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Dirty Thoughts 7/14/06
Dirty Thoughts…Fan Appreciation Night
Where does the dirty one start this week? I’m not sure you even need me this week, I mean if you get on the
message boards you can pretty much figure out what’s going on, or at least what some people think they saw
happened anyway. The dirty one knew it was going to be a crazy night when during Hot Laps, after taking the
checkered flag ending the hot lap session, a driver decided to fire down the back stretch and slammed into another
drivers car, ending his night and pretty much the other drivers as well, the dirty one took a quick look to the sky to
see if the moon was full or not and decided it was going to be a wild one this evening.
I cannot do a complete run down this week, not sure why but I was not sent the evenings results like I had been
getting, so you’ll have to settle for some random thoughts and a commentary, I hope you’ll indulge me a little.
First off, what a great night for the fans, the way the Kings and the drivers do fans night is second to NONE. Let
me say it was a pleasure meeting a lot of the drivers I hadn’t met, and of course saying Hi to the folks I had. You
all make a nobody like me feel great, and I cannot thank you enough for that. Mine was not the only happy face on
the front stretch; I saw lots and lots of happy folks, both kids and adults alike. The picture cards, the autographed
shirts, the signed cars (special thanks to Jim Shell for letting me sign his car), and the giveaways were just plain
awesome. OMG, I almost forgot how cool it was for Brad to bring young AJ Winter down to the track to give the
command for the drivers to “start your engines”, and also how cool it was that AJ nailed it, gotta tell ya, the dirty
one got goose bumps, hell I’m getting them again just talking about it. As a proud father of 2 young race fans, I
love it when tracks get kids involved in things, and I think it’s great that AJ’s parents bring the young man to the
track when they come, 20 years from now, who knows AJ might be doing his own thoughts about racing on the
internet, one can only hope so, Kudos to all those involved!!!
Next, we congratulate all the night’s feature winners. For starters, “the last outlaw” Jesse James Lay in the Late
Model division, Jesse put on a show in the feature in getting his first win at Florence in a while. The move down the
backstretch, passing both Rick Corbin and “the sniper” Wayne Chinn was a thing of beauty; my only wish is that
the fans had properly saluted you, instead of watching the BS in the infield. In the modified division, Matt
Smallwood grabbed his 7th (2 at Florence) feature win of the 2006 season; Matt has his stuff together this year in
the 911 ride. In the Super Dirt and Pure Stock classes the same two drivers that have dominated all year continued
their winning ways as Timmy Proffitt and “the bullet” Bob Lanter cruised to victory in their respective classes.
More good from the weekend, it was great to see Brandon Gibson not stop, but at least slow down Lanter’s
dominance by winning a heat race, unfortunately for Brandon, Bob had earned enough Passing Points to start in
front of him in the feature. Also, I must give a shout out to Jason Miller in the good-looking 0 pure stock, for
getting what I believe was his first ever heat race win, good job Jason, you are getting there young man. The DRC
would absolutely shoot the dirty one if I didn’t mention 70 year old racing legend Earl Smith stopping by and picking
up a heat race win in dominating fashion, way to go “Moonshine”!! Cannot forget “the professor” Larry Moreland
having a strong run in the modified feature, finishing 2nd, I think had the race went the full distance he might have
had something for young Smallwood.
Plenty of bad happened this weekend, we all know the dirty one is a big fan of Timmy Proffitt, but the dirty one was
not at all happy with how he raced Mark Robertson in the heat race. Timmy is a good driver with a great car that
does not need to drive that way, if he was mad at Mark for some reason, he should have out raced him on the track
(cleanly) and then told him about it in the Pit area later. Will this make Timmy mad at me, I hope not, I am a big fan
of the #1 SDS and think he deserves everything he’s getting, his hard work is finally paying off. Which leads me to
the Late Model feature, man was the racing fantastic, Wayne Chinn looked like he was gonna dominate, but Rick
Corbin chased him down and the two raced each other hard, making contact several times as Chinn would dive down
on Corbin to shut down his run on the low side. Problem was, the whole time he was doing that, Jesse Lay was
coming and would pass both drivers heading down the backstretch and cruise to the win. Speaking of coming,
Roger Williams, who started 16th was coming as well. Roger has struggled a bunch this year and finally had the car
working high and low on the track and had worked his way up to 6th place, when during a slide job on Mike
McWilliams for 5th place the cars became stuck together and 2 as 1 went down the backstretch. When they finally
separated, Williams did an awesome job not spinning in front of the rest of the field, but the damage was done as his
quarter panel was rubbing his right rear and he began to fade. At first it looked to be more than it was, but after
seeing the video it looked like nothing more than 2 guys racing hard for a spot. As the laps counted down and
Williams faded, he became entrenched in a battle with yet another dirty favorite, Jerry Rice. The 1b looked to be
faster than the fading Williams ride, but was unable to get around him as Roger was doing everything he could to
hang onto a top 10 finish. Here is where the controversy begins, it looked to me like Jerry made contact with
Roger and the #12 car spun. Some say it was “just good hard racing”, some say Roger turned down into Jerry,
after seeing the video a hundred times, I still think what I saw was right, but in my heart I want to believe it was
“just good hard racing” and that two guys that I root for on a weekly basis would NOT do that to one another,
especially for 10th place. After that happened, there was almost another fight in the infield, as the Rice and
Williams crews got together and from what I hear the McWilliams clan wanted to fight in the pits as well, not sure
why, I guess they forgot about the bonsai slide job Audie pulled on Scott James a few weeks ago that took the top 5
into a 5 wide situation coming off of turn 2, but they were ready to fight anyway, which leads the dirty one his pulpit
for this week….
This season has been a crazy one for sure, seems like almost every week there has almost been or has been an
altercation on the track or the infield. A very smart person said this week on the Florence message board that
people and budgets get stretched to the max, and that emotions are always HIGH because of it, and she was right.
So, that being said, whose job is it assure stuff like what happened a few weeks ago in the infield and pits, and what
almost happened this weekend in the infield and pits, doesn’t happen? If you ask me, it’s the job of the Florence
Management team with help from the drivers or team owners. Look, arguing and fighting is something that has
gone on at racetracks forever, and as another individual stated this week, the fighting we see today is PG rated
compared to how it was “in the day”, and I have to give the King family full credit for that. However, things are
again getting out of control this year, and I believe it’s the managements job to have a drivers meeting, get in front
of these drivers and teams and tell them plain and simple, “cut the BULLSHIT or you’re out of here”. The
chippyness (is that a word?) that’s been going on this year is going to stop or those involved will be gone, period end
of story. And that’s where the drivers/team owners will need to step in and get control of their crews as well. It’s
just to dangerous to be out there wrecking each other, and the cost of these cars is expensive enough without the
added costs of having to fix a car after you’ve been intentionally tore up. It boils down to respect for the other guy
and the other guys equipment, and to an extent respect is something that has fallen by the wayside. BTW, this is
has been a long time coming from me, and is not directed at any one driver!
OK, I have an idea on how to control things in the infield, and I know I’m going to get hate mail for this one, but I
guess I’ll have to deal with it when it comes. As I watched what was going on in the infield Saturday night, I saw a
whole bunch of people in the infield that didn’t need to be there. What happens if a huge fight breaks out, we have
2 officials, Josh and a couple of cops, you cannot control a large crowd with those numbers. Therefore, I say there
should be 2 people per car in the infield, and they can only be there when their car is on the track. Meaning, during
LM heat #1, if your car isn’t on the track, you aren’t either. How do you do that you ask, it’s simple, when said
driver pulls up to pay to enter the pits, he’s given 2 additional arm bands and he designates 2 crew members to be
in the infield and that’s it, that way at most you would have 48 people in the infield for the features, not the 100
people that you see on a weekly basis and who knows how many on special shows. If someone without the correct
armband runs out onto the track or the infield, he’s banned for 2 weeks. One more thing, when something occurs on
the track, and people come running out of the stands, the pit gates should be closed, there should NOT be anyone
allowed to come running out of the stands into the pits to the infield or worse onto the track. Emotions are already
HIGH and all these folks do is make it worse, of course this would be eliminated if you do the armband thing.
One last idea, the dirty one had heard over and over again from fans that, isn’t it amazing that so and so driver
always gets a good draw for the heat race and so and so always gets screwed. So I started watching, and I could
see where certain teams seem to always be up front and some seem to almost always be in the back. So, another
suggestion I have would be that more than 1 driver must be present when pills are drawn or maybe a LM and Mod
drivers meeting at 5:30 to draw pills, and SDS and PS at 5:45 to draw pills, most of the drivers are there between 5:
30 and 6:00 anyway, and anyone showing up after that gets put on the tail of a heat race. This will eliminate the
thought that certain guys are getting to draw pills until they get one they like!!! Even if it’s not happening, the
perception is that it is happening, and perception can be greater than reality sometimes.
Well I guess I’ve rambled on long enough about Florence Speedway, maybe I’ve lost a few friends this week, I
hope not, that would be a shame, but I guess anything is possible. I only write what I see and this is what I saw.
Before I let you folks go, I have to talk about a racetrack I attended over the holiday weekend. Lake Cumberland
Speedway had a Monday show over the 4th of July and several of the dirty ones crew headed down. This was the
second time we made the 2 hour journey down I75 to LCS, first time wasn’t terrible, but they only had 4 Late
models and 13 mods, and I was hoping for a better turn out this time. Well needless to say I wasn’t disappointed,
20+ LM’s, 25 Mods, 15 SDS plus 2 other classes were on hand and they all put on a show. The racing in the heats
and features was 2 and 3 wide, the track was in fantastic condition, minus the wasted time qualifying (I only say that
cause I hate qualifying) the show was ran efficiently and we headed home at Midnight after watching 4 of the 5
features (only the 4 cyl. Feature was left). I was thoroughly impressed with the show, the dirty one could only offer
a few suggestions, better lighting around the facility, better stands-you feel like a mountain climber on these babies,
not to mention they aren’t in the best of shape, another tow truck, and the passing point system to eliminate
qualifying, other than that the place is good and I will definitely be back. Another thing that made the trip great for
the dirty one was that 3 Florence regulars were on hand in the Super Dirt Division and they kicked butt. Stan
Freeman dominated the feature in picking up the win, and veterans Jim Shell and Ron Landers, sr. had great runs
as well, finishing 3rd and 5th respectively. Shell looks at home at the 3/8 miles slightly banked oval, his hanging it
out style fits the place perfectly and I’d be willing to bet if he continues to hit LCS he’ll get a win down there soon.
Landers I have seen at several tracks this year and he seems to adapt well to any surface, congrats to the three of
you on good runs. While I’m talking about drivers and good runs, how about Ray Branscum, the ROY contender at
Florence Speedway has been hauling his #15 Modified all over the area and has been quite successful in his rookie
campaign. If the dirty one is not mistaken, Ray made both shows over the holiday weekend at Portsmouth
Raceway Park, with a stellar field of drivers on hand, keep up the hard work Ray. Look for interviews coming with
Shawn Tolson, and a special 3 way interview with Ron Landers, Stan Freeman and Jim Shell, that’s lots and lots of
years of racing, it might take me a month to get this one done!! LOL BTW, no Ron Landers, sr. was not the 70 year
old driver Brad talked about, that was Earl Smith, Ron told me he’d been asked that 4-5 times, he wondered if that
meant he looked old!! LOL
There will be NO Dirty Thoughts for the next couple of weeks, the dirty one is taking a much deserved (if I must
say so myself) vacation this weekend, and will be in Pittsburgh next weekend doing some training for work. I know,
nobody cares, but I thought I’d rub it in a little that I was getting to take a vacation, haha.
So until then, keep in mind, the dirty ones comments are mine and mine alone. They are in no way intended to
offend or put down your favorite driver/brother/son or father. If you have anything you’d like to add please feel free
to email me at bryant.scudder@insightbb.com and I will be glad to do so. Remember to keep your racing clean and
your thoughts dirty!
The dirty one!!!!!
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