This month's Young Racers' Club winner comes to us from Walnut Cove, North Carolina. Matthew Duggins races a front-wheel drive U-Car at New 311 Speedway, the north central North Carolina 1/2-mile high-banked clay oval bullring that bills itself as the Daytona of Dirt. That's the same track frequented by guys like Steve Blackburn, Larry Blankenship, Ty Dillon, and Justin Labonte.

One of the better-selling trucks today is the GM Duramax Turbo Diesel which features a transmission from Allison. When you buy a heavy-duty diesel truck, like the Duramax, you buy it for strength and performance. After all, it is pretty hard to tow a 28 foot fully loaded enclosed racecar hauler with the family mini-van. As trucks like this one have become more and more common, the popularity of bolt-on diesel performance upgrades has skyrocketed. In fact, a whole new industry of bolt-on aftermarket performance diesel products sprang up. Of course adding more power and torque to your tow rig will do little unless you beef up that drivetrain to help put that power to the ground. A critical link in achieving this is the transmission. But getting that extra power and torque to the asphalt through a factory transmission can be tricky.

DPI Performance Racing Products, the company that brought you advanced traction management torque sensing differentials to get you off the corners, is now introducing an advanced, high-tech brake caliper to help you get into the corners. The newly designed calipers are manufactured out of billet aluminum for maximum strength. The calipers use a standard 3 1/2-inch mount, fit rotor sizes up to 13 inches and are available in 1 7/8-inch and 1 3/4-inch stagger piston that reduce brake pad taper.

We picked up a used ironing board at a yard sale and found it makes a great portable bench. We use it a lot in the shop and it folds up to take to the track. The best part is that we got a portable bench for five bucks.

G-Force Racing Gear is proud to announce that the much anticipated 3000 Series helmet line is now available. After a strenuous 24 month research and development program, G-Force rolled out four models in its latest helmet line; the Eliminator, Eliminator X, Pro Eliminator, and Pro Eliminator X. Standard models in sizes extra small through medium were available at press time while the larger sizes are slated for a late summer release, meaning they should be available by the time you read this Quick Tech.

Whoever coined the words, "Getting there is half the fun" obviously wasn't talking about hauling a racecar to the track. Whether the trip is made on back roads or an interstate highway, towing a trailered racecar is never fun, considering the countless brain-dead drivers you encounter along the way. It seems as though most of them think they absolutely have to be talking on their cell phones, drinking a cup of coffee, or both while they're careening down the highway.

Editor's Note: In the July 2008 issue of Circle Track master engine builder Keith Dorton wrote a letter to the editor concerning sealed or crate motors and their affect on short track racing. We published the letter in its entirety, unedited. We also offered General Motors a chance to respond which they did. Below is a letter from GM's Bill Martens, published in its entirety, unedited.

In your racecar, a cracked block from frozen coolants in the winter isn't usually the problem. Leaking freeze plugs that dump coolant on the track, however, is. If you have a freeze plug work its way loose either from the vibrations from an engine operating at extended high-rpm levels or from occasional overheating, the coolant dump is usually right in the path of your rear tires. And a spin-out or wreck from a faulty plug is the last thing you want.

On June 28, history was made. Over the past eight months, a group of veteran racers and businessmen put together the concept of a Pay-Per-Lap race. This division of money enabled the teams to earn tire and gas money even if they ran at the back of the pack while still providing incentives to lead and win the race. This could become a model for many other racing programs across America and abroad.

In Part One of this series on racecar dynamics we introduced a new way of looking at the vehicle's suspension systems. We learned that it is important to match the desires of both ends of the car in order to have a truly balanced setup. This balance is what we have always desired when applying trial-and-error methods to tune our setups.

Fossil fuel is dead. There I said it. In the face of stratospheric prices for crude oil (as of this writing one barrel of oil topped $130), one of the political hot buttons nowadays is how fuel prices are affecting the economy and how they are going to affect it in the future.

$4.50 per gallon for diesel, $9.75 per gallon for race gas...where is all of this going and how is it affecting, and going to affect, short-track racing? To get a bead on the true state of the industry we talked to five major sanctions in the United States. We chose these groups based on their broad reach and direct involvement in local racing. In a departure from typical interview Q&A style, we asked the leaders of these respective sanctions to give us their opinion on how their business is doing given the current economy. The answers were in most cases somewhat surprising and even enlightening. Here's what they said:

WEB POLL: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

Twenty seconds after the explosion, Patrick Strobel came to. He saw sunlight through the dust in the air. He felt pain. Too much pain to comprehend. He heard ringing in his ears. He couldn't see out of his swollen right eye. He felt his right leg burning. Like it was on fire.His right leg was broken, and the right side of his body had been peppered with shrapnel. Slowly, he realized that the ruptured heater core of his battered Humvee was showering him with boiling coolant.

Event provides unique and fun opportunity to view high-performance Corvettes, tour manufacturing facility

Many racers use an oxy/acetylene torch. Quite often, a butane cigarette lighter is the weapon of choice in starting the fire. Most have heard the admonishment “Don’t do it!”

They are unsafe for torch lighting because the pressure of the torch gases may overcome the butane pressure. If this situation occurs, the flame can enter the tank of the lighter. When near empty, the lighter is more dangerous. The lower butane pressure makes an accident more likely.

Getting Started

Over the next few months, Stock Car Racing will follow along as race car builder Sleepy Gomez builds an IMCA Stock Car. This is an ideal beginning race car for the novice car builder and driver. We will attempt to describe, in the simplest terms possible, what is being done, how it’s being done, and why it’s being done. Sleepy has been involved in racing since 1958 and over the years has become more infatuated with building cars than with driving them. He has built his share of cars, from karts and Mini-Stocks to Street Stocks. Sleepy works out of his shop, Sleepy’s Workshop, in Ferris, Texas, where he makes a living at metalworking and welding. The car should be ready for a couple of test rides at the end of this season—but the real racing begins in 2001.

IMCA is known mostly for its Modified class. It may come as a surprise to some that there is an IMCA Stock Car class. This class has run in the Midwest for about 10 years and is now beginning to catch on throughout the rest of the United States.

While similar to many local, entry-level and above classes, the series has a nationwide set of rules so cars (and parts) are standardized. This increases parts availability and decreases costs.

Every generation of Corvette has been equally comfortable on the street and on the racetrack. From the early C1 racers to the contemporary Corvette Racing Team juggernaut, Chevy's performance flagship has a storied motorsports history spanning more than a half-century. Visit any open-track event today, and you're likely to find both late-model and vintage Vettes tearing up the tarmac.

Head Turner
Romeo Martello
Massapequa Park, NY
'79 C3 Coupe

The Saturday night racer faces some very real issues with the fuel systems in their cars. The demands on the fuel system can make or break a racing program depending on the level of preparation that the racer places on the system.

When Chevrolet launched the Corvette in 1953, the car was far from the all-conquering performer it is today. But despite its comparative lack of speed, the diminutive sportabout represented an important milestone in American automotive history.

A picture is worth a thousand words.

Whelen Racing created quite a stir during last year's SPEED GT season, when driver Eric Curran recorded multiple victories in a Marsh Racing-prepared No. 30 C6. We recently had a chance to tour the team's facility in Old Lyme, Connecticut, where we got an up-close look at how these dazzlingly fast Corvette race cars are built. Afterward, we spoke with team sponsor/No. 31 car driver Sonny Whelen, Marsh Racing owner Teddy Marsh, and Curran about the team's history as well as its outlook for 2008.