Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

     Some folks like to make a habit of pointing out that that some young racers use the win it or wear it system to guide their sprint car careers. I bet a lot of beginers that matured into being top shelf racers had a time when they broke a lot of equipment.

     Off the top of my head, I can recall reading about racers from two different eras that people said crashed a lot in their early days- Doug Wolfgang and David Gravel. They seemed to have turned out OK I guess.

     Any other gasers and crashers come to mind?

Karl has made mention that Steve tore up his share of equipment early on, too.........but when drivers like these mentioned are doing 80-100 shows a year, what's crashing often? 

One kid that comes to mind when I first started going to sprint car races and watching them on the old Speed Channel is Sam Hafertepe Jr. It just seemed that everytime I went to a race or watched one on T.V he was always wrecking or something was blowing up. He also has seemed to have turned the corner and has won two straight ASCS National Sprint Car Titles. Always good to see young drivers develop and turn the corner. Seems like if a driver isn't like Larson or winning like Schatz right off the bat a lot of people think that they should just give up and quit.

I kid from Minot used to come down our way almost every week to race with the now defunct WISSOTA 360 series.  He had to deal with a learning curve just like every other driver and bent a few along the way.  He drove a black #15 and I hear he's doing pretty well now. 

Stan Meissner

Paul Pitzer

You have to understand what the limits are. You push until you either come out on top or you bend stuff up. Early in steve's career i have seen karl not to pleased with the outcome of a move he pulled. You have to feel the cars limits. 

You must have never seen Schatz race when he was just starting out.

He tore up a lot of equipment in his first few years.

Schatz early years were a little bit before my time as far as really being a fan and following sprint cars. I used to watch the WoO on TNN back in the 90s but do not really remember too much about it other than Steve or Sammy winning all the time. After reading and listening to a lot of history and by Donny's own admission yes he did tear it up.

A lot of people seem to just think about the 10 time Knoxville Champ & 200+feature winner Donny and completely forget the fact that he tore stuff up. The thing that happens today is whenever a young talent gets an opportunity everyone says well that young kid will tear stuff up and he won't come close to touching Schatz at winning the title. Well, yeah but that can be said about most of the sprint car drivers in the world now.

You're 100% correct.

Most people that saw Schatz race in his first few years would have bet his family would have run out of money before he ever won the Knoxville Nats.

Mr.Gil Sonner told me it was easier to slow down a young driver than to speed one up.

That would be the black #15 I referred to that we used to watch in the WISSOTA 360's in case anyone didn't connect the dots.  

Stan Meissner

I don't recall watching any driver crash more often than Clint Garner did early in his career.

the earlie 90"s were hard on "the kid", it was almost certain he would be tearing a car up and frustrating alot of drivers, Not alot of folks would know this.. but growing up in the region it was a terrible time for him, and in sprintcars small mistakes are costly, His Family had deep enuff pockets to put the equipment back under him and he forced himself to learn, After watching the 15 his first few years you would never guess he would have made it this far. his wins almost equal his wrecks at this point, and not alot of fans would believe that..

I agree with a previous poster, one in our back yard. Seemingly hung his IMCA sprint on the wall at Husets every week when starting out now wins the 360 points annually at Knoxville- Clint Garner.

The worst president of my lifetime:
Ronald Reagan

Have to push these cars to find the edge.  The trick is once they figure it out to not keep bending sending them.

Stan Meissner