ron.brown11

I see that Barrett is entered for the Chilly Willie races this weekend at Tucson Speedway. Good Luck Barrett! That's the track were I raced for several years. Sure do miss that place!

I'm sorry but I don't know of Barrett Polhemus, but he was running the number 79. Is he out of the Houston area? He qualified 11th out of 29, and finished 21st behind Bubba. Chris qualified 10th. With Barrett running the #79, I have to ask if his car ran out of Joe's #79 shop?

Bubba Pollard and Texas racer Barrett Polhemus got together on lap 171, ending both of their days.

Jake Finch finished 12th & Bubba Pollard finished 20th. Jake finished on the lead lap, but Bubba was 29 laps down. As race monitor.com only lists results (which are unofficial), I don't know if he had mechanical issues or as a result from a crash. Bubba usually runs good at Irwindale. Hopefully in a day or two, the SRL site will have details posted online.

According to race monitors.com, Chris finished 4th in the SRL Southwest Tour All Star Showdown! Great Job Chris!!!

Thanks Realist! I figured there must be some connection, but wasn't sure if it was Joe or John. Here's to hoping that he does well.

I just read an article on Daytona Beach News-Journal. It says that John Aramendia, of New Braunfels, TX, is going to race a late model for NASCAR's Ben Kennedy. I know that Joe's brother is named John, but John the business owner is in his late 50s, and I don't think he has a son named John. I saw a picture of the John that's going to race for Kennedy, and he sure doesn't look to be in his 50s. Does Joe have a son named John that races? I will try to keep up with John, and post info when I can. As I've say before, I will always try to highlight Texas racers racing in other areas, when I can.

That's Great!! There is some great racing in the SRL, and Irwindale always has great racing. I had already read the Pollard & Finch were going. James Finch provided Pollard the funds to do so. Really happy that most, if not all of the SRL National series races will be shown live on FloRacing, as they're running at some really good tracks.

I haven't seen any entry lists for the All Star Showdown at Irwindale Speedway yet. Is Chris going to run there this year? If so, wishing you nothing but the best Chris!!

Thanks Rodney. I googled Revolution Park and that's what I found. I thought surely I must have this wrong, because that's even farther away than any of the TX locations that were being discussed. If I was going to drive that far, I'd just go to Five Flags. I truly can't see where either of those 2 (Revolution Park & Five Flags) would help TX asphalt racing. Unless there was a track in TX, that they could say alternate race dates, it doesn't make sense. Racing is way too expensive as it is. If teams or fans have to drive 300-400 miles each way for a race, it had better be a big name race with a huge purse, to be able to draw big name racers. And you can't do that every week. Heck, I seriously doubt you could get big crowds of cars or fans if done only once a month. I know as Texans, we are used to driving a lot just to get groceries, but with the price of groceries, and everything else, what will they have to give up just to be able to afford to go to these races (whether racers or fans)? And then again, I still come back to the same question. How will this help develop asphalt racing in TX? If there can't be a new track built in TX, HMP is the only egg in the basket. If a new track can be built, serious questions will need to be considered up front. Where can it draw cars from? Where can it draw fans from? Is it a reasonable enough distance, that both can afford to get there on a regular basis? Can it afford to pay enough in purses, to get teams to dig out those parked race cars, and get them ready to race? Can it afford to lose money for at least 2 seasons, to build up the fan base and car count? Is there enough businesses in the region to support race teams & the track? This is why I really think that COTA could be the solution. There are a lot of racers that have run CTS, SAS & HMP, that aren't currently racing, or are racing only on a limited basis. TMS would be a long haul for those that race out of Houston or the Corpus areas, which has the most recent active racers. Austin & SA have some, and it's not as long of a haul. As Mike said above, TMS is looking into doing something there for asphalt racers, and seem to value having a multi-use facility. But it's also obvious that SMI has at least a good working relationship with the owners at COTA. And the owners at COTA already have a lot of other activities going there, so they have a lot of supporting multi-use activities in place. I don't know what all TMS has in place, and maybe Mike can fill us in on that. COTA also has the acreage to build a decent sized track. With that location, it should be able to draw racers & fans from DFW, Houston, SA, & Corpus. Plus there is a lot of industry in those areas, to try and get funding for teams & the track. So that's also approximately 20 million people to try and entice to come to watch, and or become racers. But I think that COTA has something that TMS doesn't have. Austin has always been a destination location in TX. I cannot tell you why that is, but according to several sources, people love to come to Austin. I also cannot tell you if those same people that are attracted to coming to Austin, are racers or race fans. But people are coming here. I'm betting the folks at TMS have noticed that too. If not, would they have been as willing to make less money hosting races at COTA vs TMS? I realize the TMS knew that they were likely to lose 1 Cup date at TMS, but didn't have to partner with COTA. I don't know what the answer is, but I'm certain that if the right people, with the right motivations, put their minds (and finances) to it, there is a solution to save asphalt racing in TX. Then it will be up to all involved to support it. That there might be the biggest unknown. Will we support it??

I'm going to show my ignorance here, but where is Revolution Park located??

Mike, I'd be good with TMS, it would probably limit the number of times a season that I'd be able to go. If they made it like the LA Coliseum or Bowman Gray, I wouldn't go at all. I'm not interested in dump and run racing, or demo derbies on the front stretch. But I know this, we need asphalt racing alive & well in TX. I have 2 reasons why I like the COTA location. First, I'm greedy, as it's closer to where I live. The second is because of that location. It's a reasonable drive from the DFW area, the Houston area, and SA area. What is that, like 20 million people? I live north of Austin, and that makes TMS a little over 200 miles away. That makes SA & Houston about 300 miles away. How many racers/fans can do that on a regular basis? It's approximately 155 miles from Houston to COTA. It's approximately 240 from TMS, and it's about 90 from SA. Of course these all all just Goggle maps numbers from the downtown areas of SA & Houston, and I used the actual address of TMS to COTA. I think that you would pull more racers & fans from OK, if the short track is at TMS. I'm not sure having more OK racers & fans at TMS is all that helpful for TX. But I'd be happy to have a good asphalt short track here in TX. I just feel that we'd have a better chance at cultivating more TX asphalt racers, if the track is in a more central location, to where TX asphalt racing used to flourish. I have no trouble being wrong about that, because I really want TX asphalt racing to come back.

I haven't seen or heard of anyone coming out of their seat like that in 40 years. Either I haven't paid enough attention to what's been going on in racing, or hopefully that was a really rare occurrence. I hope that they found out that something failed in his harness system, because the only thing left is his belts came undone. Either way that could have ended very tragically. Hopefully they can contain the blood leak in his brain, and won't need to operate, to relieve the pressure and stop the blood flow. That is a very blessed young man. Rodney, I could go the rest of my life and gladly not see that again, as once was enough. The same for watching a player getting CPR on the field, during a game. That's 2 miracles in 2 weeks. I know that God has an infinite number to give, but it's rare to see them happen right before our eyes like that. Praying that he has a full recovery.

That's some good racing there!! Royal Jones puts on a good show, at a nice track.

The Chili Bowl starts tonight!! For those that have FloRacing, it's already streaming.

That's great news. We need more racers running some of these touring series'. I think Larson will do well with his dirt series. The Whelen Modified series is strong and expanding. The west coast SRL series is going strong, and they've expanded their national series to nearly double what it was last season. I'm really hoping that HMP can get some stability, because that's just too beautiful of a facility to see it go away. Plus, that would give the CARS series a place to race in TX. But I'm still hoping for a progressive banked 3/8 asphalt track at COTA. That's probably just pissing in the wind, but I can hope, right?

Come on, you know that BigJohn is pulling your leg. BigJohn likes Big Letters! lol

Old habits Nick. I still follow www.srlsouthwesttour.com My friend Jim Pettit II, won the NASCAR Southwest Tour championship 2 years straight. The only other driver to do that was Ron Hornaday Jr. Then NASCAR shutdown their 4 super late model regional series' (Southwest, Midwest, Northwest & the Southeast All Pro). Jim moved to the SRL series, which operates mainly in the western states. During a 6 year run there, he won that championship 3 times. Jim has had several track championships on both dirt & asphalt. NASCAR named him one of the top 25 weekly racing series drivers of all time. Two years ago he was voted into the West Coast Racing Hall of Fame. He just races for fun these days in a dirt modified at Watsonville, CA. But like I've said before on other posts, I will try to call out Texas racers that are running in other areas. They need our support. I've never met Chris, so the closest thing to that is seeing him race, or watching the Lost Speedways interview with those TX boys Nick, Chris & Rodney. The SRL now has a National Series. Last year they sanctioned the Money in the Bank & Battle of Berlin races, that were both run at Berlin Raceway. This year they are hosting those again, plus The Rattler and the Davidson Electric 125 races at South Alabama, Citrus County in FL, 2 shows at I-44 Speedway in MO, and one at Irwindale in CA. Ricky Brooks will lead the tech side of things. Should be good racing. I sure hope that HMS can get some traction. I'd love to see an SRL show there. But I'm still hoping for a 3/8 progressive banked asphalt track at COTA..

I'm with you Nick, I don't see it happening. Race tracks are like old gas stations, cost more to remediate than the cost of the property. My first "home" track from my high school days, closed in 1987. From 1987 until 2017, a truck driving school operated in the in pit area and the parking lot outside the track. So basically from 1968 to 2017, the track property was a toxic waste dumping ground. General Electric has a huge commercial jet engine manufacturing operation along I-75 in Cincinnati, about 6 miles from the old track facility. GE bought the track property, complied with the EPA's requirements, and built another massive plant & office complex. Plus, it's only a mile back to I-75. My brother worked at the original GE facility. Before he retired, he supervised the move of his section to the new facility. They were the first to actually occupy space in it. He was good friends with the new plant manager, and he told my brother that GE spent almost $30mil rehabbing the land, before starting construction. Considering that the plant cost over $700mil, $30mil doesn't sound like a lot. But your average business can't afford that. But hey, maybe someone does have the capital, and possibly the ins with county & state inspectors. But I just don't see them being able to overcome the residential housing that is in that area now.

This 1 thing is the secret to racing more affordably & competitively. As Nick said above, and I said in a thread 2-3 weeks ago, tires are the great equalizer. That negates virtually all of the high dollar chassis', motors, & shock packages. If you can find a recap tire or a spec tire that would be great, because of the consistency. Take offs are good too, but different tracks run different tires. Now, are 1 track's take off softer than another? While living in Tucson, occasionally I would go run a winter show or 2 at I-10 Speedway in Blythe, CA. The mods could only run Hoosier treaded take offs, that had come from their late models. Oh yeah, a mod couldn't even have it mounted unless 75% of the tread already gone. They were trying to entice more out of towners to run there, and Blythe is kinda in the middle of nowhere, and it kept the costs down. The first time I went to run there, I thought that I could run the Goodyear slicks that we ran on at TRP. The race promoter walked me down to the tire trailer, and told the head guy to give me 6 used tires for the mod class. I ran 3 more shows there on those same tires. When those tires were cold, the pucker factor could get a bit intense. I found that out in qualifying, after spinning from the exit of four, all the way to the wall in turn 1. Surprisingly once good and hot, they stuck pretty good. Had they not given me those tires, the tire shed was selling them for $20 each. Most of the mods there also ran on the SRL Touring Modified Series, so there were some pretty exotic cars there. I qualified 22 of 26, do mostly to said spin I referenced above. At the end of 50 laps, I finished 5th. Nick saw my car I think at a swap meet held at SAS, and it wasn't any state of the art car. Tires are the best equalizer!!

Ah the drilling rigs. I had my first knee surgery do to a careless co-worker, on a 26,000 foot natural gas rig near Ft Stockton. My oldest brother-in-law's best friend lost his life on 1, a few months after I got hurt. We all worked on the same crew. His death too was caused by a careless worker. His was so bad, that they had to have a closed casket funeral. His wife was my wife's best friend growing up. They lived across the street from each other, almost the entire time they attended school. Working in the oil fields always pays well, but there's not a lot of room for errors. I can't tell you how many guys that I saw that were missing fingers, or limbs that didn't heal back correctly. It's a brutal business.

Mike, the car looks great!! So glad that Divid likes it. I'm even happier that it sounds like he may be opening up a bit. As I said before, you never know how many ripples in the pond, that YOU created. I have no doubt that David will continue with that. Anyone that has served in a forward operating theatre, has seen/done things that you just can't unsee or undo. Some find ways to get through, but that usually is due to a really good support system at home. Others have a more difficult time of it. It sounds like David was struggling, and you volunteered to be his support system. You didn't have to, but you saw a need and helped. Thank You!! To all that helped, in any way, whether that be with helping work on the car, bought raffle tickets, offered parts, or sent some money, Thank You Too!! I know that if I'd been able to be there when you showed the car to David, I would have appreciated the rain too. It makes my heart happy to know that there are still people in the world like you Mike. Nick, thanks for posting all the pictures!!

Mike, I'm 6' tall, and used to power weight lift. But I don't like fighting. I won't run from one, but I prefer not to if possible. But I assure you that that guy's head would have been reshaped had he entered the trailer. I have 8 plates, 10 screws & a block, all made of titanium, in my neck. But I really shouldn't have been at the track anyway. My body wasn't ready after that surgery. I just didn't want to let the driver down. Knowing all that I found out over the next few months, I wouldn't have gone.

Nick, one other thing happened the night I showed up after having my neck fused, and wearing a hard cervical collar. We were parked next to a guy named Bubba, and Bubba was running a street stock (like a bomber class). Apparently Bubba was pissed off at another driver for wrecking him. I went into our trailer to grab a tool that I wanted to have with me, when my driver went out for the main. Well, Bubba was apparently looking to fight someone over his crash, and because we had a generator, he thought it was too loud. So as I was walking out of the trailer, he said that I needed to turn it off or he was going to kick my ass. I told him I'd be waiting in the trailer, come on over. I don't know if someone talked him out of coming into the trailer, or he realized that his nuts hadn't quite dropped yet. But this I'm certain, not coming in that trailer really saved him a lot of pain. I had pulled the jack handle from the floor jack. And I would have used it too. The first shot would have been to his face. And as I had played baseball for over a decade, and fast pitch softball, I could still rip a good swing. My doctor had told me that if I got above those plates, I'd probably be a quadriplegic. Yeah, there's now way he would have gotten the first hit. Bubba finally shut his mouth, and I went about my business. But I did leave something behind. I plugged my cellphone in and turned on the video camera.That way, if he wanted to steal something, he'd go to jail. If he wanted to fight, he'd go to the hospital first, then on to jail. Or I could have ended up in the morgue, but I doubt that.. Merry Christmas!!!

Nick, how I got involved with him wasn't easy. Living in Del Rio then, they were no circle track cars anywhere there. I can't remember the name of the guy (Umshied?), that was running the TAMs series then, but I found his email and asked him about said driver, because he lived in Uvalde. He passed my email along, and I got called. That's only 75 miles from DR, and I know that he was running in San Antonio. That would knock 150 miles off a trip, by riding with him. The driver made it clear on the ride to SA, that he had a crew chief, and he made all the calls. OK, I'm good with that, I'm the outsider. The first night at the track, getting ready for hot laps, the crew chief told me to set the tires at 26psi (rights), and 22 on the left, and he was going trackside to clock lap times. Now I had never run a lap at SA, and thought ok they know what they're doing. But I kept thinking to my self, there's no way to make these tires work with those pressures. I took temps when he came off track, and to my surprise (not really), all the heat was in the center 3" of the tires. How do you run a 500+ hp mod on 3" of tires? You Can't! So when it came time to hot lap again, I set the rights at 19psi, and the lefts at 15. I'm so glad that the crew chief went to time laps, because he was 7/10 second a lap faster. I took temps again, and we were still giving away 2 unused inches of tire. The next session I dropped the rights to 17 & the lefts to 13psi. He went another 2/10s faster, and the temps finally were fairly even across all 4 tires. You should have heard the conversations between those 2. They just couldn't understand it. After listening to them trying to figure it out for 20 minutes, I'd heard enough of their guessing. I showed them the real numbers, and then I asked them why they were running the pressures so high. I was shocked when the driver said "that's what the tire trailer guys said to run". And he believed them!! But here was the strangest thing to come from that first night. The "crew chief" never went to the track with us again. The driver is a great guy. When I was about to have 4 vertebrae fused in my neck, he thought that a doctor in DR was going to perform it. This doctor had been practicing orthopedics in Uvalde for a few years, maimed several people, then moved to DR. Don't you just love small town doctors (not all of course), but DR seemed to attract the worst. This driver sat on the hospital board in Uvalde, and they were going to pull her privileges there, because of the complaints against her. He offered to take time off work to shuttle me back & forth from DR to SA, just to keep her from touching me. He was really happy when I told him that the surgery was going to happen at Wilford Hall in SA. And as you know Nick, he was licensed as a doctor & and dentist. He had more racing experience than me. But I had a lot more asphalt experience then he did. He struggled with seeing the difference between the 2 surfaces for setups. I assure you that I'm no Nick Holt, when it comes to chassis setup. Do you remember Nick, the time he hired you to come from SA to Uvalde, to do a pre season chassis set up? I went over to Uvalde, because he asked me to come that day. For whatever reason, you called him and told him you were going to be about 2 hours late. So I told him I'm going to get started on the basics like ride heights, caster/camber etc. Then I put the cars on the scales to start looking at numbers, and making some adjustments. He told me that I was wasting my time, because Nick had his own way. I told him no worries, because I planned on seeing what you did, and then try and understand why, and learn from it. When you got there, you spent about 20-30 minutes looking over a lot of pieces on the car, and taking measurements. Then you looked at the scale numbers, and scratched your head. Finally, you looked at the driver as asked "Why did he hire you? He responded "because I want a good baseline setup for opening day". You told him that almost everything was already pretty much where you would have set it. I think we made 3-4 minor changes that day, and they were for changing the scale number a little bit. This was the first time that he showed me something, that would take me 2 years to finally figure out. He only wanted to believe what someone was telling him, if he was paying them. Yeah, I too Nick will not forget that track rental day. When with only 2 cars on the track, almost a half track apart, they managed to nearly destroy both cars. I still remember my last radio call to "Stay high coming off track". That was bad, but it could have been so much worse. Then came the other car's owner losing his mind. I was certain there was going to be a brawl. I also remember his driver climbing from the car saying that he had looked down at the gauges when it happened. That car owner heard it too, but chose to ignore it. I don't think John wanted to fight about the crash, and John was never shy about wanting to fight. That told me a lot, but my driver didn't listen to his spotter to stay high, so I've always felt that we were at fault the most. Yeah, I loved that day too Nick (a different day then the one from the above paragraph). But that was also the last time he ever let me get behind the wheel. I used to drive it to pre race tech every week before that. From that moment on, the relationship between he & I deteriorated, and it took me awhile to figure out. Prior to that day, we had talked about letting me race the car on some weekend. That was never uttered again, and I never asked either. I think he was a bit embarrassed that a guy that had never turned a lap in his car, at a track I had never turned a lap on, was running as good as him. Then, in the pits after I came off the track, I didn't ask what my lap times were, because I screwed up the entry to 3, every single time I entered it. I remember whining to you that I tried everything but just parking it on entry. You said "That's what you do here at THR". I think that was the last straw for him. The next 2 times he went on track that day, he tried to do things in his car that he had never done before. He was trying to drive it the way I did. He also nearly wadded it up a couple of times, 1 of which put him in the infield's dead grass. That plugged up the radiator, we found on the next trip out. I've never seen a radiator swell up like that before, and not split apart. I don't know if you heard him, but when we were getting ready to load the car, he said that he was going to set the car on fire. Now I still had my car sitting in my shop in Del Rio. I said that if he wanted to burn down a car, burn mine, and give me his. No kore talk about burning cars. He had way better equipment then what I ever raced. That's how I was able to get fairly quick, fairly quickly. His car rotated to the right rear really well, much better then I could get from my chassis. I would have loved to have raced that car, especially if I could have run it at Tucson Raceway Park where I had thousands of laps at. I worked nights at Laughlin AFB on ejection seats, and dealt with explosives everyday. That can be a bit stressful. I would get off at midnight on Fridays, and I'd go home and try and sleep a bit. But I never got more than 3 hours, because I had the to drive to Uvalde to get hooked up with Greg. I'd leave DR at 5am. After being at the track all day, I drove us back to Uvalde, then the last 75 miles home. He usually would be on call, or in the hospital on most Sundays, and needed any sleep he could get. I would usually get to bed about 5am on Sunday mornings. And of course, my wife didn't think I should sleep all day Sunday. Ah the things we do for racing. The only thing I regret is not being able to figure out why things went sideways. Hell, I was at the track 9 days after having my neck fused. Boy that pissed off my wife!. I would still do it again probably.