Dirt Track Racing In Tucson

What a great way to end 2006 - off the plane from Indy and straight to the race track for the Roger McCluskey classic at the 3/8 mile clay oval of United Sports Arizona's USA Race Park! I want to know where they got the clay! It was a very nice facility with good local modified racers working preliminary heats and their own feature before USAC style non-winged sprint cars split the air with dust and noise. And not a watering truck in sight, quite unlike dirt tracks here in the Hoosier state. But boy did it get slick! Hard tire compounds were the order of the day for the right rear and they were still smoking them off the rim by the end of the sprint feature which was won by Jesse Hockett (#2) in a hard fought race over teammate Cassie Shuman (#12), Ronnie's son. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree now, does it? Jerry Coons Jr, (#77) was third followed by Jon Stanbrough (#79) and Jeremy Sherman (#75). Happy New Year dirt track fans! It will be months before we see them around here. Go to www.flickr.com, hit Explore, People and search for indyjay42 to see my pix from the last race of the year.