Editor’s Note: In a nod to our 91 years of history, each week SPEED SPORT will look back at the top stories from 15, 30 and 60 years ago as told in the pages of National Speed Sport News.
15 Years Ago — 2010
News: O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis and United States Auto Club officials have announced that USAC Thursday Night Thunder will return to the lightning fast oval next summer.
The series will run monthly from May through October and will feature the USAC Sprint Car Series exclusively. The announcement was made at the Performance Racing Trade Show in Orlando.
USAC Thursday Night Thunder is an iconic franchise in the history of open-wheel racing and in the mid-1990s was a “can’t miss” event for racers and race fans across the Midwest.
“Fans of open-wheel racing have long requested that USAC Thursday Night Thunder return to the O’Reilly Raceway Park schedule of events,” said Kurt Johnson, director of racing and operations at O’Reilly Raceway Park. “As home to 292 USAC races since 1961 we believe these races will be a tremendous addition to the 2011 oval schedule and will allow fans to take in great racing during the course of the summer.”
The Thursday Night Thunder races will be May 12, June 16, July 7, August 18, Sept 8 and Oct. 13.
USAC will be separating its sprint car schedule next season with the National Sprint Car Series contested completely on dirt tracks. A pavement only sprint-car series consisting of approximately 10 events will include the six races at ORP’s .686-mile asphalt oval.
While the original Thursday Night Thunder included television on ESPN, no television package has been announced for the reincarnation of the series.
Winners: Keith Rocco was crowned NASCAR Whelen All-American Series champion in grand style as the annual banquet for NASCAR weekly racing was held for the first time at the Crown Ballroom located adjacent to the NASCAR Hall of Fame at the Charlotte Convention Center.
Rocco made repeated trips to the stage during the evening. He was honored as Connecticut state champion and track champion at Stafford (Conn.) Motor Speedway and Waterford (Conn.) Speedway, and finally as National champion, receiving his trophy from Whelen representative Phil Kurze and the traditional champion’s ring from NASCAR President Mike Helton.
“I was at this banquet 9 years ago working as a crew member and Teddy Christopher won the championship,” Rocco said. ”I wondered if anyone from the Northeast would ever win the national championship again. Little did I know it would be me.”
A second-generation driver from Wallingford. Conn., the 25-year-old Rocco raced two cars to the national championship and both of his owners. John Rufrano and Mark Pane were recognized with the 2010 Lincoln Electric Car Owner Award.
“My father didn’t buy us everything to go racing,” said Rocco. who won 21 times and added 39 top fives and 50 top-10 finishes in only 53 starts. “He taught us how to do it and gave us the knowledge to do it.”
30 Years Ago — 1995
News: Following its stated objective to lower the cost of Indy car racing, the Indy Racing League announced specifications for a production-based engine to replace the current high-tech turbo units, which will be mandatory beginning Jan. 1, 1997.
The details of the doubleoverhead cam, non-turbo, 4-liter, 4-valve V-8 engine, first reported in these pages, have been widely circulated throughout the auto and racing community. Several auto makers, notably General Motors, Nissan, Ford, BMW and Audi, have adaptable units.
Last week, Oldsmobile Division General Manager John Rock confirmed his company’s Aurora engine would be made available to IRL competitors. Ford is expected to follow suit, as is Nissan.
“The engine will be production-based derivatives of powerplants found in today’s pleasure cars,” said Jack Long, the IRL’s executive director.
Contrasting the million dollar annual leases required for a single team’s engines, which deliver 750-850 horsepower, the 650-700-horsepower IRL unit is expected to have a price tag around $75 ,000.
“What we’ve said all along is that we can have this kind of engine, which will allow us to see speeds of 210-215 mph at Indianapolis, for anywhere from $60,000 to $75,000,” Long told this newspaper Friday. Specifications call for a limit of 10,500 rpm for the methanol-burning engines.
“I really don’t see where it’s going to be all that much of a problem,” Long said. “Our cars are light, they cut the air pretty well, and the aerodynamics will help make up for some decreased horsepower.”
Winners: A little more than a month after winning the NASCAR Winston Cup championship, 24-year-old Jeff Gordon has been voted the Driver of the Year by a panel of 12 motorsports journalists.
Gordon earned 11 of 12 first-place votes and easily outdistanced PPG Indy Car World Series champion Jacques Villeneuve, also 24, for the honor.
The ninth NASCAR driver to capture the award, Gordon won both the first- and third quarter balloting, while Villeneuve and Dale Earnhardt won the other two quarter ballots.
Gordon is easily the youngest driver to win the award in its 29-year history. Gordon is the second consecutive NASCAR driver to win the award as Earnhardt took the honor last year.
In racing to the championship in his third season of Winston Cup racing, Gordon won seven races and eight poles, while finishing 17 times in the top five. He also won the Winston Select all-star race.
Gordon, who drives Rick Hendrick’s DuPont Chevrolets, was excited about the award.
“I’m very excited to win, as this has been a great year of winning championships and now the Driver of the Year. It’s the icing on the cake and I’m very happy and very proud,” Gordon said.
60 Years Ago— 1965
News: The first $100,000 purse in the history of road racing through the world will be awarded at the Grand Prix of the United States Oct. 5 at Watkins Glen, N.Y.
Winner of the Formula 1 race, eighth of the nine world championship Grand Prix events of 1966, will receive $20,000 with the runner-up taking home $10,000.
Prize money will be paid to all starting drivers, the last-place car earning a minimum or $2,800 or 1,000 English Pounds.
Announcements of the unprecedented $102,400 guaranteed purse was made by Cameron
Argetsinger, executive director of the non-profit Watkins Glen Grand Prix Corp., organizers of the Grand Prix of the United States for the sixth consecutive year.
“This record-breaking purse should further establish the U. S. Grand Prix as one of the foremost sporting spectacles in American and throughout the world,” Argetsingcr stated. “The new prize money schedule or the U. S. GP should accomplish several objectives. First, the purse will elevate the race to among the top four auto contests, both road and closed oval, in guaranteed prize money. Secondly, the $102 ,100 purse will lend a new perspective to the prominence of Formula 1 Grand Prix racing in this country and abroad.
“Thirdly, a 400% increase in the winner’s purse should create the keenest competition of any road race ever staged. Fourthly, it seems appropriate that such an unprecedented purse be originated with the start of the new powerful three-liter Formula in 1968.”
The 1.5-liter formula for Grand Prix cars ended in 1965 after a five-year reign.
Winners: A standing room only crowd showed up Saturday night at the Oakland Exposition Building to watch the second of 14 indoor race meets put on by the BCRA midgets.
It was another night of wild action and c lose wheel to wheel racing with three more drivers joining the Upside Down Club.
Chuck Booth and Charlie Booth are not related but they pulled a brother act in the semi when both got on their heads in separate accidents.
Then Dave Strickland dumped in the main event. After the car was righted a fire started from spilled fuel but was quickly put out with all three drivers escaping injury.
Defending champ, Dick Atkins, put the Pastana Offy into the winner’s circle when he won the 30-lap main event in a close finish over Friday’s winner Dee Hileman, Tommy Copp and Mike McGreevy.
Strickland led the first two laps from the pole. On lap two, Rick Henderson spun while second after he bounced into Strickland causing a four-car pileup. Starting the third lap. Strickland spun leading s tarting a 10-car wreck with Atkins taking the lead.
After taking the green starting lap four, Strickland flipped in the first tum with Lloyd Nygren driving over Copp as everybody hit their brakes when the red flag came out. Strickland
re-entered the race after a quick by the doctor but spun on lap 4 and 6 as the frontend was probably bent up from the flip.
Copp got second from Hileman on one of the starts but on lap 24 after Bob DeJong spun, Hileman regained second when Copp couldn’t squeeze into second from the outside. On a trial basis, a change will be made this week to speed up the program with the heat races going back to single file starts after the first restart.
Atkins ran out the final laps of the main with Hileman’s second place keeping him in first place in the standings. Copp and McGreevy both came from the last row for the best passing jobs of the main.
