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New General Manager at Manzanita Speedway
by Windy McDonald
DECEMBER 27, 2008---Manzanita Speedway will welcome in the 2009 season with a new General Manager at the helm. Hollywood Leary will face the challenge of managing the track along with owners Mel and Bobby Martin.
Leary legally changed his name early in life and has operated Hollywood's Paint and Body shop for over 20 years. He is a former driver of both short track stock cars and dirt modifieds and has been a long time fan of Motorsports. He has sponsored several cars and has a deep love for the sport and has also proved to be a good businessman which are factors involved in his hiring.
The Martin's have great confidence in Leary as they get ready for a 2009 season that faces problems that must be addressed. The first order of business will be putting together the season schedule with the Copper on Dirt getting a lot of attention which will have three USAC national championship races scheduled for a two night outing February 20-21. USAC Silver Crown, USAC Midgets and USAC Sprints make up the card for the Copper race. The sprint car race will also award points for the USAC/CRA division and the midget race will also award USAC/Western points.
The weather was not kind to the Copper last year as the Friday night race had to be postponed due to rain and that part of the show was run on Saturday afternoon then the championship finals took place. The 2008 race attracted 115 cars but expect an even bigger field with the sprints running for national points this year whereas the sprint race last year was only for USAC/CRA points. Even then there were 45 sprints on hand and 60 midgets were in the pits but three cars failed to get in a qualifying run. The Silver Crown series had 18 cars but USAC is expecting a larger field his year.
Local drivers will be attracting a lot of attention as Jerry Coons, Jr. of Tucson, won both the Sprint Car and Silver Crown championships last year and was named as the top open wheel driver of the year. His championships made him only the fifth driver to win the USAC triple crown which consists of midgets, sprints and silver crown.
Chad Boat of Phoenix was named the USAC Sprint and USAC Midget rookie of the year in 2008. Last year he finished sixth in both the sprint car and midget main events. Another youngster, Cole Whitt edged Tracy Hines by one point in taking the midget driving title and kept Hines from becoming a triple crown winner.
The format for the third running of the Copper on Dirt will have all three divisions running on the half mile track. They will qualify through time trials and then the midgets and sprints will run heat races to determine positions in the Saturday night finals. Last year the both the sprints and midgets ran five heat races.
The Silver Crown used the qualifying times to line up their feature last year while the midgets ran a "C" and two "B" mains to secure their positions in the 25 lap feature. The sprints had a 12 lap "B" and a 40 lap feature.
A total of 115 main event laps were run last year. Coons came home the winner in the Silver Crown 50 lapper, Shane Cottle won a nail biter in beating local champion Jeremy Sherman in the 40 lap sprint car feature and the 25 lap midget race winner was Darren Hagen. The Silver Crown race was run without a yellow and Coons is now the 50 lap record holder with a time of 19:13.35.
Jon Stanbrough has the one lap record as he led the qualifying with a 20.070 time. Josh Ford barely edged Hagen for fast time in the midgets. He was clocked at 19.729 and Hagen was timed at 19.735. Forty-two midgets timed within a second of the pole sitter. Bret Mellenberndt was by far the quickest in the sprints as he tripped the clock at 18.669 with Seth Wilson a distant second at 19.143.
The schedule, a work in progress, is expected to have a few less races this years but the major races such as the memorial races for Donnie Davis, Hank Arnold and Buddy Taylor, the 58th anniversary races and the Hall of Fame Vintage Classic and the Western are expected to remain on the schedule. Leary is also hoping to have more late model races this year.
Leary is also looking into have a few non Motorsports events sometime during the year. Among things under consideration are concerts, truck racing and possibly some motocross events.
The reduction in gas prices should be a big help in getting fans to the track this year and with the product that the track has to offer, attendance is expected to be much better than in the recently concluded 2008 season.
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