MARINA DEL REY, Calif. – There were neither alarm clocks nor urges to build on his rising sprint car career this past week, only good food chains and ongoing luxuries of the greater Los Angeles area to impel Anthony Macri.
Two weeks remain in the 22-year-old’s sweetest season to date, and his recent Trophy Cup title push in Tulare, Calif., versus the state’s homegrown racers might be the figurative cherry atop it all.
“We decided to make a little vacation out of it,” Macri said during a phone interview last week, right after he and his girlfriend ate breakfast on the coast of Marina del Rey. “Oh yeah, I’m enjoying it.”
Last year, moments of inspiration pulled Macri along in what ended up as a breakout 10-win season. From 2016 to ‘19, he won just four times.
The fifth year was always the ultimate barometer. The late Greg Hodnett, Macri’s childhood hero, insistently reminded the young racer it takes roughly five years to be comfortable in 900-horsepower winged sprint cars.
If year five doled inspiration, then year six is underscored by revelation.
Macri went from an outcast on short-tracks (re: failed to qualify for both Pennsylvania Speedweek races at Lincoln Speedway in 2020) to contending for short-track wins with the World of Outlaws NOS Energy Sprint Car Series.
Much of his dissatisfaction on bullring configurations motivated him to wake up at 6 a.m. and start working out of his spacious race shop on the property of his Dillsburg, Pa., home.
That segued into a realized dream of racing in the Knoxville Nationals at Iowa’s Knoxville Raceway in August. He’s leveled up since.
Five of Macri’s 11 wins have come over the past three months. Two unfolded at Pennsylvania’s Williams Grove Speedway, the track that always troubled Macri.
In 21 races since Knoxville, he’s finished in the top five 16 times and has, at times, looked unstoppable in Central Pennsylvania. For good measure, he locked up the Central Pennsylvania points championship and launched his own website last week.
“On the drive down here, it hit me: what we accomplished, how much racing, what we’ve really done,” Macri said. “When talking to guys out here [in California], they only run 30 races a year and I think I’m up to 88 or something now.”
Macri’s biggest revelation came versus Toyota Racing Development prodigy and eventual Trophy Cup winner Buddy Kofoid on the event’s opening night.
He powered to second along the top side of the short-track and stared down Kofoid until his car started running out of fuel.
Macri finished seventh overall in the mini series points, but going into the Saturday finale, he sat third in the running, within reach of the title aboard Kyle Hirst’s No. 94.
“I don’t want to toot my own horn, but it’s pretty badass to hop in their car and run second to Buddy Kofoid,” said Macri, who held on to finish second on opening night. “He runs in California and he’s obviously one of the next up and coming kids.”
Some of those words imply that Macri, too, thinks he belongs in the up-and-coming category, and beyond the limits of Pennsylvania.
“I hope some bigger car owners see I can step out of Pennsylvania and kind of adapt, and not only adapt but I can race smaller race tracks, that I’m not just good on half-miles,” Macri said. “I think we proved that in the last race at Lincoln when we went 10th to third and came out here and had some success.”
Nineteen of Macri’s 20 wins in the 410 division have been on half-mile circuits since last year.
“I hate being called a one-track wonder, a big-track wonder, no good at small tracks,” Macri said. “That stuff really gets to me.
“If there’s anything from this weekend,” Macri started, “I hope that’s one takeaway people can get.”
Macri has two opportunities left this year: the United Racing Club event Nov. 6 at New Jersey’s Bridgeport Motorsports Park and the Sprint Showdown on Nov. 13 at Pennsylvania’s BAPS Motor Speedway.
He’ll be under the influence of another revelation whenever he’s done with his California indulgence.
“These guys definitely race harder [in California],” Macri said. “Back in PA, nobody really … I don’t want to say nobody is aggressive, but out here, they’re pretty aggressive. They’re going 100 percent first lap in hot laps.
“I had to change my driving style, get more aggressive, get on their level in a way,” Macri added.
“If they’re aggressive and I’m not, then I’m going to be going backwards,” Macri said. “Definitely had to get up on the wheel, be aggressive and make some moves that back home I probably wouldn’t make.
“But to be honest with you,” Macri started, “I’ve had some pretty good Mexican food … I’m on vacation … and I don’t think about racing while I’m out here.”