17 replies to this topic

[fastrakpr]

To all Media
10/11/2016
(Carnesville GA)

Dennis “Rambo” Franklin wins $15,000 World Championship with stock GM crate engine!

It’s true. Rambo Franklin just won the $15,000 FASTRAK World Championship with a box stock GM crate engine. Not a fancy rebuild someone charged another $3000 for, but a bone stock GM crate engine. National Tech Inspector Brad Hibbard tore it down after the race to prove its legality. In an open air tech for any and everyone to witness the top 3 engines were torn down as they always are at this event. “It’s important to our competitors that they know they got beaten fair and square” said Tech Director Brad Hibbard. “Plus Stan Lester wouldn’t have it any other way”.

“I just won $15,000 with a box stock crate engine” said Rambo. “I paid $5695 for that engine so why would I pay $10,000 for the same engine. That just doesn’t make sense to me . Winning that kind of money with a $5695 engine is as good as racing ever is anymore. Think about it. Bought a new $5695 engine and won $15,000. That’s making money in racing”.

“It’s so common how people now think you needed a blueprinted engine to win a crate race anymore” stated Lester.  “People have been sold on the fact you just can’t compete if it’s not blueprinted. Hopefully people will finally see that’s just not true. People spend so much money now on cars, but this is one area they can forget about spending money on altogether. Yes there will be bad one out there now and again, but that’s far from normal. I know people that have spent money blueprinting an engine and actually lost horsepower, so go buy a new engine, adjust your valve springs and go race”.

“I have gotten scolded more than one time mentioning this, but good lord quit complaining about shocks and whatever and go buy some shocks with the money you saved on your engine, but for the most part 99% of the time blueprinting a new GM crate engine is money thrown down the drain”.

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FASTRAK would like to recognize all the 2016 Marketing Partners. Hoosier Racing Tire, Chevrolet Performance Parts, VP Fuels “The official fuel of FASTRAK, ARP Bodies, Rocket Chassis, TNT Chassis

[starboyshady]

Do you think the fact that Dennis Franklin been racing for how long & has a ton of experience had anything to do with it ?

[jms22]

starboyshady you nailed it. A lot of these guys winning weekly and touring shows in the crate class are current or former SLM drivers with a TON of time behind the wheel. It makes it difficult starting next to a guy who has the kind of experience some of these guys have.

[Space Racer]

These huge paying crate races do nothing to help the division.  Super LM teams with more funding usually come in an carry the money away.     ALL the motors should be box stock and should never be opened.    That is one of the failures of this class. Allowing rebuilds and money spent on unneccesary rebuilds.

[fastrakpr]

Its difficult sometimes to figure out what people want anymore. On one hand, people want bigger paying races. On the other hand people don't think it helps. Did Rambos experience help? Of course it did, although after 60 laps there was only .600 separating the top 3 cars. Nothing beats experience. 

 

However Ryan Montgomery (19) and Henry Hornsby (16) lead the first 20 or so laps in a side by side battle. Tire choice made the difference. Montgomery did finish 3rd. He and Rambo battled hard for 1st place until a late caution came into play. 

 

The Friday Night World Challenge paid $5000 to win and was members only with 10 races. Saturday night was open to anyone for the first time in history. Personally I wondered about doing it that way, but the first phone call I received as from a young driver in NC. He said thank you so much for opening this race up to everyone, which I will say surprised me. I asked him why he felt that way that I was concerned our teams would be upset about it. He shared with me that there was no way he could ever afford $55,000 for a competitive super late model engine so the only way he would ever get to race with those guys was a format like we did. Hmmmm. Interesting I thought. He said this is my only chance of ever getting a ride in a super from someone seeing me at this event and competing against the big names in the sport. 

 

In 13 years of this event (formerly Grand Nationals) this is the first time there has been a repeat winner. Thats not bad from a racing standpoint. 

 

If you remember one year we had 5 or 6 $10,000 to win races. We did drop those in somewhat agreeing on your thoughts, but once a year big show I just can't see anything wrong with personally. Do they not deserve a big paying race just because its a crate engine????? 

[starboyshady]

My point was .... You made a big deal about him winning with a "box stock engine". Aren't they all supposed to be un altered ? I bet that these high dollar teams have access to some crazy stuff

[fastrakpr]

The reason for the release was to inform people all the hype about rebuilds was a waste of money. Thats all. Trust me there have been a lot of conversations here about doing away with rebuilds altogether. I fought for those guys against General Motors to keep them in the game and some of them just can't help themselves.

[MBRLLC]

Don't forget to add in the $25,000.00 car.

[starboyshady]

Would it be Ok if Josh Richards & Scott Bloomquist show up with crate cars ? Pretty soon these crate races will have the same feature line up as a Lucas or WoO race . Me personally DO NOT THINK THAT THIS IS FAIR AT ALL. They have the $$$ to have a car dedicated to comming in and stomping the "average" weekend racer at any given big money race

[Paul55]

Would it be Ok if Josh Richards & Scott Bloomquist show up with crate cars ? Pretty soon these crate races will have the same feature line up as a Lucas or WoO race . Me personally DO NOT THINK THAT THIS IS FAIR AT ALL. They have the $$$ to have a car dedicated to comming in and stomping the "average" weekend racer at any given big money race

Josh has already had one in florida this past nationals. They spent a bunch of time just in chassis dyno changing pinion angle, Headers, Carbs transmission an what ever else they could change besides the motor. It already happening. The cars are what is ridiculous with all the light weight stuff. They got the motors pretty well handled both series need to look into all the light weight drive train bs.

Edited by Paul55, 12 October 2016 - 08:49 PM.

[fastrakpr]

Guys anyway I reply to this I am going to upset someone I guess, but here's my take on it.

 

*If you are scared to compete against the big guys, then you will always be a little guy.

*You will never be any better if you only compete against people with the same talent level.

*We provided a class that was late models, but with a $5500 engine, not $55,000. What else do you want?

*The Series did not make people spend $40,000 on a car. The teams did that all on their own

*Everyone does not get a "participation" trophy in racing. Like fishing ain't called catching, its called fishing. Racing isn't called winning either.

*In my 50 plus years of experience, most people that complain about what others have are not willing to so the work to win.

[jms22]

The cost is not the issue, Fastrak is doing what they can to make it as affordable as possible. I think the major contention with some is, guys like Moran, Rambo, Miley etc., dropping into these races to sweep the big purses instead of leaving it to the guys that ONLY race crate the whole season. Everyone wants to improve, but going to a major crate race and racing against guys that run Lucas or WoO is tough. I remember back in the days of Semi-late or Limited late, you could not run that class once you have won more than 2 races in a SLM. Not asking for a paradigm shift, more of making awareness of some of the challenges in crate racing.

[fastrakpr]

I truly appreciate your response. We did that for 12 years. When we invest almost $80,000 into purse monies into 2 days of racing its not fair to ask the track to take that kind of beating. It has to work both ways.

 

I know its not the teams fault of what happened in the NE. Not our faulty either unfortunately and IF, things change one day then maybe we can make it members only again, but car count wise it wouldn't have taken long to not have a World Championship at the rate were were going.

 

Let me give you something to consider if you will.

 

FASTRAK was running along smooth, everyone making money.

Tracks having 20 and up car counts at weekly shows. Touring races average 35-40.

We were paying 5000 - 10,000 for each tour championship and top 10 positions.

National Weekly deal was paying $10,000 to win - the top 50 positions.

Grand Nationals was a 3 race deal for $2000 to win 250 to start each race

Then we paid $50,000 to win through what top 30 if I remember right?

We gave away 5 chassis every year.

We gave away 4 new GM crate engines every year.

I personally sponsored all the 5000 and 10,000 races so we could actually get them.

The last banquet we have that paid $50k to win there was over $400,000 in cash and chassis, engines, etc.

Man it was a huge time. Everyone had fun and if I am correct, not one team left without something in their hand.

 

NDRA comes along, splits the car counts.

They shut down then SECA and RUSH come along and now we split the cars by 3.

We couldn't continue to pay those HUGE amounts with now 1/3 of the cars.

 

I guess everyone got jealous thinking we were making big sums of money. We could have done very well other than we were always giving so much back.

I mean really when you think about $400,000 plus for one year! How much money could we really have been netting after doing that?

 

My opinion is the race teams had it made, but they gave it all away and for what? I understand everyone was told all the money was going South. hell all you had to do is look at the winnings list and it was evident that was not the case. Someone made it a South versus North game and they took advantage of you in the process. As the say, follow the money. AND ALL OVER THE LIE OF "ALL THE MONEY IS GOING SOUTH" LOL. In the mean time crate late model racing has suffered greatly.

 

Seems like as humans we force ourselves into some pretty hard spots in life. We just can't learn and/or see the truth until its gone. We always gave back too much to the racers I guess. So much so everyone thought we we making millions which is so hilarious to begin with. Heck I am not even drawing a salary yet and its 13 years later lol. Guess that proves I am not the brightest bulb on the tree.

 

Thanks again for your handling things in this manner. That's greatly appreciated.

 

If people up there ever get serious of getting things back, you know what to do.

[MBRLLC]

The guys spend $40,000 because your rules allow it. A lot of that expense could have been averted with a better rules package.

[DarwinsBeagle]

Guys anyway I reply to this I am going to upset someone I guess, but here's my take on it.

 

*If you are scared to compete against the big guys, then you will always be a little guy.

*You will never be any better if you only compete against people with the same talent level.

*We provided a class that was late models, but with a $5500 engine, not $55,000. What else do you want?

*The Series did not make people spend $40,000 on a car. The teams did that all on their own

*Everyone does not get a "participation" trophy in racing. Like fishing ain't called catching, its called fishing. Racing isn't called winning either.

*In my 50 plus years of experience, most people that complain about what others have are not willing to so the work to win.

I HATE crate late model racing and crate racing in general, but Mr. Lester "gets it".  Spot on.

[jo73]

I do agree with a lot that is being said by each individual, including fasttrackpr. One key statement made was the 3 way split they now have to deal with. As usual the owners/drivers are there own worst enemies. Money being spent on these cars to be competitive is getting ridiculous. It's been said make stronger rules. It's not that easy anymore as drivers have the option to go race in one of the other crate racing series. Myself if fastrack would release a statement saying we are going to be running a set of spec tires from hot laps to feature race it would have people in a uproar. Same can be said for shocks. No one has the answers. Car counts are down everywhere. Tracks are struggling for every car that comes into the pits. As in society the middle class is becoming a thing of the past. The same is happening in motorsports in general. To be competitive, a consistent top runner, you need to be spending. Chassis, tires, shocks, a total understanding of today's geometry. It's no longer something you can get into and just expect to be a winner. I for one would like to see a sportsman race with some of the local SLM guys up against the top running penn/Ohio guys. Yea dreaming, but the finishing order would be interesting.

If you've ever noticed a sprint car chassis has been the only chassis that it's basic layout and suspension geometry has not changed for years.Yea motors, tires and mostly shocks have been there biggest change. All of these series racers be it outlaws, lucas, ump take your pick are spending money, lots of it, on horsepower.

[fastrakpr]

The guys spend $40,000 because your rules allow it. A lot of that expense could have been averted with a better rules package.

I'll take the hit for that.

 

It's hard to see the future and with technology now making its way into dirt racing things have changed, but there are still plenty of people winning races with used cars. Did we see anyone ever going to a $40,000 chassis? No I didn't see that one coming, but not sure anyone did.

 

Or goal from day one was to control engine cost and tires. We have accomplished that, but who could have ever imagined the chassis and shock programs now? I know I sure didn't.

[Tommy]

In fastrack's defense of the shocks, when they started out, gas shocks were just becoming a thing and the box got too big before they could contain it. If they made a rule after that, half the guys would be bitching about the rule they made.