Kevin Kovac's Take Five
Take Five: Carpenter abandons Lucas Oil chase
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In a new feature appearing regularly on DirtonDirt, senior writer Kevin Kovac will offer readers five things worth mentioning from around the Dirt Late Model landscape (index to previous Take Fives):
No. 1: Freddie Carpenter of Parkersburg, W.Va., wanted so dearly to live out his dream of chasing the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series for an entire year. On Thursday, though, the 55-year-old racer and chassis builder gave in to the financial realities of his quixotic quest and announced he’s dropping off the national tour. Calling it “one of the hardest decisions I think I’ve ever had to make,” Carpenter wrote in a Facebook post that he simply couldn’t continue to down the road without running well enough to achieve a semblance of a monetary return. “To want to do something so bad and just not be able to make it happen is a horrible feeling,” he wrote while noting that, as much as he wished it wasn’t, the time demands of running his Kryptonite Chassis business and following the Lucas Oil Series “is virtually impossible.” And he mentioned the financial aspect as well. “It’s been costing an average of ($5,000) a week to follow the tour and some nights only getting back $200,” he wrote. “The stress of trying to keep up with it and not let my fans down is wearing me down and making me miserable to be around.” Carpenter said he’s hopeful of perhaps trying to run the circuit again next year and thanked the series officials and drivers for treating him “like family along the way,” but for the remainder of the season he’s going to concentrate on his usual diet of regional and local events with some Lucas Oil starts at tracks within a few hours of his shop.
No. 2: Carpenter certainly took some hard knocks in his three months as a Lucas Oil Series regular, including during March’s Georgia-Florida Speedweeks finale at Golden Isles Speedway near Brunswick, Ga., when he took a clod of mud to the front of his helmet and was shaken up. He started seven features in 17 attempts with a top finish of 16th on two occasions — March 28 at Brownstown (Ind.) Speedway and April 24 at Georgetown (Del.) Speedway — and ranks 18th in the points standings. The struggles, though, weren’t for naught: he proved that racing against the best drivers in the country raised his level of performance when, on Sunday, he entered a Valvoline American Late Model Iron-Man Series event at West Virginia Motor Speedway in Mineral Wells and finished a strong third in the 40-lap feature.
No. 3: During this week’s FloRacing Night in America live streams, my attention was caught by a voice on a Rocket Chassis commercial that sounded quite familiar. And Rocket co-owner Mark Richards confirmed to me that the ad’s narration was done by the person I thought it was: Bubba Clem, the longtime radio show host and owner of Ocala (Fla.) Speedway.
No. 4: When I spoke with veteran crew chief Robby Allen for my latest Inside Dirt Late Model Racing column about late Hall of Fame driver Larry Moore, we also discussed Moe Defino, the well-known West Virginia speed shop proprietor, car owner and crew chief who, like Moore, passed away on April 23. Allen was very familiar with the 64-year-old Defino, who grew up near Allen’s late father Bobby’s business in Maryland and got his mechanical start working on Bobby Allen’s No. 55 Dirt Late Models. Allen also noted that, when Defino was a teenager, he was given a special job by Allen’s father. “When Moe was 14, 15, 16, he was my babysitter,” Allen said. “They would let him go to the track with them, but he had to watch me. I was probably 8 or 9, and they would give him money so we could eat at the concession stand and then he had to watch me all night so that way nobody had to pay attention to me.”
No. 5: The World of Outlaws hosted a neat event Thursday evening at Hershey Park Stadium in Hershey, Pa.: the Hershey Sprint Car Experience. With the WoO Sprint Cars tour in central Pennsylvania for the week, the circuit joined with its sponsor, the Milton Hershey School, for its annual racing get-together at the historic stadium alongside the Hershey Park amusement park that was free to the public. While the WoO sprint car teams were the featured attraction — the touring drivers were there with their cars — other divisions were featured including midgets, big-block modifieds, quarter-midgets and, of course, Dirt Late Models with the World of Outlaws Late Model Series racing nearby in Pennsylvania next week at Selinsgrove and Bedford speedways. Former WoO champion Rick Eckert of York, Pa., WoO rookie Logan Zarin of Hookstown, Pa., and Bryan Bernheisel of Jonestown, Pa., represented the Dirt Late Model class with their cars on display.
