Team MRT’s Zane won a crucial race in his bid to win the 1997 AHORA SuperStock Championship on the ultra fast and smooth BuckTrax with a convincing win over his teammate Mark. Championship contenders from Team Banta and Right Stuff ran into numerous problems preventing them from closing up in the points. With the series pass the halfway point every consi, last chance and main position is going to take even more importance. With a record setting 15 entries it was going to be an interesting nite and shows that HO racing is doing well. It was great seeing longtime friend and racer Pete Vespender who surprised a few people with a superb drive to make the main. This was very impressive considering it has been 6 YEARS since he last drove! Pete also show a few racers that isn’t necessary that you have the fastest car but that you drive consistent and not make mistakes. Just the same old Pete who won several Pro Modified races back in the 80s!
Qualifying was indicative of who had the track dialed as Zane cracked a 3.059. I’m surprised that we haven’t dipped into the 2’s on the BuckTrax. Zane is an interesting case study of a slot car racer. It is a common known fact that when we go out of state Zane always brings home wood either a 1st or 2nd place. This year at the SCHOR SpringNats he had a great chance to win the Tomy SuperStock race until a body problem in the final segment dropped him to 2nd. Even then he almost caught the winner! But for a long time he wasn’t winning in the AHORA SuperStock races. But he is on a roll now having won 2 of the 5 races, making the main in all 5 and currently leading the points. One thing I have noticed that in the past he would wait in practice till you came alongside and then he would race you. I almost always go slowly when someone does that to make them think they are fast. In fact several times I told Zane I was doing it but he kept racing me in practice. Sure enough come race time if was a different situation. He would also crash in the race because he would race a better handling car and fall laps behind.
But that is not the Zane we see now. This guy is hooked up extremely well with his LifeLike. I haven’t even seen a LifeLike as fast as his even at the National Championships. What is really great about that he is very willing to tell you how he sets his cars up as he did to several interested people. He isn’t racing me anymore in practice (guess I’m not fast enough!) and when we were side by side in the main fighting for the lead, he just wouldn’t crash no matter how hard I tried. Except for hooking up wrong a few times in the series I think his racing has been the best I’ve ever seen him do. With the way he is building, painting and driving his cars right now it is not a surprise he is leading the points over a group of very fast racers.
Several other racers were fast at this race. Mike Albright made the Last Chance and for several segments was a threat for the win until the dreaded red lane took him out of it. Mike was another of the racers whose qualifying effort didn’t show how tough a competitor he is. Dennis was extremely strong with a car that looked to be one of the fastest out there. Rumor was he had cut a 2.9 in a prerace session with his car. After seeing it run I can believe it. Marty drove very well to just miss winning his consi and the last chance by a total of less than 4 feet. It was a heartbreaker but goes to show that even with a fast car it is tough to run against someone who doesn’t make mistakes. There was lottsa talk about how fast the LifeLikes are now. Some have even suggested that they will give up on their Tycos and start running the LL. The ease of which the LL can be tuned is a desirable trait but I have called some of the manufacturers and distributors and getting the armatures is turning into a real pain. BSRT and Wizzard cannot get them as you read this but I will keep trying to get them. But don’t give up on the Tyco just yet! Team Banta hasn’t!
It is with great sadness to report that longtime racer and friend Dan Loeffler passed away last Sunday. Zane has been calling letting us know and it was tough hearing the news. As anyone who knew and raced with Dan he was an inspiration to us all. Along with Zane he embodied the T-Jet and AFX MagnaTraction spirit of fun and camaraderie. But I would like to say a few personal things if I may. I had the pleasure of going to Dan’s house several times and it was at one of these visits that I discovered that Dan and I shared a common love of dirt bike desert racing and mountain bike racing. In fact in the 70s Dan and I were at the same races but we never saw each other. Probably cause he was much faster! Due to some severe injuries he could not ride a dirt bike but he came out to my house to do some mountain biking with me.
You can learn a lot about a person when you’re out in the middle of nowhere and pushing to the max. What I learned about Dan was that he was a tough and fierce competitor who tried his best to win. But what I came to admire as I watch him pedal off in the distance and also when I watched him at the slotcar races, be they T-Jet, AFX, or SuperStock, was that even when he was trying his absolute best and was not winning, he kept that smile on and sense of humor at the ready. He was a good man and in his passing we can look back at the man and learn the lessons he taught us in his quiet way. I hope that when things don’t go my way, when a marshal drops my car, or get taken out, or build a real slug, I’ll remember that smile, that chuckle and the man that brought so much to our group. We’ll miss him. A lot.
I am passing out a preliminary schedule to the track owners for their approval. It will include some interesting races for rest of the year including 2 Endurance races for GT bodied SuperStocks, some Open SuperStock races and a big T-Jet race with trophies. I was going to sponsor the race, that means buying the trophies or plaques and had some trouble with the name. When I first made it up I called it the Right Stuff T-Jet Bash but I would like to suggest the following. Let us have a major T-Jet race every year at Zane’s and let us call it the Dan Loeffler Memorial Race. In this way we will carry on the tradition of Dan, T-Jets, and Fun. A copy of the preliminary schedule and the dates is available for you to check out.
Points:| Pos | Driver | 5/2 | 5/16 | 5/30 | 6/13 | 6/27 | Total | drop 2 |
| 1. | Zane | 10 | 9 | 7 | 8 | 10 | 44 | 29 |
| 2. | Paul | 7 | 10 | 10 | 9 | 5 | 41 | 29 |
| 3. | Greg | 8 | 6 | 9 | 10 | 8 | 41 | 27 |
| 4. | Mark | 9 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 9 | 38 | 25 |
| 5. | Marty | 6 | 8 | 7 | 7 | 5 | 33 | 22 |
| 6. | James | 5 | 5 | 8 | 5 | 3 | 26 | 18 |
| = | Dave | 4 | 6 | 5 | 6 | 4 | 26 | 18 |
| 7. | David | 5 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 25 | 17 |
| 8 | Ken | -- | -- | 5 | 5 | 5 | 15 | 15 |
| 9. | Josh | 3 | 4 | 5 | -- | -- | 12 | 12 |
| 10. | Bryan | -- | 5 | 5 | -- | -- | 10 | 10 |
| 11. | Dan L. | 3 | -- | 5 | -- | -- | 8 | 8 |
| 12. | Mike | 2 | 4 | -- | -- | 3 | 9 | 9 |
| 13. | Pete | -- | -- | -- | -- | 7 | 7 | 7 |
| 14. | Dennis | -- | -- | -- | -- | 6 | 6 | 6 |
| = | Rich | -- | -- | -- | 6 | -- | 6 | 6 |
| = | Eric | -- | -- | -- | 6 | -- | 6 | 6 |
| 15. | Dan | -- | -- | -- | -- | 2 | 2 | 2 |
P.S. He may be 11th in points, but he’s 1st in our hearts!