Feedback after the win at Lakeside, we can assume, was quite positive.
“That engine is a good engine,” Ron Shaver said of the Ford. “I‘m telling you, it makes good power and it‘s going to shine. Mark my words.”
Shaver has seen just about everything when it comes to making horsepower. His hands-on involvement in racing engines dates to his teens when he worked in his father‘s engine shop. His company, Shaver Racing Engines, was involved every step of the way as today‘s contemporary engines evolved.
In the 1960s, sprint car engines were based on factory blocks. Many races — and track championships — were won with a block and cylinder heads purchased at the local Chevrolet garage.
But as sprint car engines evolved, and specialized builders such as Shaver experimented and learned and developed, custom parts pushed the factory pieces out of the picture.
“To begin with, our engines today aren‘t Chevy engines,” Shaver insists. “I call them that out of habit, but they aren‘t really a Chevrolet engine. It‘s a Chevrolet design from a long time ago, but there isn‘t anything on a modern sprint car engine that comes from Chevrolet.
“The very last part from Chevrolet that was still used was the distributor clamp, up until this year. We went with a different piece, and literally — there isn‘t a part on the engine from an automotive company.
“It‘s very interesting to have Ford come into the sport. It‘s been a good experience so far — obviously, winning a race this early is pretty amazing — but there is a real learning curve. I don‘t care who you are, to come into sprint car racing, you‘re going up against knowledge that has been collected and developed by a lot of different people for 20, 30, 40 years. That‘s not easy to overcome.
“But they‘ll get there, I have no doubt.”
The arrival of Ford has shined a renewed light on how far sprint car engines have come. In some respects, Shaver believes we‘ve reached a point where further progress will be
hard to achieve.
“We‘ve over-lightened the parts on our existing engines, I think,” he said. “I mean, everything we touch, we lighten. And we‘ve got to a point where it isn‘t going to go much farther.
“We have made huge strides with reliability. With Donny‘s existing engine, I think we recently reached 325 races without a break. That‘s impressive. But you reach a point where that reliability is compromised with just the slightest change, because we‘re living on the edge with these lightweight parts.
“The engine today, with oil and water and all hooked up, is about 370 pounds. I‘d guess 20 years ago we would have been around 510 pounds, ready to go, with that same configuration.
“But stop and think: we were making 500 horsepower back then. We‘re at 950 horsepower now. I mean, 950 horsepower. That‘s a real number. That‘s a tremendous amount of power, and here‘s the interesting thing. With 950 horsepower, as soon as you get to the track, you spend all night detuning the engine, because that‘s too much power to hook up to the track. You do everything you can to make it more drivable.
“So, I think we‘ve reached a point with our engines. We‘re not going to get much lighter, and we‘re not going to make much more power. At least I don‘t think we are. We‘ll see.”
You‘d be hard-pressed to find any Chevrolet dollars promoting or supporting sprint car racing these days. It’s logical, because no Chevrolet parts are being purchased and used in the sport.
But the Ford configuration could well be the dawning of a new era for sprint car racing. It‘s possible that Ford will bring promotional clout and dollars that the sport could sorely use.
If Ford can translate sprint car success into selling Ford F-150 trucks, for example, other manufacturers could well follow them here.
Ford, Chevrolet, and Toyota do battle every weekend in NASCAR. It isn‘t a stretch to envision each of those players seeing some benefit to being in sprint car racing as well.
Winning is a powerful elixir, and it inspires great emotion. Ford is excited about their entry into sprint car racing, and they‘ve already had that sweet taste of victory.
Other major players could well follow.