Budman Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 I'll start it off. How about the Jim Hurtubise story and the San Antonio Racing Community of 1964. I had never heard of it until just recently. An amazing story. Better to hear it from those that were there than from me though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NeilTPS Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 txtom & Nick I also remember that tragic night very well. It was the worst incident in all my years of race officiating. Mike Meeks and Mike Denman were seriously injured. TIDA-LM Chief Inspector Cotton Sherland and I visited them that morning at 5:00am and many times in the coming weeks until first Denman, then Weeks were released from the Brooke Army Medical Center hospital. ESPN was covering the TIDA-LM race at San Antonio International Speedway on the same weekend of the Alamo Grand Prix, which was racing on the street course downtown. ESPN aired the race footage which included the wreck and the fire. I have a tape of the program and it still hurts me emotionally to watch it. Lets all hope that none of us ever see something like that again. Len Hayden arranged the ESPN coverage which was a complete surprise to me. Len convinced ESPN the thrust of the story should be that ESPN recognize me on their program, known as "Speedweek", as the "Savior of Late Model racing in Texas". ESPN did. I was overwhelmed. Speaking of Len Hayden, when he retired from the Air Force many years ago, he moved from San Antonio to Tennessee. I regret to mention here that he has not been feeling very well since January. He is fighting a form of cancer known as Multiple Myeloma with chemotherapy and radiation treatments. If that is not enough, he was released from the hospital on May 2 after he recovered sufficiently from a bout with pneumonia. All of you TIDA, SAIS, CCS and TWS folks who knew Len Hayden should keep him in your best thoughts and sincerely hope that Len can beat this illness. Neil Upchurch former President - TIDA-LM Texas International Drivers Association 1988 - 1997 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NeilTPS Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 Nick: Check your records. As you correctly said, the race was black flagged. Given the medical emergency we had, the lack of ambulances who were transporting the injured drivers and the slick track surface condition caused by a lot of fire truck water and fire extinguishers, I decided to terminate that 100 lap race on lap 98. Neil Upchurch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProTree Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 was the modified ware driving painted a bright yellow or some loud color-i was there the nite he wrecked and was just trying to remember the color of the car-i remember it was a bright color for some reason-been alot of races since then and i aint gonna tell you what else Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 I believe it was orange and the #was 55. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
REBELRACER Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 i remember that crash, damn lucky he wasnt hurt worse, he hit hard..........and speaking of fire (meeks crash) i still remember pat lane's fire ball down the back stretch in his late model...........i believe his oil line came loose or something to that effect and the car looked like a big fireball going down the track.......or hell even that night terry barden hit that tractor tire in turn 3 and broke both his legs...........had to be a hard hit to move that huge tire.............there are so many different stories from sas, i am just glad mr dickerson is trying to bring it back to its former glory, it was such a shame to see such a good track in such bad shape for so long........ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Budman Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 Though these may be less than pleasant memories, the value of recalling them here is to serve as a reminder, lest we become too complacent about racing safety. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rodlea Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 20% chance of [very bad "R" word removed by Nick Holt, 5/5/05] Saturday - should we plan now on going to San An? Drove up to THR last week when the sun was shining bright, beautiful day. No racing. Gave me a good excuse to drive on down to San An where we really felt the thunder....no mufflers...... ha ha. Announcer at San An was worth the $8 price to get in! No yankees there... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NickHolt Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 Nick: Check your records. As you correctly said, the race was black flagged. Given the medical emergency we had, the lack of ambulances who were transporting the injured drivers and the slick track surface condition caused by a lot of fire truck water and fire extinguishers, I decided to terminate that 100 lap race on lap 98. Neil Upchurch Neil, At your suggestion, I went back and found the story I wrote about that race. It was scheduled for 100 laps, but on lap 98 someone spun to bring out a yellow. TIDA rules at the time called for the last 5 laps to be run under green flag conditions. But every time they tried to get the race restarted, another caution flag would fly. The massive fireball happened just after the two leaders (Rick Rapp and Greg Davidson) had passed the flagman to start the 104th lap. Thus, we had 103 laps complete when you terminated the race for the reasons you stated. Nick Holt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jason Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 lol wasnt racer roy announcing? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
racerx Posted May 5, 2005 Report Share Posted May 5, 2005 racer roy must have put some old school east texas tent revival racing religion on em... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Definitive Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 Ricci Ware Jr raced the Handy Dan camaro.It was one of the most professional looking cars on the track.Ricci's wreck in the modified was actually the second time he broke his neck in a racecar.When I saw him at SAS one night,he told me he was warned about how easily he could reinjure the neck.He decided to race the TPS car for years like that,and it gave him more confidence to get into the high speed modified. The big hero in that firey wreck was Beaver Stelzig,and I still get bugged when I think about how it was overlooked then and appears to be overlooked now.Beaver was out of his car and into the window of Meeks fireball of a car in just seconds.He couldn't get the belts at first,stepped back and took another breath of air then dove in again. The most horrific wreck,and the wreck the caused the longest period of silence at SAS,was when Hubert Bean had a heart attack while leading a race.He was heading down the front straight at full throttle and never lifted or broke.The hole in the turn one wall is still there. Does anyone remember when Jason Oates slid down the whole length of the back straight on his roof at SAS?The sparks went on forever.It was in a bomber/charger car. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 What ever happened to Beaver? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Budman Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 No takers on the Jim Hurtubise story? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 Nick, TxTom, Whoever We know you have some real good stories to tell. Just pick one or two of the old or new drivers and tell all of us something about them. What might seam bla-bla to you will most likely be real neat info for us. Maybe you guys could start a history section on TXSZ. Sort of a "Roll Call" if you will. Names, Circa, Car#, etc. Im sure it would be a hit with everyone. Please put some thought to it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bar2248 Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 is there a way to put the video of teh ESPN deal on the interent or somthing, I think I remember after teh race looking at one of the burnt cars...but I don't remember the wreck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
REBELRACER Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 We know you have some real good stories to tell. Just pick one or two of the old or new drivers and tell all of us something about them. What might seam bla-bla to you will most likely be real neat info for us. Maybe you guys could start a history section on TXSZ. Sort of a "Roll Call" if you will. Names, Circa, Car#, etc. Im sure it would be a hit with everyone. Please put some thought to it thats a good idea papa..........i like the old stories of sas, it really takes you back........... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RodneyRodriguez Posted May 6, 2005 Report Share Posted May 6, 2005 I like TxTom's old TWS stories Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dpappas Posted November 15, 2017 Report Share Posted November 15, 2017 On 5/5/2005 at 8:23 PM, Definitive said: Ricci Ware Jr raced the Handy Dan camaro.It was one of the most professional looking cars on the track.Ricci's wreck in the modified was actually the second time he broke his neck in a racecar.When I saw him at SAS one night,he told me he was warned about how easily he could reinjure the neck.He decided to race the TPS car for years like that,and it gave him more confidence to get into the high speed modified. The big hero in that firey wreck was Beaver Stelzig,and I still get bugged when I think about how it was overlooked then and appears to be overlooked now.Beaver was out of his car and into the window of Meeks fireball of a car in just seconds.He couldn't get the belts at first,stepped back and took another breath of air then dove in again. The most horrific wreck,and the wreck the caused the longest period of silence at SAS,was when Hubert Bean had a heart attack while leading a race.He was heading down the front straight at full throttle and never lifted or broke.The hole in the turn one wall is still there. Does anyone remember when Jason Oates slid down the whole length of the back straight on his roof at SAS?The sparks went on forever.It was in a bomber/charger car. Just to Clarify Hubert Bean has never had a heart attack in his life. The wreck in question was caused by another inexperienced driver. I know this because Hubert Bean is my father I was 9 yrs old and watched my brother carry my mother out of the stands and my older sister Darla and I beat the ambulance to the hospital. Dad was leading the race and came upon a another car to lap that car was given the move over flag and instead of moving down to the bottom of the track he moved up into my father who then spun and hit the wall with extreme force. Despite all the rumors my father was never unconcious and begged them to let him climb out of the car instead they cut him out destroying the chasis. He had some bruised ribs and a concussion thats it. Trust me theat wreck is burned into my memory in fact a few years later he spun out in Althas Ok and I freaked out because I flashed to that night at SAS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NickHolt Posted November 16, 2017 Report Share Posted November 16, 2017 Thanks for bringing this thread back up, Diane. The Bandit sure gave his fellow racers a few heart attacks back in the day though. If Hubert showed up, he was going to the front along with Kelly, Rapp, Fyrar, Davidson, Davis and, well, the list could go on for quite some time. I miss those golden years at Highway 16 Raceway, San Antonio International Speedway, San Antonio Raceway or San Antonio Speedway - all the same great half-mile speed plant. I read this entire thread a few minutes ago and I must admit some of the stuff about the fire hit me hard. I had to laugh re-reading the exchange between Neil Upchurch and myself about the length of the TIDA Late model race that suffered that devastating fire. Neil corrected me, but then I turned around and corrected him. I believe that was a first (and last) time anyone ever corrected Neil Upchruch in public.. LOL Neil, of course, has to be right up there near the top of the list of folks who made major contributions to Texas stock car racing. Foyt's up there and a few others, but there aren't many with at that level in the history of short track racing in Texas. But, you know, FB has pretty much taken over the world and I get pretty discouraged trying to keep this place clean, orderly and bash-free. Almost all the tracks no longer bother to send me stuff to post for them, preferring to use FB instead. I get it. I really do. But I still think a site like this has a place in the racing community. Nick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King237 Posted November 16, 2017 Report Share Posted November 16, 2017 I read the ENTIRE thread too Nick...wow was Lealand on fire when he posted that thread! I went back and looked through several search engines and came up with two obscure videos which aren't the best quality and I think this one is from 1997 The next one is unknown and seems to have an EMS person and "helpers" watching...perhaps Nick or someone will identify them for the people who watch this tape: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RodneyRodriguez Posted November 17, 2017 Report Share Posted November 17, 2017 That one there a TSRS race at San Antonio, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.