‘Run while you can and do not under any circumstances go see the new film, The Getaway,’ blogs racer & TV commentator, Stephen Cox!
Car guys, I urge you to fight your instincts. Forget the tantalizing prospect of watching a Shelby GT500 Super Snake being driven full-tilt for two hours. Forget the tempting storyline of a former NASCAR driver screaming like a madman through Bulgaria, leaving cops in the dust and saving his dear wife.
Save yourself instead!
A few weeks before watching T...
Read More
Stephen Cox
POLE SITTERS: DON’T GET RESPECT ANYMORE!
Race series could prevent so many of their own problems if they would simply allow the pole sitter to do his job, blogs Stephen Cox.
Every driver's meeting across the country is plagued with endless speeches dictating what the drivers must do at the start of the race. Here are a few of the pre-race instructions I've been given just over my past twenty races or so:
•You can accelerate once you reach the white stripe on the asphalt.
•You must accelerate simultaneously – as if you could driv...
Read More
WINCHESTER SPEEDWAY: WORLD’S FASTEST HALF-MILE!
Stephen Cox blogs about one of our great racetracks you’ve probably never seen.
In the spring of 1914, Indiana farmer Frank Funk had an idea. This whole newfangled automobile thing seemed to be catching on. Lots of folks were racing them. Carl Fisher had recently built a big oval near Indianapolis and scads of people were paying to see his 500-mile race every year.
Funk had made good money in farming. He had plenty of acreage, and his fields, just west of the small town of Winchester, did...
Read More
RACING WISDOM: FIVE EASY PIECES!
Words of wisdom from blogger-racer Stephen Cox that he’s never forgotten.
Number Five - “Wanna win? You need a trailer like that.”
So said a racing friend in the summer of 1986 at Bloomington Speedway. We were walking past a huge semi-trailer loaded with two spare chassis, half a dozen engines and a crew of ten mechanics. It belonged to some teenager named Jeff Gordon who was supposed to be the next big thing in racing. We all know how that turned out!
Nevertheless, I was a slow learner....
Read More
PORSCHE 550 SPYDER: AMAZING STREET/RACER!
Stephen Cox blogs about Porsche’s multi-million-dollar spectacular Spyder.
I confess that I am a muscle car guy.Can't help it. I grew up cruising Mustangs and Torino's on Saturday night and Sundays
at the strip. But after watching Mecum Auctions sell Porsche 550-0077, right, for over 3.7 million dollars at Monterey last weekend, I couldn't help but be impressed with the little machine.
The 550 was Porsche's first race-specific design. Introduced in Paris in 1953, the 550 was famously mo...
Read More
INDYCAR & LUCA FILIPPI: A BRIGHT NEW STAR!
Stephen Cox blogs about what Luca Filippi means for open-wheel racing.
Perhaps I'm the lone voice in the wilderness on this, but I was very impressed with Luca Filippi's IndyCar debut at Mid-Ohio last week. He was fantastic in qualifying. Had he not been penalized, Filippi could have had a starting spot in the first three rows; been a genuine threat on race day.
He ran a conservative, nearly mistake-free race and moved from dead last to as high as 11th during the event. Nearly all of his p...
Read More