that he would take to the track for qualifying and the feature race. It was the first race of the year at Showtime that would see both Dave Steele and Troy entered, coming after the prior two races saw each of the two racers take one win. Both drivers would start from the back of the field for the feature that would see Steele win, and DeCaire take home fifth place.
Number 68 car at Showtime Speedway
I asked car owner Dick Fieler about the change to the 40:1 TruFuel sponsored car for races in Florida, as opposed to the yellow #68, which was raced at Showtime Speedway in December and January. He replied that the TruFuel colors and numbering were being used for the sponsor exposure for TruFuel. In addition, the previous plans (as told to me in December 2012) to use the yellow #68 car in HOSS and AVSS events in the Midwest were now being abandoned. Instead, the TruFuel sponsored 40:1 car would now be seen in all Must See Racing, AVSS, and HOSS series races in the Midwest and Northeast for the remainder of the year. I also asked about the possibility of a car being entered for the Little 500, or if we might see Mickey Kempgens behind the wheel of a DJ Racing car, but both of those potential scenarios seem unlikely. The Davey Hamilton Racing team did not enter a car in last year’s Little 500, and Dick Fieler stated that it is unlikely that he will enter a car.
Troy DeCaire, L, Sport Allen, C, and Dave Steele, R
DJ Racing and Dick Fieler now plan to keep the yellow #68 car in Florida, and it will be entered for a limited schedule of Florida races with Sonny Hartley at the wheel. The schedule of races with Hartley behind the wheel has not been set as of this date, but Fieler did say that his hopes are that it will be a limited number of races, and not the full Showtime or full TBARA schedule.
Cars Line Up at Showtime Speedway
Troy DeCaire has confirmed that he will have some additional races in Florida this year behind the wheel of the Lenny Puglio owned #91 sprint car. The car was most recently seen racing with the Must See Racing series in March in Pensacola and Mobile. On those off weekends during the summer, when he does not have a race scheduled in his Davey Hamilton Racing / DJ Racing entry in any of the three Midwest pavement series (MSRXSS, AVSS, or HOSS), he will fly down to Florida to race in his home state in the #91 car. Previously, he was only going to be behind the wheel of this car for the Little 500. Now, if there is a pavement race in Florida during the summer, and it is an “off weekend” in the Midwest, he will return to the Lenny Puglio #91 car for that race. Troy’s schedule in Florida in the #91 has not been set, but I did note these Florida races are scheduled for days without a Midwest pavement race (after Memorial Day weekend):
Saturday, June 8th – Showtime Speedway
Saturday, August 31st – Showtime Speedway
Saturday, September 21st – Showtime Speedway
Saturday, October 19th – TBARA at Citrus County Speedway
Interview with Kevin Williams of Full Throttle Speedway
By Richard Golardi
The day was sunny, with tiny wisps of clouds floating in the sky above the 3/8 mile asphalt oval. At intervals around the track, chunks of broken asphalt sat in piles, waiting to be taken away by paving crews. Construction crews worked on assembling aluminum spectator seating along the back straight, and at the main gate near the front straight, circular saws ripped into plywood for other interior renovation work. In three weeks, the paving and spectator seating projects would need to be ready for the opening day of the renamed Full Throttle Speedway in Bradenton, Florida. Formerly known as Desoto Super Speedway, the management team of Kevin Williams and Mike Chase bought the track after their stint operating Punta Gorda Speedway came to an end. Williams told me that they chose to transition from leasing to owning partly as a result of the frustration of dealing with county managers that they felt did not understand the racing business.
For Florida’s sprint car racing community, the changes are all good news. After returning to southwest Florida’s Punta Gorda Speedway last year, the TBARA worked to cultivate a relationship with the Williams / Chase team, and keep the good times rolling right onto the new track. The track’s grand opening on May 4th will also be the season opening TBARA race. There were some rumors being repeated that threatened to sabotage the relationship between the sanctioning body and new track management, but those have been debunked. Kevin Williams has stated that he does not wish to start his own sprint car series, and will go forward with plans to schedule more TBARA races, pending a successful and competently run TBARA race night on May 4th. The track’s current race schedule only shows three months of race events, through mid-July.
Renovation will continue beyond the May 4th opening, but the replacement of almost one thousand bleacher boards, and the repaving of damaged sections of the track will be completed in time for the opening night. The track will also bring a new open wheel series to Central Florida, the TQ midgets. These cars had raced at Punta Gorda, and will continue competing at Full Throttle. Williams was confident that many of the competitors and fans would make the trip north to the new track, after Punta Gorda’s closing early this year. There were two TBARA races at Punta Gorda Speedway in 2012, and both Williams and TBARA management felt that they were successful.
Kevin Williams told me that he was friendly with both of the Florida track owners who had recently begun their own sprint car series. They are Robert Yoho of Showtime Speedway, and also Bubba Clem of Bubba Raceway Park. He stated that he was not urged by these owners to start his own series. The shared sentiment was that he should do what he felt was right for him and his track. Williams confirmed that there had been discussions to add up to three more TBARA races at the track for 2013, but the contracts would not be signed until after the grand opening night with TBARA as the main event.
The aluminum stands that were being assembled on the back straight were the stands owned by Williams that were brought from Punta Gorda. The track safety fencing appeared to be in good shape, and did not need repairs. I could not see if the track safety lights were operational. All of the signage still had the old track name, and some of the advertising sign boards around the track perimeter were still in need of repairs. The bleacher boards that were rotted and coming apart along the front straight stands had been replaced, mostly along the stair steps and the footers. The back straight wooden stands would be roped off and not used, replaced by the newly installed aluminum stands near turn two. This area was intended for use as a “Fan Zone”, and Family Seating area. The kitchen behind the main stand will now have air conditioning, and the black and white colors from the new track logo are now seen on the track walls and will be used for repainting the buildings and press box above the start / finish line.
I spoke to Williams about the two main problems that he acquired with the purchase of the speedway, which were lack of maintenance, and a history of poor attendance under the prior owner. The energetic pace of renovation projects going on all over the grounds showed an obvious desire to reinvest in the physical plant, so what would be done to improve attendance? There was a concerted effort to reach out to the loyal fan base that attended weekly races at Punta Gorda, and Williams felt that a majority of these fans would travel north to their new track. Williams told me that his business partner, Mike Chase, was heading up this effort to reach out to the fan base, and to advertise and promote the grand opening event.
He also told me about plans to have an ARCA Ford stock car at the track for ride-alongs, and to include fans in this experience. Kevin’s nineteen year old son Josh Williams is currently racing in the ARCA series, and placed in ninth place in the ARCA stock car series point standings last year. Therefore, it is no surprise that he would like to have an ARCA series race at the track in the future.
Williams told me that he does want sprint car racing, and he does anticipate the return of TBARA to the track later in the year. He also wants to have an “Open Wheel Madness” special event with TBARA and open wheel modifieds. This should be a time to celebrate for the open wheel and sprint car racing fans in the Tampa Bay area. With the recently announced plans for an expanded schedule of sprint car racing at Showtime Speedway, this news means that pavement sprint car racing has a new year round home, with the Tampa area reaping the benefits.
The video of the Kevin Williams interview, and tour of the track at Full Throttle Speedway can be seen here, on the Florida Open Wheel channel:
Florida Trends – Are Traveling Sprint Car Series on the Decline?
June 2012:
Robert Yoho, new leaseholder at Showtime Speedway, told me that speedway management and race officials would manage and officiate their sprint car series, the “Showtime Sprint Series”, running only at Showtime Speedway. The desire for Showtime Speedway to control the racing at their facility will likely mean that TBARA will not have a presence there.
November 2012:
“No. Not at all. I’m going to do my own thing, or not have them at all.” Bubba Clem, when asked if he wanted a similar number of Top Gun Sprint Series races at Bubba Raceway Park in 2013.
As recently as one week ago, I would have stated that the traveling sprint car series in Florida (as a group) are on the decline. Now, I am not so sure. In the past seven days, the Top Gun Sprint Series has added 2 races at Volusia Speedway Park - on 5/4 and 7/27/2013, with weekly racing back at Volusia on 4/13. The Top Gun Series has struggled with low car counts in two races this year. For the TBARA, their struggle has involved a paltry 2013 race schedule (three confirmed races in total). Earlier today, TBARA Secretary and Publicist Joshua Wichers confirmed that a race is about to be added to their schedule at Orlando Speedworld (Bithlo) for Saturday, June 1st. The race is not official yet, as the contracts are to be inked in the next several days. Races at other tracks, and a newly renovated (and renamed) Full Throttle Speedway in Bradenton give hope that TBARA’s schedule may be expanded this year.
As the quotes shown above will illuminate, a trend has been recognized in Florida in which partisan track owners desire sprint car racing, but want to control the racing. Robert Yoho and Bubba Clem have both debuted new sprint car series at their tracks in the past year (Yoho at Showtime Speedway in July 2012, and Clem at Bubba Raceway Park in March 2013). Five sprint car races were recently added at Showtime Speedway for 2013. The remaining race dates are - 4/13, 5/25, 6/8, 6/29, 7/20, 8/31 and 9/21/2013. TBARA is forging a new relationship with track owners Kevin Williams and Mike Chase of Full Throttle Speedway (formerly Desoto Super Speedway), who are transitioning from operating Punta Gorda Speedway. The track is being renovated (I will visit it on Saturday), with the opening pushed back to Saturday, May 4th, also the season opening TBARA event. TBARA has stated that they want four races at Full Throttle Speedway, but only one is confirmed. Could Williams and Chase be the next to start their own sprint car series, as has been rumored?
Wichers remains confident about the relationship between TBARA management and the Willams / Chase ownership team at Full Throttle. The series even promoted a “work day” at the track in March, soliciting volunteers for track clean-up and renovation work. He told me of plans to have a $7,500 race purse this year (compared to $6,500 last year), for an anticipated car count of 18 to 20 cars. He was quick to credit TBARA Treasurer Rex Hollinger for his work to make the Orlando race possible. “Bronson Speedway may be added this year, next year for sure, if it doesn’t work out for this year,” Joshua Wichers told me. Another asphalt speedway with an ideal location midway between the Orlando and Tampa metro areas, Auburndale Speedway, is still a possibility. Auburndale management wants a race, but at no cost to the track. TBARA would be forced to finance the race themselves, or entertain the idea of leasing the facility from the owners (an idea considered briefly last year for an early season race this year).
Full Throttle Speedway has posted their schedule, through the next three months. There is one sprint car race. I sought out owner Kevin Williams, to ask about his plans for sprint car racing at his new track. The most important question I wanted answered was whether he would be the third track owner in Florida to start his own sprint car series, and retain control of the series. In my first conversation with Williams, I found him to be open and eager to answer all my questions. His enthusiasm was obvious and infectious. Many in the racing business have characterized him as one of the hardest working race promoters that they know. The facilities at his new track had not been maintained for years, and I saw dagger-like wood pieces protruding from bleacher planks in prior years.
“The TBARA, as long as they stay functional, they will get more races. We did our schedule to get to the half-way point, the July fourth weekend. If the TBARA falls apart, and they can’t stay functional, then we’ll run our own sprint cars. At this time, as long as the TBARA does what they say they are going to do with our contract agreement with this one race, we can build off of that and do more,” Kevin Williams remarked. Williams did mention Yoho, and his experience running his own sprint car series, and also Dave Steele, who will supply sprint car tires and fuel at the track. “We’re inviting all the sprint cars. It’s called a TBARA sprint car race, but we want as many sprint cars that can show up and run. They don’t have to be a TBARA member to run at our race track. We’re not going to run and do a series and give them points and sell the tires and fuel. No, we’re not going to do that. We’re not running a series.”
But, you are still waiting to see how this one TBARA race does on May 4th, before you commit to more TBARA races this year, is that what you are saying? “No, what I’m saying is that as long as the TBARA stays functional, because I heard rumors that they’re dysfunctional with members, and this, that and other things.” I didn’t get a chance to ask him to expand on this statement, as someone was approaching, and he shouted out, “Hey, I’m Kevin – do you need anything?” I asked Mr. Williams if I would be correct in summing up his statements by saying that nearly everything was in place to schedule more TBARA races, and there was a desire to have TBARA races, and not run your own sprint car series, but you are waiting to see that TBARA is still functioning, and that the race on May 4th goes smoothly. Did I have that correct, I asked? “Yeah, you can print that. That’s fine,” he replied. “That sort of puts them where they need to be. I have no beefs with anybody. I’m just providing a facility and providing them a payout, as long as they meet their terms that we agreed upon.”
Williams did praise the TBARA, saying that, “they do put on a good show. I’ve had them down at Punta Gorda three or four times, and we’ve had good success.” And I was there for the last TBARA race in October and I enjoyed it, I interjected. “I hated for them to take it from me, but there was a lady on a mission. They thought we were getting rich down there, and they just don’t know the race car business. They tried tripling and quadrupling my rent, and using the government as their reason why they needed to do it.” Williams told me that he wants to look forward, putting his Punta Gorda experience in his rear-view mirror. “That’s why I came up here and bought this place. We’re revamping it, and I think we put in over nine hundred bleacher boards right now, and we’re still putting them in. These bleachers – they were something else.” Plans also include an air-conditioned kitchen, and partial track repaving, all on display for the track grand opening, and season-opening TBARA race, on Saturday, May 4th. The date could also mark a turnaround for Florida’s sprint car series, signaling that there may be hope for a comeback.
Rain, Fuel and Oil Figure into the Mix – Must See Racing in Alabama
Troy DeCaire again used the high groove to his advantage at the second Must See Racing Xtreme Sprint Series race of the weekend. Sunday’s race, which was rained out on Saturday, was at Mobile International Speedway in Alabama. Starting fourth, he passed several cars at the start, sliding in the second turn of the first lap. He used the restarts to challenge race leader JoJo Helberg for the lead, but was not able to use his high groove maneuver to make the pass for the lead. After using his backup car for Friday’s race at Pensacola’s Five Flags Speedway, he was back in his primary car at Mobile. The primary car had been leaking oil on Friday, and this was repaired on Saturday, to allow it to be back in action at Mobile on Sunday afternoon.
Troy DeCaire at Mobile Int'l Speedway
After challenging for the lead early, Troy was later passed by Brian Gerster for second place, and appeared to have a good hold on third place and his second podium finish of the weekend. That changed with five laps to go. The stud holding the radius rod on the right side broke while running in third. It was thought to be a flat tire at first, sending the crew scrambling to get a replacement tire, until the broken part was discovered. Troy climbed out of the car, and knew that he had likely lost the early season points lead, as the two races saw three different drivers on the podium each night.
The field lost two Floridians from the Friday night race at Pensacola. Those two were Larry Brazil Jr., and Dave Steele, who declined an offer to drive the red #91 Lenny Puglio entry with a 360 engine. The 50:1 car of Mike Larrison was not present, as the team had brought two cars to the Southern Shootout, and both cars were wrecked. The damage from the grinding crash on the front stretch at Five Flags Speedway was too extensive to be repaired. The crash happened at the start of a heat race, and Larrison was fortunate to not be close to full speed when his car nosed into the inside wall, sending parts in the air. I saw one front wing piece that appeared as if it dropped straight down into pit lane, but no one was struck by the errant part.
Qualifying at Mobile Int'l Speedway
There were now three Floridians left to race at Mobile on Sunday afternoon – Dude Teate, Troy DeCaire, and Shane Butler. Shane was looking a little trimmer, telling me that he had lost about 15-16 pounds over the winter, by cutting back on calories, and drinking more water. He said that his car was the same #18 car and 360 engine that he used to win two summer races at Showtime Speedway last year, but it would be renumbered to #55, as was used at Pensacola. The #55 had crash damage that could not be repaired by Sunday. The car would likely be the same weight as the 410 cars, even with the front wing and all the lead weights removed. There was nothing more that could be removed to save weight. Shane’s knee, banged up in the crash, was no longer bothering him, as the pain was now more in his neck. With another race on a high-speed, high G-force track, his neck would get a workout. What could he do to avoid neck pain during and after the race, I asked? “I’ll just have to man-up,” he replied.
Dude Teate, back in the Jerry Powell owned #59 car, had misfortune strike as a result of the lengthy yellow flag laps. Dude ran out of fuel in the second turn, with the #12 team car of Scotty Orr running alongside of Teate. DJ (Davey Hamilton Jr.) was behind Orr when several cars slowed once Teate ran out of fuel. DJ apparently ran into the back of Orr (according to Orr), but I must report that DJ told me that “a red car hit me, and that’s what spun me out.” DJ then spun into the infield wet grass, through a large puddle, and then struck the inside wall. The sixteen year old racer said that he got his cast wet after splashing through the puddle, and he had a headache after the collision with the inside wall. However, he was going to continue with more Must See Racing races, and anticipated running Winchester and Anderson in May, the next two races on the calendar. Dude Teate was running as high as sixth place at the time that he ran out of fuel. Since he ran out of fuel while at speed, this led race officials to red flag the race for safety, so that all cars could stop on the front straight to allow refueling. Dude had already made a pit stop for fuel, and rejoined the race, prior to the red flag being shown. He would finish in tenth place in a race that saw high attrition, and had only ten cars running at the finish.
Heat race at Mobile Int'l Speedway
One of the most innovative sprint car designs that I have seen recently was in the pits at Pensacola, on the #1 car of Jason Cox. The parts, designed by Jason Cox, and fabricated by Jason and his father Tim, involved a metal piece that partially enclosed the cockpit. The airflow would flow over a “scooped out” front end, with sides higher than the bottom, and then up to a sloping piece covering part of the cockpit, complete with wicker bill at the trailing edge. Jason told me that the enclosure still left him enough room to get out quickly in an emergency. The new design saw its first race use at Pensacola. Jason removed the extra cockpit enclosure sheet metal for Sunday’s race at Mobile. He had exhaust fumes that were trapped in the cockpit by the extra cockpit sheet metal, and left it off the car for Sunday.
Series owner and promoter Jim Hanks told me that a decision to change the feature race field to 22 cars, instead of 20 cars, was due to the desire to have both Jerry Caryer and Shane Butler included. Inclusion of one of the drivers (Caryer) was because he was loyal to the series, and Shane’s inclusion meant another Floridian in the field, and a 360 engine. With Lenny Puglio’s red #91 withdrawn, Shane’s car was the only starter with a 360 engine. Shane’s car would then serve as the “R & D 360 car”, to see how a car with a 360 engine could compete with cars having a 410 engine. The role of the “R & D 360 car” was unofficially held by the red #91 at Pensacola, with Davey Hamilton driving. Hamilton’s qualifying time was 18th fastest out of 28 qualifiers, and race results were as follows: 2nd place in Heat #1, and 12th place in the feature, one lap down. On Sunday, Shane Butler’s Sunday qualifying time was 16th fastest out of 23 qualifiers (faster than seven cars with a 410), and race results were as follows: DNF – 8th place in Heat # 1, and 19th place in the feature, with a DNF.
Jason Cox Cockpit enclosure, L, and after removal, R
The roll-bar mounted “Replay” brand cameras, which appear significantly smaller and lighter than GoPro cameras, were missing from the field, after having been prominent on multiple cars on Friday at Pensacola. A witness told me of seeing a technician open a case with about twenty of the cameras, and go about his job of mounting the cameras on multiple cars. Why were the cameras missing on Sunday? The reason, as Jim Hanks explained, was that Mobile was originally intended to be one of the televised races, but that changed with the postponement to Sunday afternoon. The postponement caused the loss of TV production personnel who had a commitment to ESPN on Sunday. Hanks stated that they would likely add a later race to their TV schedule, to keep the same number of televised races for the year.
Second place finisher Brian Gerster made an attempt to go low in the first turn late in the race to pass leader JoJo Helberg, even going so low that he kicked up grass and dirt. “I was trying to get a run on JoJo there and he had kind of been going a little bit higher. I had one shot to kind of bury it in underneath him there, and it didn’t stick. We kept it going in the right direction. We had a long way to go, starting tenth and got to second,” Gerster told me. “We were a lot better than he was at one end of the race track, and he was a lot better than us at the other end of the race track. It’s a good run for us. Everything’s in one piece, so we’ll head to Winchester in a couple of months and see if we can do a little better.”
Top Three at Mobile - Gerster, L, Helberg, C and Olson, R.
“This is my third backup motor, and this car is an old ’04 Beast, but this thing wins every time,” JoJo Helberg told me while standing in Victory Circle, celebrating his first pavement win of 2013. “Unfortunately our Mopar, which was my big horsepower motor, blew up today. But, I’m happy that the old girl made it.” Next, we talked about his standing as a driver who does better at the shorter tracks, a myth that was dispelled at Mobile. “The semi-banked half miles – it’s tough for me every time. Mobile, Pensacola, and Toledo – those tracks are really tough for me, and I’ve yet to really master them. Luckily, we stayed out in clean air, and got to start on the pole. I’m glad we can tack off a win at a semi-banked half mile.” This was his first winged sprint car win at any of the three half mile tracks that he mentioned. He also thought he may just pick “this old car” for the half miles, after it carried him to a win at Mobile. “This old Beast – this thing wins winged races and non-wing races every year. I love this car.”
2013 Must See Racing Season Begins in Florida
Dave Steele at Five Flags Speedway
For Floridian Dude Teate, the season opening race with the Must See Racing Xtreme Sprint Series was also a night of firsts for him. It was his first Must See Racing race, his first race in a winged 410 sprint car, and his first race driving for car owner Jerry Powell. Looking ahead, he will be entered in this car for the Southern Shootout weekend (Pensacola and Mobile), and also possibly the Must See Racing events in May (Winchester and the Little 500). The possibility exists for Dude that this could turn into a full season ride with Must See Racing, but as Dude told me, this will depend on his performance. He will also be returning to Florida to drive the Conley #31 sprint car for Showtime Speedway and TBARA races.
Davey Hamilton, L and Davey Hamilton, Jr, R
As father and son Davey Hamilton and Davey Hamilton, Jr. (D.J.) relaxed in the pits waiting for qualifying, I noticed the cast on D.J.’s left arm. He broke two bones in his wrist while snowboarding one month ago, and will have the cast on his arm for another two weeks. He did not feel that the cast would affect his driving that evening, which would be his first winged sprint car race. He recently turned sixteen, and now met the minimum age to enter and race in the series. His father, in a Lenny Puglio owned car, was part of an effort to see if a car with a 360 engine, and a 100 pound weight advantage over the cars with a 410 engine, would be competitive. Davey had been in the top ten on the speed charts that day, and he felt that the car did have a chance for a top five finish. His teammate, Bobby Santos, in the black # 91 car, had a 410 engine under his hood. Davey believes that his biggest challenge with the 360 engine at a fast track like Pensacola is the starts and restarts, because of the horsepower disadvantage. He is looking forward to driving this car again in more Must See Racing races later in the year. Davey will not be in the car for the Saturday race at Mobile, and the car has been offered to Dave Steele for Saturday, as Steele had an engine failure prior to his heat race in his own car. At this time, it was unknown if Steele had accepted the offer to drive the red #91 on Saturday.
Dude Teate at Five Flags Speedway
There had been hopes that more drivers from Florida would show up for this race with 360 engines that are predominant in Florida. Brian Gingras had won a heat race here at Pensacola last year with a 360 engine. With a 100 pound weight advantage, there were two cars with 360 engines in the field. I asked Jim Hanks, owner of the series, if he would consider giving these cars a 150 or 200 pound weight advantage, to lure more cars from Florida to participate. He told me that this was not being considered, as “this is a 410 sprint car series”, as he told me. He also told me that some news was coming soon about the TV broadcast plans for the series. A recent announcement by MAVTV appeared to show that there is more interest in short track racing, as rival TV networks add more auto racing in anticipation of the demise of SpeedTV.
Troy DeCaire’s third place finish in the feature was one of the few bright spots for Floridians in this race, as some others suffered crashes and engine failures. Shane Butler, driving the #55 car that he driven in 2011 at Bristol, told me that the car had sat out the entire 2012 season, and had not been driven by anyone since the Bristol race. In his heat race, Dude Teate had a tire go down, and he went to the bottom of the track on the back stretch. Shane went over Dude’s right rear tire, went airborne, and hit the outside wall in the third turn. Shane got out of his car quickly, and was examined for a possible knee injury. I asked him about his knee later in the evening. “It’s sore,” he replied. Dave Steele felt that a valve was ready to drop in his engine, so he shut the engine down. He knew that something was wrong with the engine, so he shut it down to prevent the engine from blowing up. This was the same engine that was in Victory Circle at this track last year with Tanner Swanson driving. At the end of the evening, the engine was sitting under a tarp in the bed of a pickup, preparing to head back to Indiana. There would be no repeat visit to Victory Circle.
Troy Decaire
Troy DeCaire would use his familiar high groove passing tactic to his advantage in both his heat race and the feature race on Friday at Pensacola. The starts and restarts would see Troy making most of his passes. His heat race was a display of dominance seldom seen in a field with a plethora of talent and fast cars. Starting last, Troy was in the lead of the heat race after two laps. He punished the competition even further by pulling out to almost a full straight lead. At this point, his crew and team owner rushed to the pit wall to frantically signal Troy to slow down. They feared that the engine would over rev and they wanted him to slow down, as he had no competitors near him. Troy signaled to his crew, and backed off the throttle. The sizable lead disappeared with a yellow flag, and Jacob Wilson was now close behind at the restart. He tried high and low to pass Troy, and pulled close at the checkered flag, but was unable to keep Troy from taking the heat race win in impressive fashion.
Despite his earlier domination, Troy said that he thought he had a third place car for the feature later in the evening. Starting in the fourth row in the feature, Troy again quickly moved up several positions at the start. At one point, it appeared that Brian Gerster and Troy had the fastest cars, and could possibly be on their way to the front. Gerster slowed, and then was out. Troy trailed Jacob Wilson and Ryan Litt, and would eventually settle for third place, as he had predicted. I asked Troy if he had any prediction regarding the next race in Mobile. He turned, and raised his index finger, to signal his bold prediction – first place.
Ryan Litt in Victory Circle
“The whole race, I was tearing up,” Troy said after the race, blaming fuel fumes. The fuel fumes were due to a fueling issue. It looked like you needed to have just one more restart to compete for the win, I remarked. “I just needed to pass two more cars. I was third best tonight. We’ll head to Mobile, and maybe we can be a little bit better there. I can’t say enough for these guys – Davey Hamilton’s crew, and my crew.” You did predict a third place finish in the feature, right? “Yeah, my prediction was a third, and I wish I was wrong. We had a third place race car, and that’s what you saw.” Are you feeling a certain sense of relief to have more power under the hood this year for the full season, and that when you need to make a move, that power is ready? “Yeah, that’s it. We’ve got the tools there, and we’ve just got to make them work. We had a fueling issue, and didn’t quite have the motor running like it should.”
Mike Larrison front straight wreck
Canadian Ryan Litt would celebrate in Victory Circle at Five Flags Speedway, after a late race pass on Jacob Wilson. It was Litt’s first feature win in the series. “This is a momentum race track. It’s a lot like Toledo, back home there. I just try to keep my momentum up, and keep in clean air. Jacob got into some dirty air, and wiggled and got loose, and it killed his momentum. I had my momentum going, and pretty much kept it on a rail there. As soon as you get into lapped cars, you can feel it when your car loses rear end bite and loses downforce.” Do you think you can do it again tomorrow night, and make it a double win weekend? “I don’t want to make any predictions, but if the car is handling like it was tonight, and we can have some good luck tomorrow, then we have a good shot, for sure.” Did he have an explanation why he seemed to be noticeably faster than last year? “Last year, we had a lot of bad luck. Our team is more focused this year, and we’re trying to keep positive, and just have a little fun.”
Brian Gertser would set a new track record at 13.20 seconds, beating the record set last year by Jason Cox at 13.78 seconds. The increase in speeds may be partly due to the grinding of the track surface over the winter. A total of six cars out of 29 entered would break the track record, highlighting the quality of the cars and drivers present that evening. Gerster appeared to be in a prime position to win, starting sixth in the feature. “We had a good lap qualifying, and we’re quick time, and had a pretty good heat race. I’m optimistic, but the competition’s pretty tough, so we’re going to have to race hard, and see what we get.” Brian did not run the full series schedule last year, and could not say for sure what the team planned for this year. With a small team that lacks a prominent sponsor, they are going race to race, and still anticipate that they will compete for race wins, as they did last year. “We’ve got a really fast race team here, but it’s still a family owned car that they let me drive. As far as being the favorite, I hope we’re the fan favorite, and I don’t know if we’re the favorite as far as the racing goes.”
Team Green Racing Prepares for Expanded 2013 Campaign
Garrett Green racing in 2005, and 2008 magazine cover
Team Green Racing, and team owner Gary Green, have decided to ramp up their racing efforts in 2013. The Valrico, Florida based open wheel team had one entry in last year’s Little 500, with Brian Gingras at the wheel. This year, there will be three cars, with one driven by Gary’s fourteen year old son, Garrett. Garrett has prepared for this event by driving in winged sprint car races with the TBARA and Showtime Speedway in 2012 and 2013. He started with go karts at the age of five, winning the Junior Kahuna race in 2008 at Fruitland Park, FL, and getting his photo on the cover of Chase’n Race’n Illustrated. His most recent accomplishment was a fourth place points finish in the Showtime Speedway Sprints.
The three team drivers for 2013 are Brian Gingras, Garrett Green, and Matt Hall. All three are entered for the Little 500 at Anderson Speedway in May. Brian and Garrett are entered for the team’s next race event in Anderson, Indiana in April, the Glen Niebel Classic. This race is a 100-lap non-wing sprint car race at the ¼ mile asphalt track, and provides a chance to race on the same track where they will return for the 500 laps of the Little 500 during Memorial Day weekend.
Brian Gingras
Gary Green, L, Matt Hall, C, and Brian Gingras, R.
“We’re going to do the 100-lapper at Anderson, and after the 100-lapper, it’ll be the Wednesday Must See race at Anderson, and the Little 500, both in May.” You got taken out late in the race with a wreck at the Little 500 last year, so what do you want to accomplish there this May? “Believe it or not, one of my main goals is to get Garrett in the show. I’m pretty sure it shouldn’t be a problem qualifying, either the first day or the second day. Then it would be – finish the race. I was surprised last year at how hectic it was. My biggest goal would be to make it to the end. I want to stay on that lead lap, and make it to the last 100 laps.” Brian lost a wheel as a caution came out, and as he was slowing for the turn. He recovered from that mishap to get to the last half of the race, but did not make it to the last 100 laps of the Little 500. To prepare for the upcoming races, Brian is at the gym for one and a half hours, four times a week. “Then I’ll bump it up to everyday, shortly,” he told me. “I like to go hard in the gym, so I won’t be falling out of the seat, and go right to the end without any problems.” He states that his greatest contribution as a driver coach to Garrett has been getting him to learn how to explain what the car is doing.
Garrett Green
Garrett Green and Brian Gingras, 2012
Garrett won’t be the record holder as the youngest starter in the Little 500, a record currently held by Floridian Sport Allen, who was a thirteen year old starter in 1984. Allen also had another start as a fourteen year old in 1985, which matches Garrett’s age this year. A complicated legal process will be completed in May, which will allow Garrett to have all the legal documents needed to enter as a rookie this year. There won’t be any other Must See Racing starts this year, as he is under the minimum age. The team has purchased a dirt sprint car from the Cabre family, and he will add dirt sprint car racer to his resume later this year. “I’ve mainly been practicing non-wing, to get ready for the 500. We decided that there’s no point in running with a wing, when we’re focusing on non-wing. Off-track, I’ve been busting my butt getting the cars ready, and doing pull-ups every night, and running to get in shape. We’ve been practicing non-wing at Showtime Speedway, about 100 to 200 laps each time that we’ve been there.” Garrett said that they have had four or five of these Wednesday evening practice sessions at Showtime Speedway since the beginning of the year. The dirt racing will be at East Bay Raceway Park, which has Top Gun and East Bay Sprints races after Memorial Day. He also plans on getting a private pilot’s license. His goal for the Little 500? “Finishing the race on the lead lap is my goal. Of course, I’d like to win the race, but that’s kind of like winning the lottery!”
Matt Hall
Matt will have a team car to qualify for the Little 500 in May, and until then he is working on getting a ride for upcoming winged sprint car races in Florida. “I’ve talked to a couple of people. I really want to be at Full Throttle Speedway for the opening night there. I really like that race track. As of right now, I’m focusing more on business, than on racing.” This will be Matt’s first Little 500. As a native Hoosier, having lived in Indiana about 30 minutes from the track, he has had friends that have raced in the Little 500. He lived in Indiana until age nineteen. “I moved down here in 2002. Got married, bought a house, and have lived here ever since.” He turns thirty years old on May 19th. “If I can go up there, put it in the show, and have a decent showing, it will be a hell of a birthday present. We have great equipment. I’m honored that he (referring to Gary Green) has given me the opportunity, and I’m excited for this chance. I’ve worked with Garrett, and put him in my go kart. I’ve been behind the scenes more than anybody probably really knows.” Matt’s time to step out from behind the scenes happens on Saturday, May 25th, at the 65th Little 500.
Gary Green had originally planned to enter one car for this weekend’s Must See Racing Xtreme Sprint Series opening weekend, but those plans were changed, and the decision was made to focus on later races. The team will continue on to participate in more non-wing sprint car racing at Spartan Speedway, near Lansing, Michigan. The track has sprint car racing on Friday nights through the summer, one of the few non-wing pavement sprint car series left in the country. Gary intends to leave a car in Michigan for Garrett to race during the summer, and the father-son team will commute back and forth between Michigan and Central Florida for the races. When not in Michigan, Garrett will have his dirt sprint car for racing near home, at East Bay. This track is only six miles away from the family’s home in Valrico. The fall season, back in Florida, will allow more dirt racing through November at East Bay. Winged pavement races with TBARA in the fall and Showtime Speedway during the winter may be added, with a likely return of the Showtime Winter Series.
“We won’t be participating in any more winged races, until Wednesday the 22nd of May with Must See Racing at Anderson. Then, we’ll take the wings off that car, and Matt will try to qualify it for the 500,” Gary Green told me. “After the 500, we’ll leave one of the cars up there to run the Spartan Speedway series with Garrett. We’ll make about six of those races. Then, we’ll bring one of the cars back to convert it back to a winged car, and we’ll run Garrett in the rest of the Showtime races. We’re not sure if I’m going to let him run at Bradenton (Full Throttle Speedway), simply because I’m concerned about the speed that track carries. Plus, on top of all that, we have the dirt car now. We’ll get it ready to run East Bay Raceway only. It’s close to the house, and I want him to get used to one track. He’s still fourteen. He turns fifteen in August. We want Garrett to have quality seat time, without concentrating on points. We may even run the USCS, since we like to drive out of town. We may just take him to a couple of those races, but not this year. Like we told you a year ago – he either was going to make it or he wasn’t, but we were going to put him in as many responsible situations as we could. We’ll get him as much seat time as possible. As long as that meter (measuring Garrett’s progress) is still going forward, I’m going to keep going with him. You give him a couple of years, and I can assure you that he’s going to be a hard driver to beat.”
TBARA UPDATE:
TBARA is moving forward with forging a new relationship with track owners Kevin Williams and Mike Chase of Full Throttle Speedway (formerly Desoto Super Speedway). After transitioning from operating Punta Gorda Speedway, the new owners apparently made the purchase with seller financing from John Sarppricone, in the form of a $1.1 million loan from Sarppricone. The purchase price for the 38 acre property and asphalt track is listed at $650,000. With ongoing renovation at the Manatee County track, the track opening has been pushed back to Saturday, May 4th. This date will also be the season opening TBARA event. TBARA has stated that they want four races at Full Throttle Speedway, in addition to two races scheduled at Citrus County Speedway. Another track may be added later. Showtime Speedway has eight sprint car races scheduled starting on March 30th, but none will be sanctioned by TBARA.
Dirt Racing’s Split Means Lower Car Counts for Florida
The seven cars that started the Eagle Jet Top Gun Sprint Series feature race at Hendry County Motorsports Park on Saturday night could foreshadow a trend for this year. That trend is lower car counts for all the dirt sprint car series racing in Florida. When none of the Jacksonville area teams made the six hour trip south to Hendry, that left nine entrants from Central and South Florida for the night. With the addition of FSCA (Florida Sprint Car Association) races at Putnam County Speedway Park (along with Top Gun Series races previously scheduled), this North Florida track will now host winged sprint car races from two different sanctioning bodies, beginning this Saturday. This means more racing closer to home for the “North Florida crew”, compared to last year.
The sprint car series that may see the greatest stability, and car counts as high as last year, is the series with East Bay Raceway Park as its home base – the East Bay Sprints. The Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series, which has yet to run its first race, is an unknown entity. It is using USCS rules, which have not been used in Florida recently, outside of the February Winternationals at East Bay. Those competitors who have told me that they intend to run this Bubba Raceway Park series include AJ Maddox, Danny Martin Jr., Robbie Smith and Sport Allen. Gene Lasker stated that he will run some of the Bubba Army races. Matt Kurtz previously told me that he will not defend his driver championship in the Top Gun Series, and will not run the full series. With the two new dirt series that did not race in Florida last year (FSCA and Bubba Army), are there too many Florida dirt series now?
Gene Lasker in Victory Circle
I asked one of the dirt racing veterans to tell me how he sees the current dirt racing scenario in Florida. With four different dirt sanctioning bodies in Florida, who will survive? His response: East Bay Sprints and FSCA – Survivors. Top Gun Series – “Maybe.” Bubba Army 360 Sprints – Not a survivor. He was predicting that the Bubba Army series would not survive, even though they had not run a race yet (two attempts to race cancelled due to weather). The new series would be composed of those Florida racers with eligible engines (most had just raced in the East Bay Winternationals), and others from out of state. But, how many out-of-staters would make the trip down to Ocala, for a $1250 winner prize?
For the Top Gun Series, now racing at two tracks separated by 238 driving miles in North Florida and South Florida (in addition to two races at East Bay, with two more to be added), the miles of separation mean the Jacksonville area teams may vanish from South Florida competition. Likewise, the Tampa Bay area teams may not feel motivated to make the trip to Putnam County, a 170 mile trip. They have nine races at East Bay (East Bay Sprints and Top Gun), making it decidedly easy to stay close to home. Three drivers in Saturday’s Top Gun feature have expressed a desire to race in the Bubba Army series, and have the engines at their disposal. Teammates Maddox and Martin Jr., arriving in the early evening at Hendry County on Saturday, told me that they had just dropped their 360 limited engines into their cars on Friday evening. The team scrambled to unload, and get out for hot laps.
Jimmy Ballew Jr.
Don Rehm, Promoter and Owner of the Eagle Jet Top Gun Sprint Series, could best be described as somber and subdued after seeing seven cars in his first feature race of 2013. But, with Hendry County’s remote location (no large cities within a 70 mile radius), smaller crowds and smaller fields for the feature races had to be expected. The last two feature races after the sprint cars each had less than half a dozen cars racing at the “Southernmost Dirt Track.” “Well, I’m disappointed in the car turnout. You know, a lot of good things going on, but just was way short on car count. Then, on top of that, seemed like we tried to destroy everything that we did bring to the race track,” according to Rehm. What about expectations for Jacksonville area teams to show up here? “I anticipated some of them coming down, but you never know. I don’t know what we have to do to get more people to travel, but that’s part of my job. I’ve got to figure out how to get it to happen. Hopefully, we’ll be able to announce a number for a point fund in the near future,” Rehm told me. Would this point fund require running every race during the season? “Seventy per cent. It was announced at our awards banquet.” So the Jacksonville teams will not be able to run just North Florida races and qualify for the point fund money, as that may be just about 50% of the races. “Absolutely.” Don said that he was still negotiating with North Florida Speedway, and that East Bay has “guaranteed him two more shows”, likely after Labor Day weekend. The final schedule may show sixteen races for 2013.
The Putnam County races on the Top Gun schedule will all be run, as contracted, even if the track is looking to add more races with FSCA. This group had intended to sanction the cancelled race on March 2nd, according to the track’s affirmation. Car count will be the biggest challenge for every dirt sprint car series in Florida (East Bay Sprints may be the exception). “I don’t know if people are not ready yet, or what’s the deal,” according to Don Rehm. Are there too many dirt sprint car series in Florida? “It’s hard to say. We’ll just have to wait and see how it works out. I hope that it doesn’t hurt anybody. But, who knows?” Do you think there will be a shakeout, because there are too many series, and not enough cars, and only some will survive? “That’s usually the way it works,” was Rehm’s somber reply. “I just have to work at getting my car count up, and go from there.”
Tim George gave me an update on his plans for the season, saying that he will be at East Bay for East Bay and Top Gun Sprints, and will include his daughter, Rebecca, for some of these East Bay races also. He does not have the 360 motor needed to run the Bubba Army races, so he will not be there. Are your chances better now in both series, and do you see yourself as a favorite to win? “Some of the fast cars are still here,” he said, looking out over the pits at Hendry County.
AJ Maddox, with my GoPro camera on his car, survived a first lap spin after bumping his teammate, still managing a top five finish. “It was a slick track. Just got a new motor, and was trying to shake it down. Pretty happy with the night – got a top five. I didn’t think Danny was going to stop down there. I kind of ran into the back of my teammate, and spun myself out. That was my fault.” Still planning to run Top Gun and Bubba Army races? “Yeah. We’ll run whatever we can.” The team would favor the Bubba Army series, if there was a schedule conflict.
To say that Gene Lasker was elated after having a dominant win in the Top Gun series would be an understatement. After taking over the Victory Circle ceremonies, and seizing the microphone to deliver his monologue, Lasker was ready to give me his prediction for the year ahead. “I told my guys that I owe them a championship, because we haven’t won a championship in a long time. I promised that I would pay attention and do my job,” Lasker said. Is this the year for a championship, I asked? “Yeah – this is the year. It’s going to happen. Well, you watched us out there. We led all twenty five laps.” Which series are you predicting to be the one where you will win the championship? “I’m going to try to win both of them. I’m going to try to win East Bay and Top Gun, because I’m going to run both of them. For the Top Gun series and Don Rehm, I’m trying to help him get the series going good in Florida, because it’s the best series we’ve got. Hopefully, they will see that Lasker’s back on top, and they will want to come watch the show. We’re not going to miss any races, and we’ll put on a show. We’re going for the win every single time.” Are we going to see you being this dominant throughout the entire season? “Yeah, you probably are,” he said, smiling confidently as he walked off into the darkness to return to his hauler.
USAC Sprint Car Weekend Wrap-Up from Bubba Raceway Park
By Richard Golardi
The first race of the three days of USAC sprint car racing at Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala was highlighted by a feud that started on the track, and overflowed into the pits, and also a duel on the track that ended with the fall of the checkered flag. Dave Darland was a part of both, and ended his night in the pits with a damaged car, and was a witness to a pushing and shoving match in front of his trailer at the night’s end. Coleman Gulick, upset about an early race incident in the Thursday feature, was spun, did a 360, and got back on track. He continued to pass all the cars on track, under the yellow flag, until he reached the leader, Dave Darland. He then collided with the rear of Darland’s car, who managed to avoid spinning, or stuffing it in the wall. The post-race pit incident did not involve any punches being thrown, as a crowd had gathered and separated the two drivers and crews.
Chase Stockton
Darland had the lead after the on-track incident with Gulick, but was soon caught by Bryan Clauson. The two continued to fight for the lead over the final twenty laps, often racing side-by-side, and using both the high line and the low line coming out of the tight turn four. Clauson would make the final pass at the white flag, after Darland seemed to bog down in the turn four low line. “I threw everything I had at him in the middle of the race, and I felt like he countered my best stuff. Traffic helped us get back to him there, and I was able to rail two good corners to get by him. It’s a great way to start the year,” Clauson said. The battle on track between the two highly talented sprint car drivers was a highlight of the 2013 Speedweeks. After seeing a driver lose his cool, and intentionally crash another competitor, the satisfaction of getting to see driving talent on display redeemed the night for USAC.
A young driver who is now a frontrunner in the non-wing USAC sprint division, and in his second year with the tour, is 24 year old Chase Stockon. Chase’s accomplishments during the weekend included posting two fastest qualifying times, and adding a heat race win on Saturday before driving past Hunter Schuerenberg for the final podium spot on the last night. His feature race finishes showed steady improvement over the weekend, going from seventh, to fourth, and then third on Saturday. Stockon was in second place in the USAC series points upon leaving Florida. He said that he felt that the team came alive in the second half of 2012, and that they picked up right where they left off at the end of the year. “We’ve got a lot of backing this year, and figure that this is our best shot that we’ll have,” according to Chase. He has a graphic design business that he owns and operates when he is away from the track, and he has been married for almost two years. “Vacation in the off-season amounts to about a month now. I make sure I take care of my wife, and make sure she’s happy for that month.”
Chase Stockton
“Tonight we set fast time again, and we won the heat race from sixth, and we were on fire again tonight,” Chase told me on Saturday night. “The car came in a little too late on that one, but we’ll take a third. Started off the race a little too tight, and it finally came around about the last eight laps.” Do you think you’ll be improving as the year goes by, just as you were improving over the course of three days here? “Yeah, we were pretty strong down here this year. We learned a lot last year everyplace we went, and we kept good notes and put it to use tonight.” Stockon was looking ahead to running the full USAC sprint car season and “maybe a midget deal in the works, and we’re going to run some MSCS stuff close to home.” So, that’s about how many races for the year – is it about fifty races? “Yeah, fifty or sixty, somewhere in there, just for sprint cars. If we pick up a midget deal, we’ll fit more than that in.” Is this 100% dirt racing? “Yes – all dirt. Never raced on asphalt, but if the opportunity ever came up, I’d love to do it.” The Little 500, or something like that? “Yeah,” he said. Having done so much dirt racing, never having raced on asphalt, you must see dirt clods coming at your face when you dream at night, right? “Yes, constantly,” he said, and laughed. I thanked Chase for carrying my GoPro camera on his car when I was at the track, on both Thursday and Saturday nights. “Glad to do it,” he replied.
Floridian Collin Cabre had seen competition in a national sprint car series prior to this weekend, with the Must See Racing Xtreme Sprint Series. He had gone to the heartland of sprint car racing, in Indiana, and won a race with the Hoosier Outlaw Sprint Series in 2011. He followed that up with a selection as a finalist in the NASCAR Drive for Diversity program, and with an alternate driver selection in the program for 2013. He and his family were working on prospects to get some late model rides during the year. They were in contact with late model car owner Tim Russell, and had discussed participating in his late model driver development program. In the interim, his father Lou, a former WWE professional wrestler, sold the dirt sprint car that they used in Florida’s Top Gun Sprint Series in 2012. They made the decision to move up to compete in USAC’s National Sprint Car Series, starting with the three races at Bubba Raceway Park. The track was only 88 minutes from the family’s home in Thonotosassa.
Collin Cabre
On the first night, Collin would hold onto the transfer spot in the B main until late in the race, even seeing one competitor crash and flip behind him in an attempt to catch up to him. He would get passed by several cars later, falling to ninth place in the B main, a broken rear shock to blame. He would be a spectator for the feature. The team had set a goal to qualify for the feature at least once during their first weekend of competition with a national series in a dirt car. On Friday, in the B main again, Collin would get caught up in another car’s crash ahead of him on the back straight, and flip violently down the track several times. “He is fine. His bruised up knees, ribs and back seems to get the most complaints. Not the way we wanted it to go, but that is racing,” was the team’s message posted later on Saturday. The team intended to fix the car, which had just been meticulously prepared for its first weekend of racing, and move on. Collin would get some more laps of testing, in preparation for a trip to Indiana later in the year. Collin and his team were united in their determination to make a comeback from the tough two days of competition in Ocala. “It is what it is …,” was their parting message.
Collin Cabre
The video of the Thursday USAC feature race is here:
The video of Collin Cabre at Bubba Raceway Park is here:
Florida Pavement Sprint Car Schedule Changes – Tampa Bay Area Benefits
By Richard Golardi
An additional five sprint car races have been added at Showtime Speedway, for a total of eight races for the rest of 2013. The race dates are - 3/30, 4/13, 5/25, 6/8, 6/29, 7/20, 8/31 and 9/21/2013. There are no conflicts with the existing TBARA schedule as of today. This confirms what Taylor Andrews, of Dayton Andrews Dodge, told me at East Bay Raceway Park on Friday evening. He informed me that five additional winged sprint car races were being added to the schedule at the Pinellas Park asphalt track, in addition to the original three dates. Original plans by track leaseholder Robert Yoho were to only have sprint car racing on the fifth Saturday of the month (and only four months have five Saturdays, limiting the number of sprint car race dates). This does not include the possibility of additional dates added with a possible return of the Showtime Winter Series later in 2013. No decision had been made regarding the return of the Winter Series, but Andrews did confirm for me that they did notice the marked increase in attendance with the last Winter Series sprint car race on January 12th.
The TBARA had originally planned to have their season opening race at Punta Gorda Speedway this weekend on March 2nd, but that race has now been cancelled. Saturday night racing at the Southwest Florida track appears to have ended. The current operators, Kevin Williams and Mike Chase, purchased Desoto Super Speedway in Bradenton last week. A member of the Charlotte County Airport Authority was quoted as saying that she was surprised. Williams and Chase had operated the Punta Gorda track under a lease from the Airport Authority, which ends on March 31st. They had stated that they could not afford the higher rent being demanded by the Airport Authority, which apparently led to the decision to purchase Desoto Super Speedway. The sale price has not been disclosed, but the speedway was listed for sale at $2.9 million last year. The sales listing stated that “Desoto Super Speedway is known as the South’s Fastest Short Track. The 3/8 mile oval track is 1/3 mile around the 10 foot apron. The outside retaining wall is ½ mile around. The asphalt racing surface is 60 feet wide with the turns banked at 12 degrees and the straightaway banked at 6 degrees.”
A press release from Kevin Williams and Mike Chase stated, “To all the fans, owners, and drivers, Mike Chase and I, Kevin Williams, have purchased Desoto Speedway, which includes 63 acres which will soon be named Full Throttle Speedway. We will be doing some upgrades to the track in the next month, and plan on having a grand opening on April 6th, and the upcoming season will run from April to December. With the uncertainty of Punta Gorda Speedway, we felt it was the best time to take on another track to make sure the future will still be bright in Southwest Florida for the fans, racers, and our kids. Thank you all for your continued support.”
I spoke to TBARA President Buff Fritz on Saturday, and he confirmed that Williams and Chase have plans for some track repaving and other work, which is going on over the next month. The current April 6th TBARA race date at Punta Gorda Speedway will be moved to Full Throttle Speedway, and will take place on that date, the planned track opening for the newly renamed speedway. Fritz told me that the race dates that had been scheduled for Punta Gorda Speedway will now go to Full Throttle Speedway, and more dates may be added. This marks the second Tampa Bay area pavement track to be resurrected in the past year, after Showtime Speedway (formerly Sunshine Speedway).
The cancellation of the March 2nd planned season opener for the TBARA marks the third time this month that a Florida sprint car racing series has cancelled their planned season opening race. The only track to have begun their sprint car racing season was Showtime Speedway, on January 12th. The Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series cancelled February 7th for rain, Top Gun Sprint Series cancelled February 9th for low car count, and now TBARA has cancelled a March date as a result of track ownership changes.
The 3 weeks of Florida Speedweeks, just concluded this weekend, included some exciting dirt sprint car racing, a brand new Florida short track (Daytona Speedway short track), a frightening crash that injured spectators, calls for research to redesign race track catch fences, midget asphalt racing, and the absence of asphalt sprint car racing. The changes announced for sprint car racing at Tampa Bay area asphalt tracks will benefit a large number of teams based in the bay area, and also those businesses that support them. It is a small victory for Florida sprint car racing, after the disappointment of seeing three series that were forced to cancel their season opening events.
Frustration for Floridians at the 360 Winternationals
Friday night was the second night of the 360 sprint car Winternationals at East Bay Raceway Park, and it was a night of mostly frustration for the drivers from Florida. There were four Floridians that advanced to the feature race that night. The four drivers included two from Tampa, Gene Lasker and Robbie Smith, one from Fort Myers (Tony Agin), and one from Jacksonville (Matt Kurtz). Some were using the three race series as preparation for the upcoming Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series at Bubba Raceway Park, which was using the same engine package (USCS/ASCS rules). Teammates A J Maddox and Danny Martin Jr. were in this group, and both were at Bubba Raceway Park earlier this month on the day that the series was to begin competition. A rain out pushed the first series race back to March 2nd.
Steve Poirier
With the ranks of drivers competing in Florida swelled by the addition French Canadian and Midwestern drivers, the pressure to advance would build during the night. Sport Allen would speak of his frustration, and of disappointment he felt about not reaching the level of success that he wanted. After a B main crash, he jumped out of his crippled car and pointed angrily at Terry Gray as he passed by.
A J Maddox told me that he got caught up in lapped traffic on the last lap of his B main, and lost two positions. “We caught lapped traffic, and there were people all over the place. Made a wrong decision. I got hung up on the top, and kept sliding up.” There was some controversy over another car’s placement of their transponder, when timing showed an extremely slim margin. A J said, “No, he beat me at the line, but I thought that was still the white flag lap. Everyone raced back around, and I drove back by him.” An inspection showed the number 64 car did not have the correct transponder placement (by less than a foot), but it was moved, and the result stood. “We’ll come back tomorrow night, and give it a shot.” And then March 2nd for the first Bubba Army Series race? “Oh yeah, I’m going to be there.” A J said he was committed to running all Bubba Army races. Followed by March 9th at Hendry County for Top Gun? “I don’t know if I’ll go to that. I just hate that race track. I crash every time I go there. I’ve had bad luck there.” A J spoke about the disadvantage that a driver from Florida has in this type of national event. “A lot of these guys do this for a living, racing fifty to sixty times a year, at least. Running limiteds twenty times a year, and trying to race with these guys – it’s just not the same.”
Danny Martin Jr., L, and A J Maddox
Robbie Smith said that he was not comfortable yet with a new car, and a new seat, but still made it to the feature race on Friday. He was planning to move on to Ocala next, for more 360 races with the Bubba Army Series. What about Top Gun series? “I don’t know if we’re going to run too many Top Guns, because there probably will be conflicting dates, and it might be a place that we don’t want to go to. If I’m going to go that far, I’m probably going to do some ASCS or USCS stuff. We’re going to concentrate on some ASCS 360 races, versus the Top Gun Series. I like the motor package and the way the cars operate with the ASCS type engines.”
For Matt Kurtz, after missing a feature start by two positions in the B main on Thursday, he was in the feature on Friday as a result of a good heat race finish. “Yeah, I got second, so that was good enough.” Matt told me that he will not defend his driver championship in the Top Gun Series, and will not run the full series. “It’s too far south to go to Hendry. That’s six and a half hours for us (driving time from Jacksonville). If I go down there and win, I’ll make a thousand bucks, but I’ll spend five or six hundred on fuel.” The shorter drive to Putnam County for other Top Gun races did not make up for the long haul to Hendry County, he felt. So will you run the full Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series? “No. We have no idea, really. We don’t know what we’ll run.” The team was not going to commit to running either one of the Florida dirt series, and would likely pick the races to run at a later time. The team was looking to “run up north”, and chase after the larger purses that would pay for the greater expense of travel to races in the Southern states. For 2014, the plans may include an attempt to “go after the championship up there.”
Sport Allen
“It’s been kind of a disaster so far. We’ve had a comedy of errors take place,” Sport Allen told me. What errors are you referring to, I asked? “I don’t want to point fingers.” At this point someone behind me said, “Terry Gray!” Sport responded by saying, “No, we just had some things we shouldn’t have been doing to the car.” What happened with Terry Gray? “He kind of raced me a little hard in the heat. I wasn’t quite sure why we were racing for dead last so hard for.” After dealing with broken parts during the night, and going to the B main, Sport was out after the B main crash that took out his car, and another car, number 422. He later asked me where the pit was located for this car, because he wanted to talk to the driver, and express his regret about what happened, even though he felt another driver was at fault. “I’ve got this cloud over my head that will not go away for the past five or six years,” Sport said, as the frustration showed on his face. He was looking at Showtime Speedway, and the Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series as his next races.
“This new Stealth car that we’ve got is a little bit tricky. I looked like a flounder out there last night, sliding around,” Gene Lasker said. The multitudes of changes that his team made on Friday brought a heat race win, and a start in the Friday feature. “The front wing broke about half way through the heat race, and I drove it with the wing broke, and it was kind of hard, since it wanted to move around by itself, but I won the heat race anyway.” What’s ahead this year? “We’re going to stay here in Florida, but we’re going to try to make the Knoxville Nationals, and we’ll try to make Eldora.” Gene Lasker had a busy year ahead, as he was planning to run East Bay Sprints, in addition to all of the Top Gun series races, and also add some of the Bubba Army races at Bubba Raceway Park.
I spoke to Taylor Andrews in the pit of Sport Allen, and he told me about plans to add five additional sprint car races to the three that were showing on the 2013 schedule at Showtime Speedway. I asked him if this was part of a plan for a new “Dayton Andrews Dodge Showtime Speedway Sprint Series”, but he said that was still undecided. The possibility of the TBARA being involved was also unknown at this time, but it was already decided to add these races, with dates yet to be determined. This apparently means an abandonment of the plans to only have winged sprint car races on the fifth Saturday of the month, and would mean that the schedule would have to be revised for the other track divisions. But, the commitment to have sprint car racing at the Pinellas Park track appears to have strengthened. This positive news for Florida, near the end of a month of frenetic changes for pavement tracks and pavement racing, would benefit those teams based in the Tampa Bay area.
Johnny Gilbertson would begin his transition to running dirt and pavement both, and was noncommittal about running a full TBARA season to defend his driver championship. But, I reminded him that he gave me the same reply one year ago, when asked if he intended to run a full TBARA season to defend his crown. Gilbertson would fail to make the feature at East Bay on Friday night.
The track surface at East Bay Raceway Park was described by several drivers as “a desert”, and also “improved since last night” by other drivers. A fine mist of sand rose into the air from the track during the Friday night feature race, won by French Canadian driver Steve Poirier. This was the first time that I heard a driver speak in a French Canadian accent from a sprint car race Victory Lane in Florida.
Dave Steele Returns to Midget Racing at New Smyrna Speedway
By Richard Golardi
“My buddy Evan, that runs this team, he wouldn’t stop calling me until I agreed to come run one,” Dave Steele said, explaining his return to the USAC National Midget Series at New Smyrna Speedway in Florida. Dave told me that his participation in the race did not signal a change from his semi-retired status. His priorities were still his family and his business, Steele Performance Parts in Tampa. He was not looking to add races outside of Florida to his schedule this year. “No, I’m still semi-retired. I kind of just morphed into a local racer, really. Local racers are as hard to compete against as these national guys.”
After showing up at Citrus County Speedway in his new number 33 sprint car in October, Dave went on a tear with his new car, winning the next five races entered at Citrus County, and four straight at Showtime Speedway. This was a sweep of the four-race Winter Series at Showtime Speedway, earning him the Showtime Winter Series driver championship. These races often saw Dave slicing through the field, pressuring the leaders until someone made a mistake. Then he would strike at just the right moment to take the lead and move to the front. The races might have seemed monotonous to some, but it was a remarkable demonstration of driving skill, with measured restraint. Each race would end with the same result. Dave Steele would stand in the Winners Circle, celebrating as the winner, once again.
Dave seemed to relish the role of an owner/driver, but he was still looking to sell the car that was racking up the wins. “The car is still for sale. If someone meets my price, I’ll sell it.” Has anyone met your price yet, I questioned? “No,” he told me recently. But he did have some new plans for the two upcoming Must See Racing Xtreme Sprint Series events next month, at Pensacola and Mobile. In his shop, a new Diablo chassis was being built for these events, and Don Wilshe was loaning an engine for this two race stint in the Deep South. A recent comment that Wilshe would have “two and a half” teams racing in March was referring to this engine loan arrangement. If we can we expect to see you at both Pensacola and Mobile, what about beyond that, I asked? “We’ll just see how that goes. It’s hard to say. Those are pretty close to home. We can get there and it’s inexpensive. I’m putting a new Diablo together, and hopefully, it’ll be done in time.” Referring to Don Wilshe, Dave told me, “he’s nice enough to loan us the engine for that deal.” Will the car still be the black number 33? “It might be different color, but it’ll be thirty three.”
The only race that Dave would confirm that was outside of Florida was the race in Mobile, Alabama in March. He would leave the possibility of another race outside of Florida open. “Well, maybe. All we have planned is Mobile, so that’s a little bit outside of Florida.” And, also TBARA and Showtime Speedway races here in Florida? “Yup, still doing that stuff.” Dave was entered for the next Florida pavement race with the TBARA at Punta Gorda Speedway on March 2nd. What about the possibility of doing more USAC midget races this year with RW Motorsports? “Probably not. These were just here in my backyard.”
The two races at New Smyrna Speedway, a track that Dave had seen many times in sprint car competition, would produce two very different results during the two nights. An engine failure in the feature on Sunday gave him face full of steam and water, and sent him to the pits. The car that Kyle Larson used to win the feature race on Sunday was assigned to Dave on Monday. The RW Motorsports team would run only three cars on Monday, as Kyle Larson was at the Daytona Speedway short track, racing a late model car (he would win that race too). On Monday, Dave would win the first Scramble (Heat Race), and start on the pole for the Monday evening feature. Prior to the feature, Dave was talking up his teammate, Bobby Santos, as the presumed favorite for that night’s feature race. However, Santos was standing next to us when this statement was made, and he merely just smiled. Steele would lead early in the Monday feature race, and get passed by Santos when he dove low into the third turn and took the lead. He would finish in fourth place, behind Santos, RW Motorsports teammate Kyle O’Gara, and Caleb Armstrong.
“It’s really about as good as I could expect from myself. I pretty much sit at a desk all day at my shop. It’s hard to pick and choose and just run these races against these guys every once in a while. A fourth is probably a little better than I expected out of myself,” Steele told me. With a return to winged sprint cars in March, it is likely that Steele will be back to the car and back to the competition where he feels comfortable, and where he has been a regular visitor to Victory Lane.
The video of Dave Steele at New Smyrna Speedway, including GoPro roll-bar mounted camera video, can be seen on the Florida Open Wheel channel:
World of Outlaws Weekend Wrap-Up from Volusia Speedway Park
By Richard Golardi
The three day stretch of sprint car racing at Volusia Speedway Park in Barberville, FL was preceded by two days of rain on Wednesday and Thursday. The puddles and thick mud on the front straight next to the inside wall remained for the first feature race on Friday. If you chose to step off the small stage at the finish line, you would sink in the mud up to the top of your ankles. That’s what happened to one race official who waded in to retrieve the small wooden step ladder. The mud-soaked Good Samaritan was retrieving the ladder for the family of new Kasey Kahne Racing driver Daryn Pittman, who was a Friday feature winner in his first World of Outlaws feature race in the #9 Great Clips sprint car. Daryn’s win, runner-up and fifth-place finish during the three days made him the overall champion of the UNOH DIRTcar Nationals and earned him a three foot, bronzed gator trophy. “We had a conversation on our way down here between me and the whole crew on what our goals were for the year and the number one goal was to come here and win that gator,” Pittman said.
When I spoke to him earlier on Friday, I told Pittman that I thought that he was one of the three fastest cars at Bubba Raceway Park during the prior race weekend. I then asked him about the track, and if he thought that he would be one of the fastest cars at Volusia also. “The car’s good, and the track’s fast. Obviously, it had a lot of rain, and it’s still pretty smooth. We were second quick. I’m trying to be a part of this team, and see how we shake out for the whole year. Qualifying is one thing, but we’ve got to win races.” Prior to winning that night, I asked him about his chances of winning that weekend. “That’s our plan. I think we’ve got as good a shot as anybody. You’ve got to finish the job, and be there for all thirty laps. It’s going to be fast tonight. We’ve got the car that’s quick enough. We just have to stay on top of the changes.” Do you feel like a part of the team already, during the first month of competition? “Truthfully, I felt like I was a part of the team the first night that I ran the 49 at Charlotte. They have done a great job to welcome me in here, and for my family, we feel like we’ve been here for five years already.” Daryn said that he had brought his family to the race shop, and that they had joined him in Florida for the trip south. How many wins do you think you’ll get this year? “Ten. I’ve never won more than seven, so that’s a personal goal of mine. When you come to a team like this, your goals are high, and your expectations are high. I know I’m better than I was the last time I was out here, and I know I’m with a better team, and I don’t think it’s that unreachable.”
Fred Rahmer would sit in the Tony Stewart Racing entry with the nickname “Smoke” on the side on both Friday and Saturday evening when Smoke (Tony Stewart) was at Daytona Speedway. As he did last year, Tony intended to race his car on Sunday evening at Volusia, when his duties with Sprint Cup racing were complete for the weekend. Stewart finished 12th in the feature race on Sunday. I asked Fred if there was any possibility that he could be driving the car again on any future weekends, when the Outlaws team was racing on a Sprint Cup weekend, and Tony was busy. “No. Just this,” Fred replied. What are your chances tonight, I asked? “Who knows? It’s a different car, but it’s a great car. Big shoes to fill. I’ll do the best I can, and go from there.”
For Sammy Swindell, his first sprint car race of the year on Friday night would follow up another successful year for him and his family at the Chili Bowl in January. He would place second again in the annual indoor midget race in Oklahoma in January, behind Kevin, his son. Back on dirt, behind the wheel of his number 1 World of Outlaws sprint car, it appeared that he was preparing another full season run with the Outlaws, in an attempt to win his fourth Outlaws driver championship at age fifty seven. But, Sammy does not usually say that he is committing to a full season with the Outlaws circuit during their first weekend of racing. He will remain noncommittal, with an obvious preference to leave all his racing options open to change during the course of the year. I asked Sammy that direct question – will you run a full World of Outlaws season this year? “Well, we’ll start out and try to do that, for sure. I mean, the situation where we’re in, we’ve got the option where if things really go bad, we don’t have to. I was contracted to do that.” I asked about racing in any other series during the year, if time allowed? “Well, if you run the full season of this, it doesn’t leave you much room to do anything else.” What’s your goal for the year? “It’s to win all of the races.” At Volusia Speedway Park, Sammy would have feature race finishes of fourth, twelfth, and sixth. He also had the save of the weekend during his Saturday night heat race, when a slide in the fourth turn saw him sliding across the high side of the track, directly for the end of the wall at the opening. He was able to regain traction in the loose dirt, and safely steer away from the wall opening to complete his heat race.
Bill Rose was not so lucky during his heat race that evening. He had a left rear tire blow out on the last lap of his heat race, which went through the side panel and arm guard. This resulted in a broken left arm, requiring surgery to put a plate and screws in his arm. The surgery went well, and he has been released from the hospital. Bill told his crew that he intends to be back behind the wheel in two and a half weeks, when the World of Outlaws has their event in Las Vegas. Danny Smith drove Bill’s car in the feature that night, and again in Sunday’s feature.
On Saturday, Terry McCarl got his first feature win since 2009 at Eldora Speedway, after having only four top five finishes since that July 17, 2009 win. He won his heat race, and his finish in the dash got him the top groove for the start of the feature. That was the preferred line on the track that night, and McCarl had Steve Kinser on his tail through the early part of the feature. Kinser and Schatz collided in turn two, and took each other out of the feature. McCarl was pressured late in the feature, but Daryn Pittman would settle for second place that night, less than two car lengths behind McCarl when the checkered flag fell.
My GoPro camera was placed on the yellow Tom and Sherry Leidig Phoenix Racing #59 team car with veteran Jac Haudenschild behind the wheel on Saturday evening. Jac told me that his son Sheldon had a GoPro camera also, and that they did place it on the car some of the time. Since the “team camera” was not on the car that evening, that allowed me to place my camera on the car to catch the 30 lap feature on the super-fast banked half mile North Florida dirt track. This track would have the fastest Speedweeks racing of any short track in Florida, thanks to the banking, track shape, engine power, and driving skills of some of the best drivers in the nation. Jac Haudenschild would not disappoint, providing the most exciting racing action that I have seen from my camera, since becoming a GoPro owner in 2012.
The video can be seen here on the Florida Open Wheel channel:
Q & A WITH JOEY SALDANA AT VOLUSIA
The following interview was conducted at Volusia Speedway Park, FL on February 16, 2013. This was an evening that saw the World of Outlaws STP Sprint Car Series in competition for their 2013 season opening weekend.
Q – New year, new team. How are you jelling with your new team so far?
A – I think we’re jelling good. Obviously, the first night out, we didn’t get the finish we were hoping for. My guys have worked really hard. They built a whole World of Outlaws team in thirty days. That’s damn near impossible. I’m just thrilled that they’re down here competing at a high level.
Q – So, thirty days ago, all you had was …
A – Thirty days ago, this thing didn’t exist. Dan ordered the engines, and everything was starting to take shape, but it wasn’t until the first of the year that the guys actually had a piece to work on. Thirty days was a big task, and they did it. Cars are awesome. The guys worked seven days a week, twenty hour days. They did whatever it took to get down here, so hopefully we can get them some better finishes.
Q – Do you feel that you were fast last night (Friday), but just had some bad luck?
A – I think a lot of your luck in racing is what you put on yourself. In qualifying, we were seventeenth quick. You come out here and do the best job that you can. Last night, we were seventeenth quick and finished twelfth in the “A”. We continued to work as hard as we could all night, and we’ve got to get better.
Q – What changes do you want to make, or is the crew making, in order to get better?
A – I haven’t worked with Davey in eleven years, and I’ve never worked with Bob and Shaun, and Dan as an owner. It’s just a new team. We’re all new.
Q – Dan (car owner Dan Motter) didn’t even run a car last year?
A – No. Dan sponsored Jac Haudenschild for a few races at the end of the year, and he sponsored an All Star race in Minnesota last year. But, he hasn’t been involved in racing in fifteen years. We’ve just got to keep digging. We can’t think that last night’s a failure. It’s a start in a new direction.
Q – You’re intending to run the full World of Outlaws season?
A – Yup. That’s our goal. That’s our plan.
Q – What about sponsors for this year?
A – Sponsor right now is Motter Equipment. Dan Motter’s funding us out of his pocket. A lot of others are helping us that were sponsors of Dan, back when he had his own team. We’ve got a lot of help, but we just want to represent everyone well.
Q – What is your goal for the year, other than the stated improvement that you are seeking?
A – Well, the goal for me is win races, and win a championship, and win a Knoxville National. My goals haven’t changed. And, I know the goals for everybody here is the same. One thing I’ve learned – it isn’t about money out here, it’s about teamwork. As long as we stay on the same page, and believe in each other, we’ll be fine.
Q – Tell me about your off season. Did you race anywhere during the past few months?
A – I went to Australia for seven races, and raced for Parramatta City Raceway in Sydney. Didn’t really have very good success. We ran fourth once, fifth twice, and blew up a couple of times, flat tire, caught on fire. It was an eventful trip, but it was a good experience.
Q – What was the track like here? Was it a little more dried up tonight?
A – It’s pretty heavy, pretty hard to race on. You can pass cars, just you had to have a good car. For us, we started sixteenth, got up to around ninth, and me and Steve got together on a restart, and I fell back, and came back to twelfth. All in all, it was a decent night. I’ll take a twelfth and load it in the trailer.
Q – The goals that you described do sound like they are realistic goals for the team.
A – Yeah, if you don’t have those types of goals, you shouldn’t be out here. For a first year team, if you don’t have them, then you have nothing to strive for. Definitely for myself, that’s what I want to accomplish before I get out of racing. It’s definitely a goal that I have every year.
Q – Thank you for the interview, Joey.
Dale Blaney at Bubba Raceway Park
Searching for a car to take my GoPro camera along for a ride at Bubba Raceway Park that evening, I surveyed the “parking lot pits” in the Ocala Howard Johnson Motel parking lot. Spotting the blue #2 car of 3-time All Star Circuit of Champions driver champion Dale Blaney, I made my request. Dale’s car, with black and light blue on the panels, was carrying the logos of sponsors Ti22 Performance and GF1 Chassis. At 6’4”, I wondered how the tall Ohioan fit into the small confines of a sprint car cockpit. The headrest in his car was placed several inches higher than other cars, to accommodate his long frame. I wanted to get the GoPro camera slightly behind, and next to his head, to get a “driver’s view” down the track, without the top wing obstructing this view. It would be a difficult task to get this camera placement.
Dale explained that his 2013 plans included running the full All Star Circuit of Champions series, and about 15 to 18 World of Outlaws sprint car races. This was about the same schedule that the 49 year old racer ran last year, and he also has the same car and same crew as last year. He intends to run all of the premier events with the Outlaws, including those at Eldora, Knoxville, and Williams Grove, and about another twelve or so additional World of Outlaws races. I mentioned to Dale that I believed that he had one of the three fastest cars at the track the prior night (Friday), and he agreed with this ranking. He turned in the fourth fastest qualifying time on Friday, and would place first in the dash, thereby earning the pole for the feature. Blaney would finish fourth in that night’s feature, won by Donny Schatz.
After no rain since Thursday, the track was noticeably dryer on Saturday, and was slick with rubber. Dale would qualify one position higher, and would again win the dash, to take the feature race pole position for the second night in a row. Up until the two thirds point in the Saturday feature, he appeared to be on his way to his first 2013 feature win. But, Donny Schatz was again moving through the field, as he had in the prior night’s feature. It looked like Dale’s chances were still good, if he could handle traffic and avoid bad luck, in order to halt Schatz’s march through the field.
Dale could be seen changing his line down the front stretch at about the midway point in the feature race. Instead of hitting maximum acceleration coming out of the fourth turn, and drifting out to the outside fence coming out of turn four, he chose a different line. Instead of accelerating hard coming out of turn four, he kept far from the outside wall, and took a more direct line, low on the track, to follow the shortest distance down the front straight to turn one. He also had to deal with cars going over the berm, and throwing up a storm of dirt and rocks directly in his path. Then there was the traffic, and a competitor’s blown tire, which happened right in his path and would dramatically affect the outcome of the feature race.
Video of Dale Blaney racing in the All Stars feature race at Bubba Raceway Park on Saturday, February 9, 2013, with GoPro roll bar mounted camera:
Additional videos from All Stars race weekend at Bubba Raceway Park, Friday and Saturday, February 8 and 9, 2013, on the Florida Open Wheel channel:
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSdPdgmUo6WfkfR6Eo__QBA
Dirt Flies at Bubba Raceway Park for the Start of Speedweeks
Steve Buckwalter
The three day stretch of sprint car racing at Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala, FL was supposed to start on Thursday the 7th with the season opening race for the new Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series. Afternoon rains forced the cancellation of the event late in the day. The race was hyped as having Tony Stewart, a personal friend of track owner Bubba Clem, entered in his own Tony Stewart Racing entry. With most of the remainder of the field being composed of drivers from Florida, the race would present a first ever scenario of “Tony Stewart versus the Floridians”. There is no way to know how many Floridians would have raced that evening, as the rain clouds had been gathering off the gulf coast, and as they moved east, some teams almost certainly cancelled their plans to travel to Ocala. I was told that six cars were in the pits by late afternoon, when the race was cancelled.
Among the cars with 360 engines compliant with the USCS/ASCS rules for the new Bubba Army series were the cars of A J Maddox and Danny Martin Jr. I spoke to A J Maddox and he told me that he had two cars, and two engines, which would allow him to enter Bubba Army and Top Gun series races, without the need to change engines. The next scheduled Bubba Army 360 race is on March 2nd and the Eagle Jet Top Gun Sprint Series will start the next weekend on the 9th at Hendry County Motorsports Park.
Daryn Pittman
The rains on Thursday afternoon left a muddy infield and a wet track for the season opening race for the All Star Circuit of Champions on Friday evening. The number of cars in the pits was in stark contrast to the prior evening. The entry list showed that 35 cars were entered, which was the largest field for the season opening Florida race in the past five years. Only one car was lost on Friday, leaving 34 cars entered for Saturday. At the Saturday drivers meeting, Bubba told the racers that he intended to work the track to “dry it out for you.” Later in the evening, the slick track was reflecting the red lights of the scoreboard in the third turn groove. Steve Kinser and Daryn Pittman were putting on their new sponsor colors for the first time on Friday. Kinser would don the colors of his new sponsor, Bad Boy Buggies, and Daryn Pittman would start his first race of the year with Kasey Kahne Racing in the #9 Great Clips sponsored car.
Donny Schatz won both nights
The complete Tony Stewart Racing team, consisting of Stewart, Kinser, and defending World of Outlaws driver champion Donny Schatz, would race both nights in Ocala. This was sure to pack the stands, and could challenge last year’s Saturday Speedweeks late model race as the best attended race since the track was renamed. Donny Schatz did move through the field to the front on Friday, taking the feature race win, but the rest of the TSR race team did not dominate. Stewart would finish in 10th on Friday, and Kinser was 17th. That changed on Saturday. With a slick track that seemed to be to Stewart’s liking, he posted the second fastest qualifying lap, behind teammate Schatz. Neither of them bested Daryn Pittman’s qualifying time from Friday, when he took a super-smooth trip around the dirt oval at 11.840 seconds. Pittman, Schatz and Dale Blaney consistently looked like the three fastest cars at the track. Stewart’s found speed on Saturday powered him to a third place finish in the feature, behind Schatz and Tim Shaffer.
One of the Saturday morning activities that I found along the I-75 corridor leading to Ocala was a makeshift “Saturday morning pits”, in the parking lot of the exit 354 Howard Johnson Motel. With extended parking spaces designed to accommodate truckers, the parking lot was a perfect fit for teams to prepare for that night’s race. It also afforded a chance to get a close up look at the teams, and take photos. I interviewed Dale Blaney, and he agreed to allow me to install my GoPro camera on his car for the Saturday night feature. The GoPro view from his car was the most dramatic footage that I have gotten from a GoPro so far. Just watching him place his left front tire, missing tire markers by inches, and riding up on the inner berm, was a blast. I will have the link to this video in my next column.
Driver Interviews:
Jason Sides – Jason said that he had not decided on running a full World of Outlaws season, but will decide after running the upcoming five days of sprint car races at Volusia Speedway Park, from Wednesday through Sunday of the upcoming weekend (Wed. & Thurs. – All Stars, and Fri. to Sun. - World of Outlaws). He wants to race in the first three World of Outlaw features first, and then decide after these races are completed. He was carrying a local sponsor’s name with him, Plant City sponsor Wetherington Tractor Service.
Kraig Kinser – was “only driving in World of Outlaws” this year, but was adding the two nights at Ocala for the All Stars, and would race in all five nights at Volusia Speedway Park this week, beginning with Wednesday, and “then Vegas next.” He said that the team had not made major off-season changes, only “changing little things here and there, like the tire rule, since we are back on Hoosiers.” He told me that he was comfortable with the car set up and the track, and that the Friday race was his first ever at the track. “We are chasing set up,” he explained, partly because the track was new to him. He had not raced during the off season this year, and had skipped last month’s Chili Bowl.
Steve Kinser
Danny Lasoski - “I’ll be at Volusia next week, and then after that, I’ll be at Las Vegas with my own car. We really had a good Speedweeks last year, and I’ll be at all five races at Volusia with Team Zemco. I’m kind of like the original outlaw. Wherever there’s a race, I’m going to go to it. I’m looking to run for Team Zemco, my own car, and I’m going to run my first 360s.” I asked Danny if this 2013 schedule was similar to 2012, and he said that it was similar. “Right now, I’ve got 106 races on my schedule, and I’ll try to hit them all,” he said. I remarked that this was the highest 2013 planned race total that I had heard, so far. Regarding race wins, Danny said, “last year I had fourteen wins, and I’d like to add six more, if I could.” So, twenty wins is your goal? “That’s my goal. You’ve got to have a goal.” I mentioned that Bubba Clem was his friend, and that he was a local resident, with an Ocala winter home. Danny stated that he thought Bubba was doing a good job at the track, and he was glad to see the stands packed. “We have a place here in Ocala, six miles from here. When racing starts, I’ll go back to Missouri. I usually come down here in the first week in November. It’s too cold in Missouri,” he said. Then he laughed, knowing that Floridians have it good during the winter.
Dirt Sprint Car Racing in Florida is Heading for a Split
By Richard Golardi
A split in dirt sprint car racing in Florida will become final on Thursday, as the first ever Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series race is held at Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala. The other 360 dirt sprint series, the Top Gun Sprint Series, had intended to start their 2013 season only two days later, at Putnam County Speedway Park. That race has been cancelled, due to concerns about low car count. The Bubba Army series is using USCS/ASCS rules, with races scheduled through July 2013 at Bubba Raceway Park. The Top Gun Sprint Series will start their season in March, with Hendry County Motorsports Park also on the calendar.
Is it a good thing for Florida to have a split in dirt track racing this year? Or will this turn out to be bad for owners, driver, and fans alike? Let’s look at the positives and negatives for Floridians:
Positive – more dirt sprint car racing. Negative – there aren’t enough cars for two series, and low car counts will possibly bring more race cancellations, resulting in fewer races. Positive – more races at more tracks means more chances to see sprint cars, adding South Florida and North Florida into the mix. Negative – these tracks have hosted little or no sprint car racing in recent years, and the fan base is unknown. Positive – racers that have wanted to race USCS/ASCS rules in Florida have had their wish granted – courtesy of Bubba Clem (track owner). Negative – are there enough of these cars in Florida to make a series a worthwhile investment, or could we see an embarrassingly low car count (and what is enough – 12 cars - 15 cars - or 18 cars?). Positive – Bubba Clem has a friend named Tony Stewart, and he asked his friend to show up at his track on Thursday with a race ready 360 engine and car, and race (Tony said yes). Negative – I give up. There isn’t one. Tony on dirt at BRP will be fun to watch. Well, OK, there is one possibility. Tony could thrash the field, and make it a wipeout. This could happen. I will still watch it (and smile).
Don Rehm & Bubba Clem
I recently spoke to Don Rehm, Promoter and Owner of the Eagle Jet Top Gun Sprint Series, and asked him if the split was a good thing, or a bad thing, for dirt racing in Florida? He replied, “I don’t know what to tell you. The reason that the Top Gun Series was developed was because the 360 class of cars just dwindled away, and people couldn’t afford to run them. Then the promoters weren’t able to pay the purses that people thought the 360 cars were entitled to. It became a situation where it kind of went by the wayside. Now, I’m not sure of the number of 360 cars in the area.” And by “360 cars”, you are referring to the cars complying with USCS/ASCS rules, which is the rules package being used at Bubba Raceway Park? “ Right. There are a number of cars that run with us that have 360s also. But, there’s a lot of guys that don’t have them, and I don’t think they can afford to step up and buy a 360.”
I remarked that I had not heard from anyone that had openly stated that they were going to run both dirt sprint car series in Florida. Do you know of any drivers or teams who have stated that they will run both series, I asked? “No, I have not heard anyone say that. But I think you are going to have to have two race cars,” Don Rehm told me. Not just two engines, but two cars, I asked? “Well, it could get very time consuming to keep changing motors all the time. Even though it’s a 1 to 1 ½ hour job, it’s taking away from your maintenance program and everything else to do that. I don’t know how many people will do that, you know?” So, it sounds like you are saying that the racers in Florida will have to choose one series, or the other. Is that correct? “Well, I really don’t want to say that. They may be willing to do that, but it involves a lot more work than a lot of people are willing to do.”
So far, the two series only have one conflict, on April 13th, when the Top Gun Series is scheduled to race at Hendry County Motorsports Park. The Bubba Army 360 Sprint Series schedule shows race dates through July 2013. The timing of the release dates for the two schedules appeared to show some effort to avoid conflicts between the two series. “My schedule was put together two weeks before, but I didn’t want to release it until my awards banquet,” Don Rehm told me (the Top Gun awards banquet was Saturday, January 26th). “When he put out his on the Friday before, it just happened to be that way, and it worked out fine, and I’m glad it did. We don’t need conflicts.”
Don Rehm
“Basically, these two tracks asked us to come and race for them,” Don Rehm told me, referring to the addition of two new tracks, Putnam County and Hendry County. The 2013 schedule for Top Gun bears little resemblance to the 2012 race schedule, which was dominated by races at Bubba Raceway Park. A transition away from the west Central Florida base now sees the series racing mainly in East Florida, instead of West Florida. The teams based in the Jacksonville area, including defending series champion Matt Kurtz, will be pleased with the relatively short trip to Putnam County. The Top Gun Series schedule that was released is not the final 2013 schedule, as East Bay Raceway Park has not set dates for the fall, and there may be two additional East Bay dates added. This would likely include the traditional Thanksgiving weekend date at East Bay. Rehm also told me that he had spoken to track management at North Florida Speedway, so there could be two races added at that track, too. “That’s the extent of what I would like to run this year,” he told me.
Don Rehm confirmed to me that there had not been any communication between himself and Bubba Clem to run any Top Gun Series races at Bubba Raceway Park this year. The Ocala track has scheduled seven Bubba Army races through July, including the race on Thursday this week. “I would not be opposed to racing, if they ask us to come back. We’d just have to work it with what we already have in the schedule,” Rehm remarked. I asked if there was any desire to add a special event, possibly a Friday/Saturday doubleheader, as was done at Bubba Raceway Park last year? I was told that a possible “mini-series inside the series” was being discussed, which would be three or four races, instead of a weekend doubleheader. The mini-series would race at more than one track. “It would be inside what we already have for races,” Rehm said, explaining that it was not planned as a winter series.
With the changes coming for the Top Gun Series this year, I asked Don Rehm if he was happy with the “2013 version” of the series? “Yes. I think change is good. I like the idea of going to some different race tracks. It’s spread out more evenly across the state, and that’s got to be a good thing.” Don told me that he was positive about the car count for the upcoming races when racing resumes in March, and he remained positive about the prospects for long-term success for the series.
E-mail Richard Golardi quickterm@yahoo.com
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