Seems like only yesterday................

Time Trials - 41 Cars

20 Dennis Rodriguez..........16.895
-6 Eric Gordon.................17.794
47 Rip Williams.................16.696
57 Greg Lovakovich...........18.917
91 Lealand McSpadden......16.342
-4 Terry Shepherd............16.115 Quick Time
-1 Brad Noffsinger............16.969
69 Steve Butler................16.383
98 Verne Sweeney............16.589
57 Ron DiDonato...............16.961
21 Jack Hewitt.................16.237
26 Scott Burns.................18.138
-5 Byron Reed..................17.159
17 Troy Cline...................18.087
-7 Ray Morgan.................16.775
95 Tray House.................16.703 Wall Contact on Lap 2
28 Tom Bigelow................17.828
91 Dave Darland...............17.036
37 Cary Faas...................17.781
25 D.J. Ruth....................18.299
-8 Joe Changos..................18.970
-5 Jac Haudenschild..........17.444
67 Ron Lewis....................17.685
-4 Richard Griffin...............17.718 After Spin on Lap 1
19 Bobby Michnowicz.........18.589
-4 Gus Wathan.................18.354
63 Rusty McClure...............17.641
39 Jeff Walker...................18.362
16 Jerry Nemire.................18.403
63 Mike English..................18.619
17 Ton Elliott....................17.837
59 Mike Kirby.....................18.413
65 Johnny Mackison............19.137
0K Don O'Keefe..................18.721
29 Rocky Hodges................17.967
81 Jon Stanbrough..............18.265
23 Frankie Kerr...................18.090
32 John Tucker...................19.669
75 Jerry Caryer...................18.779
-6 Bill Rose.........................18.299
-8 Greg Staab.....................18.980
-5 Bimbo Atkins....................DNQ

Fast Car Dash - 3 Laps

Won by Lealand McSpadden, followed by Shepherd, Hewitt, and Butler

First Heat

Won by Tony Elliott from the pole followed by Sweeney, Shepherd, Reed, and Rodriguez

Second Heat

Won by Jac Haudenschild from 3rd position, followed by Hodges, Hewitt, and Faas

+3 Car Pileup collected DiDonato, Williams and Hewitt. Hewitt was able to restart.
+Bimbo Atkins DNQ but raced a number 5 in this heat.

Third Heat

Won by Rusty McClure from 3rd position followed by McSpadden, House, Gordon, English, and Noffsinger

Fourth Heat

Won by Steve Butler from 6th spot, followed by Bigelow, Kerr, Rose and Morgan

+Big Time crash in this one. From where I sat it looked like Jerry Caryer nearly took out the flagstand. Required downtime to repair fencing on frontstretch.

Semi-Feature

Won by Rip Williams from the pole followerd by Griffin, Morgan, and Noffsinger.

Feature Race

No.Driver...............Finish

-7 Ray Morgan................11
95 Tray House.................7
47 Rip Williams.................9
98 Verne Sweeney..........10
69 Steve Butler...............4
91 Lealand McSpadden..WINNER
21 Jack Hewitt................6
-4 Terry Shepherd..........16
-1 Brad Noffsinger............8
-5 Byron Reed.................5
-5 Jac Haudenschild........12
63 Rusty McClure.............3
-4 Richard Griffin.............14
37 Cary Faas..................17
-6 Eric Gordon................18
28 Tom Bigelow...............19
17 Tony Elliott................20
29 Rocky Hodges.............13
23 Frankie Kerr.................2
-6 Bill Rose.....................15

+Pretty fair first time back at the Big "E" after a Hewitt slider that didn't quite make it took the Tempe Tornado out of the ballpark on the first night of last year's '91 CRA stop at Eldora.
+Several of these cars had alpha designors in their numbers, i.e. 7M, 5H, 23S, etc. I chose not to include the letter. Does it really matter 9 years later?
+Apologies to drivers whose names I spelled incorrectly or flat out missed them altogether. Also didn't get complete heat and consy finishes, so I gave you what I had. Yet another instance of too much Burger Beer in the FB tanks???
+The "Wild Child" had passed McSpadden with a slide job at one point only to have the yellow fly for a spinner. When it went green he tried it again, cleared Lealand who backed off a tad, but caught the fence resulting in a terrifying series of flips. Basically O.K. but sported a pair of serious red eyes the next day.
+Terry Shepherd also in a big time feature crash on frontstretch which I believe put him on the sidelines for several weeks.
+Frankie Kerr in the Stan Shoff #23 huggypoled from the last row for the entire race to finish second. One of the best going from wing to non-wing that I've seen. Jac was always fast but crashed a lot.
+I chose to post the Friday night (5/1/92) results rather Saturday's because, due mostly to crashes, there were fewer (only 33) cars on night 2.
+On night 2 (Saturday) newbies were Scott Hall in #91, Warren Mockler in #7, Jeff O'Bannion in #21, and Ron Wolfe in #67. A much faster track (heavy rain shower right after I arrived on night 2) had my boy, Richard "The Gas Man" Griffin quick timer at 15.798.
+Nice guy and good buddy Rusty MClure proved that Friday night's 12th to 3rd run was no fluke as he flew Bob Hampshire's #63 from 10th to take the win and an extra 10K of Frank Lewis' bucks for beating all the CRA shoes. He won again the next night at Millstream but found that the 10K bounty was limited to one per customer. McSpadden ran second on night two.
+More crashing on night two had Eric Gordon getting sucked into the wall out of turn two (how many times have we seen that??) starting several high flying endos down the backstretch. Dennis Rodriguez had a bad one on the frontstretch which put him in a Dayton, OH hospital for quite a long time.
+And then it was on to PA.

Marv,

Thanks again for sharing. However, I have a question? You have McSpadden listed as fast time with a lap of 16.342 while Hewitt at 16.237 and Shepherd at 16.115 have quicker laps?

Good catch Mike. I was thinking of the USAC inversion of the top six, forgetting that CRA inverted the top 8.

BTW, I would welcome any corrections to the above driver names. In particular; the first name of #7 driver Morgan, last names of the drivers in #57 (I'm pretty sure Lovakovich is incorrect), #8 (Changos is wrong, I'm certain), and any others. Thank You!

Ray Morgan ??

I remember this race kind of. We were having a pretty good night until the Main Event when Brad Noffsinger and I got involved in that pretty ugly crash on the front stretch. I rembemer the helicopter ride and that was it for about two weeks until I awoke from a coma. I was only 19 when this crash occured so I was lucky to heal at all. I will be at the Chili Bowl again this year racing aboard Scott Morgans #1d. I count everyday as a blessing ever since that crash at Eldora.

#75 Jerry Caryer

I went to quite a few of these races. Took a buddy of mine to a couple. Millstream was colder than all get out. Fish I don't think it was the same guy but I thought there was a guy who while qualifying got squirrley coming out of 4 & went heading straight on into the front stretch wall except the rear dug in & sent him barrell rolling through the front stretch fence just past the flagman stand & ended up in the grass past the bleachers. Was this not during one of the CRA events. Remember the slider gone wrong with Hewitt & McSpadden & Dennis's wreck pretty good. Did'nt they race @ Limaland once too ??

I don't remember which year of the USAC vs CRA tour races at Eldora it was (maybe the first year), but, I was talking with Jack Hewitt after the heat races, and Rip Williams walks up and asks Jack: "Hey Jack, when are they gonna lay down some rubber on the bottom so we can race"

I busted out laughing...

Jack is laughing too, and says "Rip, this ain't California, we don't run around the bottom here. You're gonna have ta' get up by the wall and stand on it"

Rip looks at Jack for a second or two and says "Are you serious?"

Jack says "Yep!"

Rip then says "Well sh*t"...then turns and walks away.

Me and Jack just laughed at him

SCF, I remember an Eldora crash very much like the one you describe which involved Kokomo's Gary Fisher in a yellow #79 sprinter. I'll have to dig out some old programs to find the date and other details. Seems like I recall a relative of Gary (son or grandson??) who once posted here on IOW. He might be the one who requested to be relieved of further IOW aggravation or I might be wrong about any IOW connection. If he's still here he would know as might other IOW members. Anyone??

Gary Fisher drove the Evan's Bottle Shop #79 and his younger brother raced later.