At Gas city Friday night Billy Puterbaugh Jr. was showing some of us
the bruise on his shoulder from being hit by a rock at LPS.
His mother had the rock in a big Zip lock bag.
You had to see it to believe it. It was bigger than a brick.
I hope Billy looks at this post and post a picture along
with story behind the ROCK.

Mark Fritz

Did he smmmmmmeeeeeeeeeeeellllllllllllllllllllllllllllll what THE ROCK was cooking? j/k, glad Billy wasn't hurt seriously, could have been like Massa if was a few inches a different direction.....

It's obvious the Billy Jr. is a tough guy just like his DAD!!!!!!!!!!!!

Billy showed me the rock on Saturday night and I was pretty amazed. It had to be every bit of five pounds. Not sure where it came from exactly because it wasn't physically visible when I was out in the infield looking at the track. Only thing I can think of is that he may have gotten drug back onto the track somehow. But I'm truly glad he wasn't more seriously hurt. I think that JackSlash might have an interview posted soon on the site. They were interviewing Billy that night.

When i washed the car this morning i had a rock the size of a tennis ball in the floor, does anyboby remember a couple year's back when they brought in the new dirt and it was full of hugh rocks???? maybe all the grading they are doing is bringing all the rocks back to the surface??? JMO!!!:34;

I will post a picture of the rock when i get it back. Having it made into a trophy lol

I remember when there was a rumor of an underground spring in turn 1 @ 2 that somebody put rock and clay in to stop the bleeding on the track. Possibily MR. SPIKER has done so much grading that he has hit these and brought them to the surface and they are now a risk.

Here is a link to the clip we shot last weekend of Billy and his big rock!

http://vimeo.com/6088055

That's is really wild. I got hit at Terre Haute one time and it hit my visor so hard that it flipped my shield up. I'm sure many guys have stories.

The really scary part of this, when I was a young kid my parents took our sprinter to Eldora every Saturday night during the late 1960's and into the mid 1970's. I saw Don Hewitt lose his eye one night, I'm pretty sure driving the Nichols Brothers 31 car.

After that Dad made a piece that attached to the front hoop on the car. He had made it as a rock deflector. After running Eldora, you could see the damage done to that metal guard. Hal Minyard drove our car back then and still drove with an open face helmet. I bet Don was wearing an open face helmet the night he lost his eye.

I may be wrong on this one, and please correct me if I'am, but didn't Jim Elliott (Tony's Dad) lose an eye? That was many moons ago, but I recall we were at some new track or some place that we had not ever run before when Jim lost his eye. Jim was a great racer just like Tony.

George Wilkins

If I remember correctly, Jim Elliott lost his eye at Bryan, Ohio. Jim was an excellent racer. I saw him win many a race in Paul Hazen's car back in the day at Warsaw Speedway.
On another note, when I ran Salem (yes a paved track) this year with HOSS, at the start of the feature, we all went sailing into turn one and something flew up and hit me dead center, just above my shield. I saw stars! Then over my radio, I heard "caution, caution" (unrelated). The lights had gone out in turn one and two.
They then pulled the red flag so they could fix the lights. While under red, I was feeling around in the cockpit trying to find what hit me. I couldn't find it. When we restarted, I pushed on the throttle and it only went half way. (although some might say I was at half throttle all night!) I made one lap and pulled in. When I got out of the car, I looked to see why the throttle wouldn't open and there was a big piece of asphalt under the throttle pedal.
When we used to run with the USCS down south, they always mandated rock screens even on the pavement. I always laughed about it........until now.

Tom Paterson