Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
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What is your first memory of a sprint car . That one thing that u remember about sprint cars that hooked u as a fan ?

Mine wasnt even at a racetrack or a running car. In the mid 70s  as a young kid we lived out in the sticks and had to drive some distance to get to town. There was an old sprint car that sat out by a barn on one of the county roads that we occasionally traveled. I never saw that car move or race or anything but as a child i thought it was the coolest thing i had EVER seen. I was hooked then and have loved sprint cars ever since. When i go to the races now i still see that old blue and white sprint car by the barn. 

The very first race: '81 Johnny Key Classic San Jose Fairgrounds Speedway. Not knowing shit from shinola and being 10 years old I rooted for Mike Sargent and he won! I will always maintain that his cars were some of the most beautiful ever made. The journey didn't really begin until I turned 18 and my dad (who hates racing) couldn't stop me from going any more. The train really left the tracks at that point!

I was hooked more on Open Wheel Dirt Racing having gone to my local dirt tracks (Wilmot, Lake Geneva, Waukegan, Cedarburg) back in the mid 60's.

Whitey Harris, Roger Otto, Johnny Reimer, Al Schill all ran modifieds in the IRA. Got married and started a family so I didn't follow racing very much but in 1983, I happened to spend an August night in Oskaloosa Iowa and there wasn't a hotel room to be found. When I asked why, they said "It's Nationals Week". So I went to Knoxville and have only missed 2 years at the Nationals since. My son and I made it out annual pilgrimate until his son was born. In 2011, all 3 of us went to Knoxville so it's become a generational trip. I also managed to see the WOO at Husets, Wilmot, Beaver Dam, Cedar Lake, Hales Corners, Ascot, Santa Maria, Eldora, San Jose, Hanford, Hartford, MI. Kokomo, Terra Haute, Houston, Sharon, Limaland and countless other dirt tracks.

There is still nothing better than watching a sprint car at full throttle backing into the corner, flinging dirt.

Going to the races at the MO. state fair in the 60's, and looking at all the cars that would park outside the track as the drivers and families went to the fair after the races. Seeing these cars on the old flatbed trailors up close.....man it was the coolest thing ever for a young kid. genneten(sp), hibbard brothers, taylor, utz, blundy,corbin,goodwin,jenkins....man these guys wee and still are my heroes.

Dad crewed for a racecar back in the 1950's in Grand Forks for George Swangler. Moved the family out West in the 1960's and eventually crewed for Boyd Rayfield at Sky Valley in Monroe, WA. I can remember Dad getting home from work on a Friday night, Mom had the cooler packed and blankets ready to go. Me and a buddy and a sister or two would pile into the station wagon and we were off to the track. Watch the races than run like hell to be the first one to sit in the car after the races. When they would run Skagit on Saturday night, sometimes he'd leave when I was out playing with friends - was always pissed off on those nights that I missed out on going to Skagit......

Now, my daughter has the bug. :-)

David

I was born into it. If you lived in my family, you went to the races every Saturday night...I never remember not going to the races.

Member of this message board since 1997

I was born and raised in South Florida, not exactly a hotbed of Sprint car racing. In 1962 it was decided by the "grownups" that; as my Grandmother needed some tests done at the Mayo Clinic,  we would therefore have the family summer vacation in Rochester MN. It just so happened that the State Fair was in full swing during that week.  My Mom and I went to the races every evening while the rest of the family did who knows what. It was all stock cars and a few open wheel coupes which were probably early supermodified, on the 1/2 dirt.  On the final night, during intermission there was  a short exhibition race consisting of a half dozen or so IMCA Sprint cars that were in town for the Sprint car races coming up the following week. I had never been to a race before, and that wide eyed 12 year old kid was instantly and  hopelessly bitten by the racing bug during that week.

 www.memorylaneracing.com

"Every time I pull onto the track with Dad,Uncle
Bobby,Mario,AJ,Gordy,JR...,I get goosebumps. Those
guys are my hero's.They always have been and they
always will be." 
Al Unser Jr.

 

I started going to dirt track "stock car" (actually modified coupes & jalopies) races in Virginia in the 1960s. We moved up North, I went to a paved race, lost interest. But I always knew about sprint cars, never lived where they ran.

4 summers ago  I was in upstate NY when friend gave me a Circle Track Mag that mentioned Central Pa. sprints. I was headed to Southern Pa. the next day. Perfect opportunity, I got on the Net & found a race at little Clinton County track. You know what got me? THE ENERGY! 24 900 HP cars on a track designed for what, 8 horses? It was like a slow-mo atomic explosion. Flew from Denver that fall to see Sammy win Natiional Open at WG...... hooked

The other thing.... smell of methanol! Not fragrant like a rose but it was a sensual reminder of the experience. I mentioned this to one old timer & he said, "Yea, just like gunpowder"

Love the smell of methanol and the sound of "open" headers! The only thing better than methanol is NITRO!

Eldora Speedway may 21 1978 when King Of Outlaws won his very first feature event because i was on my way home from a business trip with my dad and and he said lets stop at eldora the woo are there; problem is i did NOT have a camera  then after tghat i was hooked on Outlaws and saw them on tour ever since !

Long Live  20 Time  World Of Outlaws Champion Steve 
Kinser #11 

My Dad raced around the Kansas City area when I was very young. He quit when I was about 10 or so. We only went to the Fair Races for years after that. When I was 16, I was going to High School with Ricky Weld and he invited me to go to Riverside one Saturday night. I watched Tiger Bob Williams drive an awesome race in Bill Sloan's #24 car, a one night deal for him but what a Race. The amount of talent at Riverside(Mo.) was unbelievable. Gene Genneton, Jerry,Kelly and Kenny Potter, Woddy Woodward, Bill Curtis, Dick Howard, Dale Moore, Bobby Layne, Jackie Gibson, Eddie Fitzgerald, Ricky Weld, Curt Grogan, Too many for me to even remember. I swore that night I would someday drive one of those cars. Within a year I was out there racing with those guys. I'll never forget the Drive that Tiger Bob put on that night, His performance that night Hooked Me and  the rest is History. 

I had already spent 25 years following modified stock cars in the Northeast before I saw my first real sprint car race.   Truth be known, I had started to sour on the racing.  Went to Port Royal PA for a sprint car show in 1991 and what I saw that day changed everything: Drivers racing hard for every position, the incredible speed, the noise (no mufflers back then), races going non-stop, green to checkered, real balls to the wall racing.  Plus, sitting in those old Port Royal bleachers you could almost touch the cars and they screamed past. There was no "one thing" that hooked me about sprint cars that day.  I just remember saying to myself, “This is what I’ve been lookin’ for.” 

'78 or '79 Gold Cup at West Capital, nothing better!

Dale Johnson from Hartford, Ohio in the black and gold Dick Neely's Spl. # 7 at Butler Speedway in Prospect, PA in 1960.  People had always asked if I had seen Dale Johnson in that black # 7.  Not until that night.  Back in those days the exhaust pipes went the whole way to the rear of the car.  When he got off the throttle and those orange flames shot out the rear,  I was hooked.  And he was such a gentleman on and off the track.  Several years later when I got my first automobile, a 1960 Chevy hardtop, it was soon named  " Dale " .  And the first race photo I ever bought was Dale Johnson standing by that black # 7 at Tri City Speedway near Franklin, PA.  Although he quit racing in the 1960's,  I ocassionaly would see him at Sharon Speedway in Hartford,Ohio.  That black # 7 is still said to exist but isn't yet restored. 

1978 at Harlin Iowa was my first sprint car race with Eddie Levitt winning the a main. I was hooked after that on sprint cars but loved the Super Modifeds a few years before that. Been going all over ever since.

First sprint car race 1977 Gold Cup at West Capitol. All the Outlaws were there, although the Outlaws where not

officially formed yet. Ferkel, Kinser, Swindell, Schwartz, Wolfgang, James and the great locals Anderson, Van Connett,

Boyd, Sills, Green, Rescino and the feature winner Gary Patterson. And 36 years later and I'm now an Outlaws winning

car owner. 

1955 Hawkeye Futurity.  Got to meet Bobby Grim and Hector Honore and they made an immediate fan out of me.  I owe those gentlemen a big thanks for 58 years of great racing memories.

My dad took me to my first race at west capital raceway on sept. 3 1971, It was my 3rd birthday. And on that day i was hooked , we never missed a saturday night all the way until the day it closed.  growing up watching  some of the west coast's best sprint car and modified drivers was truely an experiance i will never forget.

I kind of was too.  My Dad worked the corners at Wilmot's old track as a Safety Man in the 60's.  My Mom took me as a baby and then when I was 5, I could or did, sit in the stands by myself. Then moved to the 'new' track in 73.  I assisted my Dad as he ran the place for two years in 75, 76 for the IRA.  I was kind of born into it also.  Rarely venture far from the home track, but I have fun nonetheless.  I'm sure I've seen you Budz76, somewhere at Wilmot....

For me my first exposore wasn't originally Sprint Cars but the old coupes of the late 50's, early 60's.  My cousin and uncle worked on the #2 car pictured in the foreground.  My dad was taking me over to my uncle's place to watch them work on it.  I was pretty excited about that race car and the family connectoin to racing so when he thought I was ready to sit through a night of racing he took me to the old Twin City Speedway in Blaine, MInnesota, just north of the Twin Cities.  The track later was renamed North Starr Speedway and actually hosted a couple of Outlaw races before it closed at the end of 1979.  I wasn't too big on drivers at first, the driver of the #2 was Jerry Richert Sr. who went on to win the 1962 Nationals and a bunch of IMCA titles.  At that time we simply knew him as a local driver who worked at the Whirlpool company on St. Paul's east side and dabbled with race cars on the weekends.  This photo was probably taken around 1960 as the rules were changed and they cut the thing down and removed the body in the winter of 61/62.  I found out that JR was driving Sprints and we lived three blocks from the Minnesota State Fair dirt track but my dad wasn't very fond of Sprints so he would only take me to Stock Car or Supermodified races.  He passed away in 1965 and my relatives eventually did own Sprints but by that time I had joined the Navy and missed their last six years of racing.  I worked nights though the later half of the 70's and had four kids so it was difficult getting to many races but I managed to get my son hooked on it.  Now we're working on the grandkids. 

Stan Meissner