• Tag Archives USAC

  • Last Race of ’12

    Posted on April 25, 2013 9:06 am by Marty Hawkins

    Petaluma Speedway hosted it’s first injected 360 Non-Wing Sprint Car Race on October 13th. The Adobe Cup attracted 18 sprint teams who were informed at the drivers meeting that the track was left dry & slick intentionally to give the regular Spec Sprint competitors more of a chance against the injected cars. Sebastopol’s Geoff Ensign was quick time in the VanLare 5v over Santa Rosa’s, Marty Hawkins, Sparky Howard, Nick Larsen, and Colton Slack. Ensign made quick work of Heat Race #1 as he picked up the win over Jim Richardson. Colton Slack won Heat Race #2 over Klint Simpson, and Billy Aton beat Scotty Dupont to the checkers in Heat Race #3. With no cushion to lean on, the feature event quickly went single file as the beautiful red #32 of Colton Slack took the early lead from his outside front row starting spot. Pole sitter, Billy Aton slid into second as Marty Hawkins worked his way into third when Nick Larsen encountered troubles early. Running in fourth place, Sparky Howard felt the pressure of teammate Geoff Ensign all race long, as Ensign repeatedly tried the outside of turns 1 & 2 on every restart. Throughout the race Hawkins pulled to the inside of Aton twice coming off turn four but didn’t have enough to complete the pass. With about 6 laps to go Colton Slack appeared to hook the inside berm and turned around, handing the lead to Aton. On the final restart Aton brought em’ down slow and stacked the field behind him coming off turn four. Geoff Ensign used it to his advantage as he got alongside Howard and passed him going into turn one, but with only a few laps left, third Petaluma Speedwaywas as far as he could get. Billy Aton took the win with 19 year old Marty Hawkins in second and Ensign in third. It didn’t sound like any of the three drivers were very happy with the track, as they all made comments in their trackside interviews. Aton was happy to be in victory lane. Marty Hawkins said he flew home from Southern California (where he is a junior in college) just to race in Petaluma. He said he wished they raced more injected non-wing shows just 15 minutes from home. All in all, it was a good night of racing and if there had been a little cushion, Ensign would have surely made it a three car battle to the end.

    -David Bell, Sprint Spat Assoc. XXIX 2012, Original Post (http://www.hoseheadforums.com/forum.cfm?ThreadID=72301#thread366245)

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  • Goodbye for now, but one last thing…

    Posted on September 8, 2012 9:57 pm by Marty Hawkins

    Labor day weekend marked the last race I would run before headed off to start another chapter in my life, college. Both my Dad and I worked our tails off and was able to put two complete cars together, with the help of borrowed parts from Jimmy VanLare. Unfortunately, it was no Cinderella Story as our weekend was plagued with bad luck. Continue reading →

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  • CRA at Ocean

    Posted on June 23, 2012 4:22 pm by Marty Hawkins

    After a disappointing DNF at Hanford I was ready to get back to Ocean Speedway where we managed to get a 5th earlier in the year. Running again with CRA, only this time we kept the 360 in, unfortunately do mainly to time. Either way, we were ready. We arrived in Watsonville where is was rather cold, and the track was looking fairly decent. In hot laps the car felt good and I was anticipating a good night. However, the folks at Ocean had different thoughts. After hot laps they went out with tractors and scrapped the cushion off. The result was not surprising. Slow laps on a slick track. Unfortunately for Dustin Baxter, who had his first run in a 410, was not prepared for the changes that had been made to the track. Heading out early he hauled the car into turn three, where it managed to slide all the way to the wall, and then proceeded to launch out of the park. Thankfully Dustin was alright, but wasn’t able to get the car back together. After qualifying the track prep again went out and worked on the track for a good half hour. Putting the blade on it and ripping it up, while putting some water on. Being in heat one we weren’t ready for the changes. We qualified 10th which put us in the third row of our heat, and pretty much just stayed there to finish 7th. I wasn’t very excited about not getting the car to go forward, but thankfully we did not have to run a semi. We lined up 12th for the main, but once again wasn’t ready for what the track had to offer. The top was nothing to get a hold of, and my set-up made the bottom feel like a row boat in the ocean. I tried every line I could think of but still ended up in 14th. Needless to say I was frustrated. Instead of showing up to race against the CRA group, we showed up to race Ocean Speedway. It might have got us this time, but I wont let that happen again.

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  • Back to 360′s At Hanford

    Posted on June 23, 2012 4:03 pm by Marty Hawkins

    Well, we went back to Hanford again. This time with the West Coast 360 group. I was hoping we would be back up to speed with the 360 group, but after qualifying 15th out of 19 that would prove to be trivial. We started in the front row of our heat and since everyone was to make the main event we figured we would test out some set ups. We went from first to fourth in our heat and me being the inexperienced mechanic that I am, really didn’t know what to do to make the car go forward. So what does everyone do when they don’t know the answer? You guess! And in terms of racing and wanting to be competitive, we guessed pretty aggressively. Unfortunately all our guessing was for not. The track was slick and most people where running over each other on the bottom. On lap 5 some cars got bottled up in front of me. In an attempt to avoid it I ended up clipping the left front tire off someone else’s car and knocked the front end out. It’s a bummer that the only time I got to test out the set up was under yellow and in heavy traffic. It would have been interesting to see what the car would have done in open air. Nevertheless, we got it all put back together, loaded it up and headed home.

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  • Hanford USAC/CRA May 19th

    Posted on June 23, 2012 3:44 pm by Marty Hawkins

    We haven’t raced with the CRA boys since the Gold Cup in Chico last year, so we were excited to bolt in the 410 and head to Hanford. Our great friend and sponsor, Ron Nicholson had our 410 freshened up at Bailey Bros. last year and we are still trying to figure out how to get all that horsepower to the ground. We didn’t qualify very well and finished 6th in our heat as the car just seemed loose. The CRA guys don’t have any trouble getting it to the ground. They run cockpit adjustable shocks on the car that can cost around $2000, and they know how to tune em’ during a race. We have one cockpit adjustable shock on the left rear, but our biggest struggle was once again tires. While most guys were on the wider and softer HTW right rear tire, we still had the harder DT3 that CRA ran last year and we didn’t have $500 for a couple new tires. We must’ve changed the gear 4 times throughout the night in an attempt to stop the wheel spin. After throwing some drastic stuff at our set-up, our pal Steve Ostling (USAC official and former New Mexico Sprint Car Champion) made a deal with Bruce Bromme for a nice used tire. After working out the trade details, we mounted it up. I started 14th and right away could feel the difference. We had a long green flag run and I worked my way to 8th before the yellow came out for a car that spun. The yellow seemed to last a long time and I think the tire cooled and sealed over, because once we went back to green, I just couldn’t get a hold of the top like I was earlier. I drifted over turn two and lost a few spots and had a great battle with Rusty Carlisle. At the end, I finished 11th and was really happy with how well our 410 ran. We want to congratulate Danny Faria who got his first CRA win in a commanding drive….Nice job! We also want to Thank Ron Nicholson and The Toiyabe Group once again for the motor work and all the support they have given us over the years! Thanks to Jimmy VanLare at VanLare Steering Repair for their support as well! Finally we want to Thank Steve-O and the Ron Chaffin gang for the tire! OH YA…and THANK YOU Grandpa for the use of your truck! It takes a lot of great people to keep us racing, and we can’t thank them enough.

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  • “Chris & Brian Faria Memorial” May 11th & 12th

    Posted on June 23, 2012 3:32 pm by Marty Hawkins

    Mom covered for us at the shop while we took Friday off for the Tulare Thunderbowl and two nights of USAC West Coast 360 racing. The race is in memory of two of the Faria brothers, and it’s the first time we’ve been able to make this race and show some support for our good friend, Danny Faria and his family. Marty qualified 8th out of a stout field of 28 cars, but then things just got slicker and slicker. Starting deep in his heat, Marty would only get to 5th and would need to run the semi in order to make the main event. He would finish 2nd in the Semi, but wore a new left rear tire half way out doing it. We made some more changes to the car and lined up for the main. Marty tried every line on the track, from rubbing the fence, to hooking the berm. At the end of the show, he had dropped to 17th and wasn’t happy. The track was so slick and dusty and he just couldn’t get a hold of anything. After the race, our new friend Johnny Vermeer came over and dropped off a new right rear tire for Sunday night.
    Sunday was hot while Marty washed his car and did his regular maintenance routine. Johnny showed up with more help in the way of some tire bleeders to keep the pressures down as the tires get hot. Qualifying didn’t go as well, ending up 19th out of 33 cars, but he did transfer straight out of the heat race and that meant we didn’t need to wear out any tires in the semi. Lining up deep in the main event, Marty was patient as he raced in heavy traffic and worked his way into the top ten and passed about 5 cars in the last five laps to bring the Blakeley Landscaping maxim home in 7th place. New tires made all the difference and Marty felt pretty good after this one. We don’t get alot of double headers and it was nice to get a second night and a second chance to get things right.
    We’d like to Thank Johnny Vermeer and his boys for coming by and helping us out. We really appreciate their generosity. Thanks to all the folks who helped make the Faria Memorial a great event. Thanks to the volunteers from KWS who put on the breakfast Sunday morning (Marty and I don’t eat to well when were gone…so Thank You). We also want to Thank Donny Austin at Nor Cal Drive-line and Johnny Franklin’s Driveline Service, along with Frank Giammona at Santa Rosa Auto Parts. These are just some of the wonderful folks that make racing possible for us.

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  • Two shows, One night at Hanford 7/16/11

    Posted on July 20, 2011 12:43 pm by Marty Hawkins

    Earlier in the year we left Hanford in the rain after securing a feature starting spot in our heat race. So after a few weeks off and some promo time at the fair and parade over the 4th in Calistoga, Marty was back on track in Hanford for two main events in one night. I had a feeling they were going to try and keep the track wet with the extra main event on the schedule and I was right. The track was super wet and heavy. Thank God Kim and the younger boys came along, otherwise we would’ve never been able to keep the car clean. We must have removed over 100 lbs. of mud every time that car came off the track. Continue reading →

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  • Western Classic Series at Ocean Speedway and Santa Maria.

    Posted on June 22, 2011 12:04 pm by Marty Hawkins

    After a couple of weeks off, we headed to the central coast for a double header of USAC sprint car racing. Friday night in Watsonville was cold and damp. It started out as the heaviest track we’ve run all year. The thick cushion sent a couple cars flipping in qualifying and a few more throughout the night. Our fresh Bailey 410 ran perfect but still caused us problems. The lighter, stronger motor is hard to balance between pulling wheelies and just screaming the rear tires. Gear choice would be our downfall as we started a bit too low and as the track slicked off, Marty could hardly touch the throttle. We did manage to balance it better by nights end and he came from 24th to finish 16th.
    The next morning we awoke to a phone call that Marty’s younger brother, Cavin might have broken his collar bone at camp. So while mom headed back home, we pushed on to Santa Maria. Marty enjoys racing at Santa Maria. It’s a wide racy track, and usually has two grooves. The set-up was closer but we still went backwards in the heat. After five straight races of transferring out of our heat directly to the main, we were now headed to our third straight Semi. We won our heat when we ran the 360 against these same guys, and now we are struggling with our 410. If that wasn’t enough, we found that the front exhaust header tube on the left side had broken clean off of the collector, and when we changed the headers, the pitman arm on the steering box didn’t clear the larger mufflers. Danny Faria loaned us a shorter arm and we got it all back together in time. With the shorter steering arm, Marty would have to adjust to turning the wheel further. He started deep in the Semi and Thank God he went forward. The car looked good and after passing a few cars for open track, he was catching the car front of him. Unfortunately the race went green all the way and he ran out of laps. We tagged the back of the feature due to a provisional and with a full load of fuel and even more changes to the chassis, Marty took off. He avoided a few pile-ups throughout the night and came from the back to finish in 16th again. Not a great weekend. We are quickly gaining respect for the teams that have their cars dialed in on a regular basis, because compared to the 360, this 410 thing is a sensitive balancing act. We never had to touch the motor all weekend, so that makes things much nicer when it’s only the two of us on the road. And since I am the only guy standing in the infield during the race with all the spare parts in case of an accident, I do appreciate having a kid who uses his head and doesn’t run over people.
    Our next race on the schedule is Hanford on July 16th with the 360. Marty is already locked into the first main event (a make-up race from earlier this year) and then we’ll get to run a whole second program on the same day. We are feeling pretty good about our 360 program as we’ve been good once we get into a race. The car is competitive and Marty is comfortable hauling it in. We do need some help in the pits and an experienced crew-chief with our 410 deal would be a great help, even if only for a couple of weeks. A good crew chief isn’t hard to find if you have enough cash. Luckily we have had some great guys offer to give us a hand with the set-up, so we’ll most likely take them up on that here in the near future. As always we couldn’t even think about racing without all the help from our great sponsors, The Toiyabe Group, Blakeley Landscaping, Santa Rosa Auto Parts, The Barricade Company, VanLare Steering Repair, HMS Airless Repair, Palisades Ranch, Carmichael Auto Service, SoCal Performance, and Johnny Franklin’s Driveline & Hitch Repair.

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  • Pombo/Sargent Classic in Tulare

    Posted on May 19, 2011 10:26 pm by Marty Hawkins

    I grew up at the sprint car races and have seen some really great battles over the years. This may sound silly, but to me, a great sprint race is like watching ice skating on steroids. It flows from one end to the other, fast, smooth and on the edge. You watch as time runs out knowing that someone will try a risky move near the end. Sometimes things go wrong and parts fly, and sometimes they make it look so easy as they pull off the pass for the victory. You watch intensely wondering when it will happen and how it will go. I’ve seen a bunch of these kinds of races and they are the best. Last weekend I actually watched my son in such a race. Knowing he is only 18, with limited experience in his sprint car kept my stomach in knots. He has been getting better and better and just two weeks ago pulled off his first heat race win. He started on the front row of that one and afterward, Peter Murphy took the time to come over and congratulate him. Peter was watching from the pits and went on to win the feature that night. This week Marty out-qualified Peter and half the field, then lined up behind Peter on the second row of the heat. At the drop of the green Marty pulled alongside Peter down the back-chute, but Murphy took the lead going into turn three. Then Peter tried the top of turn one and Marty almost got him again. Marty shadowed the leader for 8 laps and at times they were running so close to each other as they pitched it into turn one that I held my breath. Then with 2 laps to go, Marty slid his Schnee chassis in just above Murphy, turned it downhill, and drove under him off of turn two and passed him down the back-chute. He took the white flag and had a half straight away lead at the checkers. It was smooth and patient and calculated. IT WAS AWESOME! Afterward Peter Murphy came over and said (in his cool Australian accent) “Hey mate, if I come over and tell your kid he did a great job, I don’t think he should be allowed to pass me the very next time we race”. He was only kidding of course and a great sport to come over again.

    Like I said, Marty did a much better job in qualifying. He was 12th out of 24 cars and he would’ve started on the front row of the feature if he was just one car faster. That’s OK because the track was so slick in the feature that we ended up going backwards. Marty was upset that he finished 15th (understandable), but I wasn’t. Unlike the last time we raced Tulare, Marty tried every line on the track. He ran the top (and even bounced off the wall once), the middle and the bottom. Greg Alexander, who is an accomplished driver, was frustrated as well since he started on the pole and ended up 5th. He said he couldn’t get a hold of anything consistent. I told Marty that I’m glad we didn’t start on the front row, because we need a little more time to get the set-up right. Marty learned a bunch by running all over the track. He is getting his short game down pretty good in the heats and even had a good qualifying night, so we are consistently getting better and once again rolled it into the trailer in one piece. I don’t think we have ever raced 4 weeks in a row, and this coming weekend in Hanford will be our 4th. Then thanks to our wonderful sponsor and friends at The Toiyabe Group, we will run the following weekend at Calistoga with the wing and our fresh Bailey Bros 410. Marty is a little nervous about running with the wing because he has been getting so comfortable wingless. He really loves racing in Calistoga. I think he’ll do fine.

    We would like to thank the great sponsors of the USAC West Coast 360 Series including DJ Safety, Saldana Racing Products and Circle Track Performance for the great contingency prizes they gave us for the heat race wins. We also want to thank Ted Surber for his support and Russ Westerskov for showing up in Tulare and lending us a hand in the pits. We’ve been having a great time hanging out with Danny Faria and are kind of sad that we’ll be towing home after Hanford this weekend.

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  • The Fun Continues, Our 360 vs. CRA

    Posted on May 12, 2011 9:55 pm by Marty Hawkins

    We headed back to the central valley this weekend for our first race with the USAC/CRA 410 guys. Uncle Greg came along and made the drive much nicer in his new Ford truck. We got to Danny Faria’s shop around midnight and were up first thing in the morning to finish getting the car ready. We hadn’t gotten our 410 back yet, so we were giving it our best with the 360. Danny worked all day on the family farm and let us have full use of his shop. The Majority of the work was done last week, so we mostly mounted tires, set the chassis and played with the bigger fuel tank. Once we were loaded, we hooked up with Butch Brazil and it was off to Hanford.

    There were 24 sprint cars and only three of us had a 360 under the hood. The car felt great in qualifying, but it just wouldn’t pull very hard off of turn four which still had moisture. We started on the pole of heat two, with the likes of Super Ricky Gaunt, Greg Bragg in the Moose Mobile, both the Williams boys and The Bullet, Blake Miller all breathing down my neck. The heat went non stop for 10 laps. I had one of the Williams poking his nose under me and The Bullet on the outside. I was hoping just to finish with a transfer position, but then I started driving in a little lower and the car hooked up really nice. I pulled away just enough to win my first CRA heat race. I have to say that since we have raced with these folks so much over the past couple of years, it was pretty special to finally pull off a heat win. I have a lot of respect for these teams.

    The good news was, we transferred straight to the feature. The bad news, we had to start dead last. Knowing our odds of pulling off anything spectacular against these guys in the main (we already did that in the heat), we were ready to learn as much as we could since we are coming back here in a couple weeks with the 360 bunch. We all talked things over about how to hook up the car, but still keep it drivable in a pack. The track had been getting slicker as the night went on, so we killed stagger, tucked in the wheels and went to staging.

    At the drop of the green, everyone in front of me went to the bottom and had to use the brakes to stay off of the car ahead of them, so I went to the middle and drove around 4 cars before the yellow came out on lap two. Then I was able to pick up about another 5 spots before the next yellow on lap 8. I was feeling pretty good and our Schnee chassis was going wherever I pointed it. As long as we kept things in a pack, I could keep up and even drive by some of the more powerful cars. Then we had a string of long green flag laps and a few of the veterans were able to get back by me. The car ran great and we were able to hold onto a 14th place finish. All in all we were pretty happy to have another successful weekend. Our gracious host however didn’t have as much fun. You would think that a guy who opens his home and his shop to people he hardly knows, then works all day before heading to the track, would have a little karma on his side. Danny lost his brakes in the lap two incident when another car ran over him. He kept it going and drove from his 8th place staring position, past Spencer, and past Kruseman to take the lead (WITH NO BRAKES). He led for 12 laps lifting the throttle pedal to choke the motor down and toggling the kill switch while steering with one hand. On lap 26 while battling with multi-time USAC National Champion, Bud Kaeding, he lost the handle and spun it in turn four. Kaeding went on to win the race, coming from the back after his lap 2 altercation, while Danny watched the last 4 laps from the pits. It just didn’t seem right, and yet when the fans came down out of the stands, Danny put on a smile and was his normal, upbeat self. I guess if we race long enough, we’ll have nights like that too. I hope he has more luck next week at Tulare (while I follow him right to the front).

    Since we were the highest finishing 360, we won a $200 Bonus and 20 gallons of fuel (Thank you USAC/CRA and Steve Howard at SoCal Performance). We also want to Thank Danny, Butch and Uncle Greg for making the weekend so much fun. We are looking forward to heading back to Tulare this weekend and pulling off a great finish for our wonderful sponsors, The Toiyabe Group, Blakeley Landscaping, Santa Rosa Auto Parts, HMS Airless Repair, Carmichael Auto Service, The Barricade Company,  Ted Surber and Palisades Ranch, VanLare Steering Repair, and Johnny Franklin’s Driveline & Hitch Service.

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