Motor Racing / Shav Glick : Noffsinger, Shuman to Seek a Rare Sprint Car-Midget Double at Ascot

Brad Noffsinger of Huntington Beach, sprint car champion of the California Racing Assn., and Ron Shuman of Tempe, Ariz., five-time Turkey Night midget champion, will try for a sprint car-midget double never before accomplished in two of Ascot Park’s premier events.

Both will drive Saturday night in the ninth annual Don Peabody Classic, which winds up the CRA season, and then come back next Thursday night in the United States Auto Club’s 46th annual Thanksgiving Night midget car race.

Noffsinger and Shuman will be teammates in the 100-lap Turkey Night race since both will be driving for car owner Larry Howard. Shuman won the race, final event of the USAC season, in 1979, 1980, 1981, 1982 and 1984. In 1983, the year that Kevin Olson broke Shuman’s streak, the Arizona veteran led 87 of the 100 laps before a drive line broke.

Noffsinger will also be trying to become the first CRA champion to add a Turkey Night win to his resume since Rick Goudy did it in 1978. He has won three midget races this season on the Ascot track.

Second place in the CRA will be at stake Saturday night between 1985 champion Eddie Wirth and 1985 runner-up Mike Sweeney. Sweeney has a 14-point advantage after winning last week’s main event.

Only one driver, Bubby Jones of Glen Avon, has won both the Peabody race, named for a former CRA president and USAC sprint car supervisor who was killed in an airplane accident in 1978, and the Turkey Night race, but he did not do it in the same year. Jones has won three Peabody races but scored his only Turkey Night win in 1976, two years before the first Peabody.

Jack Hewitt of Troy, Ohio, who won seven of eight USAC Silver Crown races for dirt track cars this season, has entered Saturday night’s 50-lap $30,000 race, which will pay $5,500 to the winner.

The USAC midget championship will be determined on the West Coast between two multiple champions. Rich Vogler, who has won three times, has a 42-point lead over Mel Kenyon, a seven-time winner and last year’s champion.

The season will end with a 50-lap main event Friday night at Ventura Raceway and the Turkey Night race next Thursday. If Vogler finishes ahead of Kenyon in Ventura he will clinch the championship before coming to Ascot.

A resurgence of interest in midget car racing, brought about in part by the Jolly Ranchers Western States regional series, accounts for the 80 cars entered in the Turkey Night race, up from 67 last year. The field includes six former USAC national champions, Kenyon, Vogler, Olson, Tom Bigelow, Steve Lotshaw and Sleepy Tripp.

Tripp, who won the national title in 1975 and 1976, is the defending Western States champion, but although he lives in Costa Mesa and considers Ascot his home track he has never won the Turkey Night feature.

Defending champion is Brent Kaeding, the 1985 Northern Auto Racing Club champion from Campbell, Calif., who scored his first USAC win last Thanksgiving.

This year’s Western States series will end with races Friday night at Ventura as part of the national event, Saturday night at Baylands Raceway in Fremont, Calif., and Nov. 29 at El Centro. Robby Flock of the City of Industry leads Rusty Rasmussen of Fresno by 49 points going into the final three races.

Other entries include Indy car veteran Johnny Parsons and rookie P.J. Jones, 17, son of 1963 Indy 500 winner Parnelli Jones. P.J., a senior at Miraleste High in Rolling Hills, has signed to drive the Western States series next year in a Cosworth-powered midget sponsored by Art Hale, president of American Racing Equipment.

ROAD RACING--The California Sports Car Club will hold its annual sports car enduros Sunday on Riverside International Raceway’s 3.3-mile course. A 1 1/2-hour race for open-wheel formula cars will start at 9:30 a.m., followed by a 3-hour enduro with a LeMans start at 1:30 p.m. Featured will be the Cal Club’s new national champion, Lance Stewart of Redondo Beach, who won the Showroom Stock B title in a Honda in the SCCA national runoffs at Road Atlanta. There will be practice and qualifying on Saturday. . . . Al Holbert, International Motor Sports Assn. champion, collected $140,000 in bonus awards at the Camel GT banquet, including $75,000 for winning the GTP title, $50,000 for owning the car that finished the most miles and $15,000 for his second straight Norelco Driver’s Cup award, voted on by the press, race by race. Tom Kendall, a junior at UCLA, received $20,000 for winning the Camel GTU title. Kendall, now 20 but 19 when he clinched the title, is the youngest champion in 17 years of IMSA racing. . . . Rob Dyson, who teamed with Price Cobb to win the Times Grand Prix of Endurance at Riverside in Dyson’s Porsche 962, was named most improved GTP driver. . . . The R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. announced that it will offer a record $700,000 bonus pool next year.

MOTOCROSS--The Continental Motosports Club will end its season Friday night at Ascot Park with the running of the 14th annual Night Nationals. More than 300 riders are expected for the sportsman finale. In the pro division, Willie Surratt of Canyon Country and Bader Manneh of Santee will renew their Trans-Cal series rivalry in the 125cc class. Manneh beat Surrat in the final race at Ascot after Surrat had led the entire series.

FORMULA ONE--American involvement in the world championship series dropped to a new low with the announcements by Goodyear that it is ending its financial support of the Grand Prix series--meaning free tires for selected teams--for the first time since the series began in 1950 and by Carl Haas of Chicago that he is withdrawing the only American-owned team from the series. Haas’ decision was made after the Ford Motor Co. terminated its Formula One engine building program. Haas’ cars were designed for the new Ford Cosworth V-6 engine. Haas will continue with his Newman/Haas Indy car team, however, with Mario Andretti as the driver of a new Lola T-8700, powered by an Ilmor Chevrolet engine.

MOTORCYCLES--The Toyota Budweiser Formula USA Gran Prix will be run Sunday at Willow Springs Raceway. There will be ten 20-mile races beginning at 11 a.m. . . . Team Hammer, with Doug Toland of Buena Park, Peter Carroll of Costa Mesa and Dave Sadowski of Exeter, N.H., won the national endurance championship riding a Suzuki 1100. They averaged 75 m.p.h. for six hours in clinching the title at Road Atlanta.

VINTAGE CARS--Former Formula One champions Phil Hill, Jack Brabham, John Surtees and Jackie Stewart, and former Indy 500 winners Sam Hanks, Rodger Ward and Bobby Unser will be among the participants at the Palm Springs Vintage Grand Prix Nov. 28-30 at the Palm Springs Airport. Also featured will be a two-day Concours d’Elegance presented by Lincoln Mercury-Merkur at Angel Stadium to showcase more than 500 historic cars.

STOCK CARS--NASCAR was born in the Deep South and was once considered the sole property of sons of Dixie, but times are changing. Two key men on Richard Childress’ team that helped Dale Earnhardt win the Winston Cup championship were Kirk Shelmerdine, the crew chief, and Lou LaRosa, the engine builder. Shelmerdine is from Philadelphia, LaRosa from Brooklyn.