Weekly Notebook presented by FK Rod Ends
Notes: Winning Georgian buoys crew chief's legacy
By Todd Turner
DirtonDirt.com managing editor
Chris Woods (Heather Rhoades photos)
Before connecting with veteran crew chief James Foster, Chris Woods of Statham, Ga., had been a moderately successful Dirt Late Model racer. Under the guidance of Foster, who for more than 40 years prepared winning cars for National Dirt Late Model Hall of Fame drivers including Buck Simmons, Jack Pennington and Fulmer Lance, Woods blossomed in 2022 with a 16-victory season.
Woods was off to another hot start in 2023 when a heart attack killed Foster in June. Racing would never be the same.
"I was lost,” Woods said. “I didn't know what to do. I wasn't gonna race anymore honestly. … I was really just like, 'Well, I gotta start figuring out who to sell all this stuff to,' you know, because I got cars and motors and parts and 40 wheels, just all the stuff I had.”
A few weeks later, Foster’s son, Bryan Foster, telephone Woods to ask about his racing plans. While the elder Foster had prepared the Limited Late Model driven by Woods, the younger Foster had handled the team’s Crate Late Model. Bryan Foster wanted to continue his father’s legacy.
"He called me Sunday after church,” the 53-year-old Woods recalled, “and he's like, 'Man, we can't go out like this. This ain't what dad would want.' He said, ‘I wanna race. Do you wanna race?' And I said, ‘If you wanna race, I wanna race.’ And we went at it.”
Getting right back in the groove and racing in Foster’s memory, Woods blazed to a career-high 22 victories last season in the Limited and 602 Crate Late Model divisions at Winder-Barrow Speedway in Winder, Ga., and Lavonia (Ga.) Speedway. He’s on a similar pace in 2024, hitting the double-digit victory mark before the first half of the season’s completion with Bryan Foster calling the shots to land atop DirtonDirt.com's Weekly Notebook presented by FK Rod Ends. It should be a memorable season, one that will include James Foster's posthumous induction into the Georgia Racing Hall of Fame in Dawsonville.
Woods never would’ve believed the success he’s had behind the wheel. His first stint in racing came in 1998 starting in four-cylinders, and he’d moved up to Late Models by 2002 before he shelved racing to focus on his growing businesses, Southeast Miscellaneous Erectors and T&S Transport. When Woods ended up back at the track in 2015 to assist a friend, the racing bug bit again.
"He hadn't raced in a year and we won the first night out in a Late Model,” Woods said. “I was like, ‘Man, I gotta have one. I gotta get back in one.' So within two weeks, I bought a new car.”
For the next several seasons, Woods won three or four races a year during that era when David McCoy of Franklin, N.C., was piling up scores of victories annually for team owner Steve “Hollywood” Turner. James Foster was preparing the cars and turning the wrenches. When Turner shuttered his team, McCoy approached Woods about forming a new team with Foster calling the shots.
"I did the best I could with what I had,” Woods said. “I just didn't have time to work on them and keep up with everything. Well, when I met David at the track one night, he was trying to help me. He's like, 'Man, you can drive. You just don't make the right adjustments and stuff.’ ”
Under Foster’s tutelage, Woods began finding victory lane more often, and when McCoy left to join Coltman Farms Racing to compete in the Super Late Model division, Woods continued his relationship with the Fosters in driving his Limited and 602 Crate cars. Woods is humbled for where James Foster took his racing.
"I would win two or three races a year — four if I was lucky— because I didn't have time. I just didn't have time. I think we could have done better if I had time to work on them. But when he came along, he inspired me to do better,” Woods said. “He kept my cars up. When I went to the racetrack, I never had parts failure. I was always competitive and it got to a point where we'd win four or five Limited races in a row. I mean, that's unbelievable for us here in my area. Like go to four different tracks and win, all in a row.
“It just made me so much more confident and confidence is everything in Late Model racing. If you go out there knowing you got a chance to win, you're gonna do better. If you go out there just hoping, ‘Well, maybe tonight's my night,’ then, you know, that's about all you're gonna get out of it. But when you go out there going, 'I know my car can win if I just do what I gotta do,' our car is good enough to win. And he didn't go to a racetrack and he didn't have a car that could win.
"I told David, I said, ‘I'm almost ashamed to race for James because I can't win like you did.’ And he said, ‘Give it some time, give it six months to a year.’ He said, ‘By next year you'll be winning 15-20 races a year.’ And I was like: There's no way. It's not possible. There's no way. And he did it. I mean, the first year he had me win 16 races. I know that's probably not a lot to some people, but to me that's a lot of races with the competition like it is now."
Fortunately for Woods, everything Bryan Foster learned from his father has kept the team humming — and winning. Woods is aware of the different styles between father and son.
Racing for James Foster, Woods felt the pressure to perform for a crew chief who had prepared cars winning more than 1,200 races over 40 years, and "when I come in the pits, he'd just give me a look at the top of his glasses. Like, 'What were you thinking?' Or I would come in and he'd give me a little nod and a wink and that's all you ever got from him,” Woods said. "He wasn't an emotional guy. He didn't tell you, ‘Great job,’ like he'd either give you a thumbs up or a little fist bump. He never got excited or nothing. But he would tell you, ‘Maybe you should have done this or maybe next time you should try this or whatever.’ And it was just great. I mean, just having him was a confidence builder.”
With Bryan Foster, “he's more aggressive than James ever was. James was methodical, same system every weekend, same moves, same everything. He believed in systems and systematic breakdown of the race each week to figure out how to get better,” Woods said. "Bryan, he'll throw the kitchen sink at it. I mean, he's just that much more aggressive. And he's up to date on newer (technology), he's more into the newer style racing that's going on now.
"He'll tell me before I go out, ‘I got you loose enough to run the top for three laps and then when it blows off, you're gonna be in everybody's crumbs.’ He said, ‘You need to get the lead in the first three laps or we're done.’ And that's basically it. I listen to him and do what I can do.”
What Woods usually does is win races.
"Now Bryan is the key. He's the leader, he's making all the decisions and he learned all that from James,” said Woods, adding that they share a bond of lost fathers with Woods losing his dad just a few months after Foster died last year.
The younger Foster helps Woods on how to "attack the racetrack, how we keep up with the track during the night as it dries out, you know, what moves to make. And then Bryan does a lot of research with the newer-style stuff because he's younger and keeps up with” the sport’s developments, Woods said. “And he's really good on the spring smasher. And he calls around to all his buddies that are in racing and they talk. I'm behind on all that. I get in the car and I drive if he tells me it'll do this or that, that's what I'm doing. But I can't work and own the businesses I do and run. We've got 170 employees and I can't keep up with all that, and be able to go and tell you what my load numbers are on the right-front or left-rear and all. I can't do that.
"It just impresses the hell out of me for people to be able to keep all that knowledge, you know , and keep it at the track and make an adjustment that makes you that much better, you know. It's amazing. It's a talent. It really is an art to working on these dirt cars."
With the team clicking off weekly victories, plans are to run more regional special events. The team has added a larger hauler so Woods can take both his cars to farther-flung races. He finished second in June 15’s Red Clay Series event for 602 Crate Late Models at Sugar Creek Raceway in Blue Ridge, Ga.
“We're about to venture out on the road a little bit and try some of these series races,” he said.
Woods will never forget that James Foster set everything in motion.
"For somebody like me to win three races a year, four races, and in a complete nobody — and I'm still a nobody, by the way — to come behind people like James had: Buck Simmons, Jack Pennington, Fulmer (Lance). All these people that were big-time names that drove in the '80s and early '90s and won hundreds of races race for him,” Woods said. "And for him to take the time and take somebody that, 'Well, this guy may win two or three races a year, he might ruin my reputation as a crew chief, but I think I can do it for him and make him win,' for him to do that, that shows you how talented he was.
"To go from (winning) three races to 16 in one year, 22 the next and there's no telling what we would have done if he survived, if he'd still be here. He was that good. Honestly, he was that good.”
Weekly highlights
• Starting outside the front row, Eric Pollard of Peosta, Iowa, led all 25 laps of June 23's Key City Challenge at Dubuque (Iowa) Speedway for a $2,500 victory.
• Jeff Watson of Campbellsville, Ky., achieved the 100-victory career milestone June 22 with his Crate Late Model triumph at Rockcastle Speedway in Mount Vernon, Ky. He has 51 Crate Late Model victories with 29 in Super Late Models and 20 in modifieds.
• North Carolina and Alabama drivers stole away with $3,000 Battle of the Mountain Super Late Model victories in Georgia on June 21-22. David Payne of Murphy, N.C., won the weekend opener at Sugar Creek Raceway in Blue Ridge, Ga., and Dillon Tidmore of Gadsden, Ala., won the finale at Chatsworth's North Georgia Speedway.
• Shane Sabraski of Rice, Minn., had a two-victory weekend in the Late Model division, winning June 20 at Grand Rapids (Minn.) Speedway and winning June 23 at Granite City Motor Park in Sauk Rapids, Minn. He also won a modified feature at Granite City.
• Hometown Crate Late Model racer Davin Kaiser won June 22 for his second straight Crate Late Model victory at Winchester (Va.) Speedway. Kaiser has been third or better in all seven Crate events at the track in 2024.
• Warrensburg, Ill., driver Dakota Ewing scored a pair of June 21-22 Crate Late Model victories, winning home-state events at Farmer City Raceway and Charleston Speedway.
• Clicking off his ninth overall victory of the season, Hayden Ownbey of Cleveland, Tenn., topped the Limited Late Model field June 22 at Mountain View Raceway in Spring City, Tenn.
• Scoring June 21-22 victories, Tyler Carpenter of Parkersburg, W.Va., topped Super Late Model action at Ohio Valley Speedway in Washington, W.Va., and Tyler County Speedway in Middlebourne, W.Va., with Saturday's Earl Hill Memorial victory paying $5,080.
• Kyle Moore of Mansfield, Ohio, continued his domination at Wayne County Speedway on June 22 with his sixth consecutive Super Late Model victory at the track in Orrville, Ohio.
• Sweeping the 602 and 604 Crate Late Model features, Bryson Mitchell of Russellville, Ala., went unbeaten in June 22 action at Pine Ridge Speedway in Guntown, Miss. The 602 victory paid $2,500.
First things first
Recent first-time occurrences at the dirt track:
• Winning June 22 at Hummingbird Speedway in Reynoldsville, Pa., Clay Ruffo of Brookfield, Ohio, notched his first career Super Late Model victory. The 27-year-old is originally from Mercer, Pa.
• Grabbing his first win for car owner Mac McDougal, Logan Hitt of Buckhannon, W.Va., captured June 22's Super Late Model feature at Elkins Raceway in Kerens, W.Va. McDougal was the longtime car owner of Billy Holbert, who retired after the 2023 season.
Weekly news briefs
• Brandon Hardgrove has sold the lease to Ponderosa Speedway in Junction City, Ky., a track he’s operated for four seasons along with Lake Cumberland Speedway in Burnside, Ky. Hardgrove didn’t respond to DirtonDirt.com requests about the identity of the new leasee, but said in a Facebook post the family now holding the lease doesn’t plan on running events until 2025. Hardgrove accepted the recent offer to purchase the lease because he wants to scale back to promoting a single track, reducing his stress and workload. Former track owner Larry Yantz had assisted Hardgrove in the 3/8-mile oval’s promotions.
• Dixieland Speedway in Elizabeth City, N.C., this week named Eddy Pollard as race director. The Ocean Isle, N.C., resident has 40 years of experience in flagging, race directoring, announcing and publicity with several tracks in the Carolina as well as the Carolina Clash Super Late Model Series and Vision Wheel Steel Block Bandits.
• Bedford (Pa.) Speedway hits a milestone with June 28’s program, the 900th event in the history of the track that opened in 1936. Super Late Models top a five division card with Kyle Lee of Mercersburg, Pa., leading the division standings.
• Spectators paying $5 admission for June 29’s race program at Richmond (Ky.) Raceway will be eligible for a drawing for two grandstand tickets for the track’s 37th annual Butterball Wooldridge Memorial on Aug. 17. The drawing will be held immediately following Saturday’s Crate Late Model feature.
• Corinth (Miss.) Motor Speedway will reopen June 29 after making track surface and facility improvements under new managers Jimmy Hayes and Matt White. The track plans a nine-division program with Limited Late Models, 602 Crate Late Models and a beginning Late Model division among them.
• Longtime Florida short-track racing photographer Rick Warren died June 17. He was 71.
• Jeff and Renee Delonjay have reached an agreement to purchase Adams County Speedway in Quincy, Ill., from Paul Holtschlag, and the couple plans on improving the surface and facilities at the track promoted by Jim and Tammy Lieurance, according to a recent story by Steve Eighinger in the Muddy River News. Other plans: repainting structures along with improving lighting, concessions and restrooms. Jeff Delongjay will also explore moving the go-kart track into the infield of the quarter-mile oval and potentially moving race nights to Friday instead of the traditional Sunday.
• Needmore Speedway in Norman Park, Ga., has announced the sixth annual Morgan Sheffield Memorial scheduled for Aug. 24 will pay $3,016-to-win for the 602 Crate Late Model division. Several contingency awards are also planned for the racing paying at least $216 to every starter.
• County Line Raceway in Elm City, N.C., is mourning the June 15 passing of Jimmy Massengill, a longtime technical inspector at the track. Massengill, who stepped away from his duties at the track prior to a cancer diagnosis last year, was 80.
Weekly points
DIRTcar (Supers): Rusty Schlenk of McCure, Ohio, has 1,011 points to lead Ashton Winger (797) and Jason Feger (775).
IMCA (Limiteds): Evan Miller of Silvis, Ill., has 716 points to lead Jesse Bodin (627) and Andy Nezworski (516).
POWRi (Limiteds): Alan Westling of Fulton, Mo., has 3,640 points to lead Tucker Cox (3,400) and Kyle Graves (2,420).
USRA (Limiteds): Matt Larson of Lake Elmo, Minn., has 3,107 points to lead Cade Nelson (2,736) and Jason McFadden (2,485).
WISSOTA (Limiteds): Tyler Peterson of Hickson, N.D., has 1,783 points to lead Kevin Burdick (1,555) and Jeff Massingill (1,374).
American All-Stars (Crates): Brandon Fouts of Kite, Ky., has 432 points to lead reigning champ A.J. Hicks (320) and Steve Stollings (315).
Crate Racin’ USA (602 Crates): Colby Ponds of Caledonia, Miss., has 636 points to lead Josh Parkerson (620) and Heather Lowe (601)
Crate Racin’ USA (604 Crates): Shannon Lee of Lumberton, Miss., has 572 points to lead David Williamson (565) and Sid Scarbrough (484).
DIRTcar (Crates): Jim Moon of Grand Prairie, Texas, has 705 points to lead Chase Osterhoff (635).
Fastrak (Crates): Luke Hyre of Rock Cave, W.Va., has 486 points to lead George Casto (482) and Noah Whited (410).
RUSH (Crates): Jeremy Wonderling of Wellsville, N.Y., has 871 points to lead Austin Hauser (811) and Austin Allen (690).
Upcoming weekly specials
Among non-touring and independent special events coming up for Late Models at dirt tracks around the country:
Thunder Mountain Speedway, Knoxdale, Pa. (June 28): The Vince Gaston Memorial pays $8,000-to-win at the track not running weekly but hosting this special event; practice is scheduled for June 27. Fast time pays $500 from People’s Auto Body, among other bonuses.
Penton (Ala.) Raceway (June 28): Limited Late Models chase a $2,400-to-win purse with bonuses for the top three finishing drivers using Crate engines.
Volunteer Speedway, Bulls Gap, Tenn. (June 28-29): The track celebrates its 50th anniversary with a Super Late Model special that includes a pair of $5,000-to-win events for preliminaries (with two $1,000 fast time awards) and a $50,050-to-win finale. Crate Late Models also chase big money with an $8,050-to-win finale.
Winchester (Va.) Speedway (June 29): The Jimmy Spence Memorial pays $6,091-to-win for the Super Late Model division bonuses that include $500 for heat winners and lap money.
Gondik Law Speedway, Superior, Wis. (June 28-29): A pair of $2,500-to-win Late Model programs are on the undercard of the eighth annual Great Border Battle for modifieds at the 4/10-mile oval.
Thunderbird Raceway, Muskegon, Mich. (June 29): Super Late Models chase an $1,800-to-win purse on Kids Night.
Marion Center (Pa.) Raceway (June 29): The Spider Barnett Memorial for Super Late Models pays $3,000-to-win. It's also bicycle night for the kids with giveaways of bikes, backpacks and school supplies.
Plymouth (Wis.) Dirt Track (June 29): On Late Model Appreciation Night, Late Models will chase a $2,500-to-win purse with extra purse money supplied by Ricky Lemmen Trucking. Edler Bros. Trucking has posted $200 for fast time and $100 for heat winners.
Thunder Mountain Speedway, Corbin, Ky. (June 29): The track's $3,500-to-win Crate Late Model special has been named the Rod Carter Jr. Memorial after the recent passing of the longtime Kentucky racer. All regular divisions are also in action.
County Line Raceway, Elm City, N.C. (June 29): One of the track's Fast Five Late Model Shootout events pays $3,000-to-win for Limited Late Models with four other divisions in action.
Fort Payne Motor Speedway, Fyffe, Ala. (June 29): The Firecracker 50 pays $3,000-to-win for the 604 Crate Late Model division. Limited Late Models are among other divisions on the card.
Potomac Speedway, Budds Creek, Md. (July 3): The Gene Van Meter Memorial pays $3,000-to-win for the Super Late Model division with Crate Late Models among classes on the undercard.
Mudlick Valley Raceway, Wallingford, Ky. (July 3): The holiday special pays $5,000-to-win for the Super Late Model division with a fireworks show planned at intermission. Peoples Bank of Kentucky is the presenting sponsor.
Bedford (Pa.) Speedway (July 3): The Firecracker 76 pays $3,000-to-win for the track's Limited Late Model division with two undercard classes.
Off Road Speedway, Norfolk, Neb. (July 3): The Ray Haase Tribute for IMCA Late Models pays $2,500-to-win and $500-to-start as part of the Titan Clash miniseries.
Wartburg (Tenn.) Speedway (July 3): Limited Late Models will run without the roof in the $3,000-to-win holiday special.
Tennessee National Raceway, Hohenwald, Tenn. (July 4): The Red, White and Blue Thursday Night special includes a $4,000-to-win event for the 602 Crate Late Model division ($1,000 of the winner's purse from Bruce Odom). Several other divisions are in action and Summertown Metals is sponsoring a fireworks show.
