TROPHY CITY VISIT A FUN TRIP FOR A HOT ROD FAN!!

Richard Griffin’s retirement from the SCRA was not unexpected, but still a surprise to all his fans. His 25 year career included 49 SCRA and 14 CRA wins to tie him with Bob Hogle at 63 on the all time combined total sheet I keep. He was involved in a lot of other sprint car wins prior to driving the Ron Chaffin owned # 50. His wild antics of years ago were a trademark for him. He will be missed as he was very popular with his Gasman moniker known around the country. He and his car owner each took home $10,000 from the SCRA point fund at this week’s SCRA banquet. Bruce Bromme Jr won the Mechanic of the Year Award for the umpteenth time! Congrats to him and his crew of Michael & Gary Tanaka and Eric Kaufman. No word on the replacement for the Gasman, but the “little red sucker” will still ride roughshod on the field for years to come, won’t it?

Runner-up Damion Gardner received $5,000, as did car owner Harlan Willis, both for runner-up in points. Damion also received the Dean Thompson Achievement Award for having the most wins on the season. Josh Ford won the Jeff Bagley Memorial Rookie of the Year, plus the NWWC Rookie of the Year Award. Ford's father Keith, took home SCRA Rookie of the Year Car Owner Award. Levi Jones was the "Most Improved Driver", while "Hard Luck Awards" went to Brian Venard for SCRA and to car owner Johnny Vermeer for the NWWC. Bud Kaeding received $16,000 for his NWWC point’s award. I have missed most of the banquets since they started going to Vegas, but this one was surely interesting. Congratulations to all the winners, you earned it.

The biggest concern for me the past week was getting rid of a sinus cold that still is hanging in there today for the 9th day, even though it eased up for a few days, it seems to have started all over again. I managed to not miss work last week, nor the big surprise birthday trip for Terry. Although not racing related, our long planned trip to San Jose was to visit with old friends involved in racing and it turned out to be a lot of fun. It was our first trip up there since San Jose Raceway closed four years ago.

We arrived in San Jose around noon on Friday to visit with Trophy Dave and Murial Pusateri. The two fold trip was to get in a visit with them, see their new house, plus get Terry’s b-day present to her. She has wanted one of these for a long time and it was one of those things you put off, until now. It was the only weekend we could work out with both our busy schedules, so when we went to Dave’s brother Ron’s house after lunch, to presumably look at some art work and his slot machine collection, she still had no idea what the surprise was. After Ron showed her some of his large slot machine collection, she caught on that one of them was to be hers. Surprise! Now she can crank her own one arm bandit until she is satisfied right at home. That should save me some money? We celebrated her birthday at the popular Original Joe’s in downtown San Jose.

The rest of the weekend was spent eating, visiting, eating, checking out the beautiful remodeled home, eating and enjoying the time we all spent together. The man who has made all of the Wagtime trophies over the 13 years has been going to few races since San Jose’s dirt track closed. He keeps running his annual Trophy Cup every year, now at Hanford for the 11th annual this coming October, but has found a new hobby for his free time now, hot rods. He always liked hot cars and always owned his share, but when he bought a 29 Model A hot rod two years ago he got the bug to make it even better. He stepped it up by changing to a Jag suspension, adding a one of a kind rear-end, an all chrome undercarriage, a trick radiator and many more major modifications that makes this almost 400 horsepower, Corvette motored, hot rod a special piece.

The ride in it was a special thrill as nobody could keep from smiling and waving as we went by. The sound is just what I like, a deep rumble. It’s red, it’s hot and has it’s own parking slot in the attached three car garage. Next to it sits his second rod, a red four door 31 Model A convertible, which is now Muriel’s favorite ride. It doesn’t have quite the horsepower the other “A” has, but is quick enough with it’s own warmed over chevy power! Work starts this week on the 6 car garage around the other side of the house for the rest of his car collection that includes at least that many other vehicles, thus the reason for the additional garage space needed and the move. Great weekend with those two and I am sorry racing is going away for them, but happy they have found something they both enjoy. The 400 mile, 5 hour trip home was fun as I must have thought I was in his hot rod streaking thru the red snake coming south on highway 5. Amazingly I still got passed a lot!

By now everyone is aware of both sides of the coin in the west coast non wing world and are hopefully making the right decisions on what they want for the future. To continue on as is in SCRA with Barona and Tulare the main tracks, or make a change to the new USAC/CRA which gives them essentially the same tracks to run on, that is the hard question and I’ll leave you to it.

We’ll miss you Gasman!!!!! I wonder if my dream Vette would be as much fun as a hot rod?