Casey, Ranta anxious to tackle a national tour
By Joshua Joiner
DirtonDirt.com staff writer
Car owner Arnie Ranta (left) and Terry Casey after a 2008 victory. (Jeremey Rhoades)
Reconnecting with the car owner who helped him achieve his most successful season in 2008, Terry Casey of New London, Wis., will return to full-time racing in 2012 with plans to field an Arnie Ranta-owned MasterSbilt Race Car on either the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series or the World of Outlaws Late Model Series.
Casey, 42, who previously drove for Ranta from 2006 through 2009, scored three Lucas Oil victories during his first season on a national tour in ’08 on his way to the tour’s Rookie of the Year title and a seventh-place finish in the overall standings. But goals to contend for the series championship in ’09 were quickly spoiled when a run-in with Shinnston, W.Va., driver Josh Richards early in the year at East Bay Raceway Park in Gibsonton, Fla., resulted in Casey being suspended for five series races, virtually ending the team’s chances at the title.
The team disbanded after following a regional schedule during the remainder of the ’09 season and neither Casey nor Ranta have competed full time since. Now reunited, both are optimistic they can again reach the performance level that made them one of the top up-and-coming race teams in ’08.
“Those three are the biggest wins of my career, and really the only ones I remember the most,” Casey said of the Lucas Oil triumphs he scored with Ranta. “We were really good those years we raced together and I don’t see why we can’t be successful again. I know he’s excited to go back racing ... and I’m definitely pumped up about it.”
The team will open its season with a trip south to compete at Screven Motor Speedway in Sylvania, Ga., Feb. 10-11 in the $20,000-to-win Winter Freeze, which kicks off both the World of Outlaws season and Georgia-Florida Speedweeks. From there, the team will head to Florida where Casey and Ranta will be faced with the decision of whether to stick with the Outlaws tour or jump to the Lucas Oil Series.
In years past, Casey and Ranta could have waited until after Speedweeks before committing to one of the national tours, but they won’t have that luxury this year thanks to the tours going head to head in Speedweeks for the first time.
Following Screven, they’ll either have to stick with the Outlaws and compete in three series events at the inaugural Late Model Winter Nationals at Bubba Raceway Park in Ocala, Fla., Feb. 16-18 or head back to East Bay and compete in the 36th annual Dart Winternationals Feb. 13-18, which opens the year for the Lucas Oil Series.
“That’s kinda up in the air yet,” said Casey, who won an event at East Bay in ’08 and has never competed at Ocala. “We might not decide until we hit the Florida border. I know which way Arnie’s kinda leaning toward, but we’ll just wait and see. It’s unfortunate we can’t do both. I’d love to go back to East Bay; we’ve done good there before. And I’d love to go to Ocala for the first time, but we’ll just have to wait and see how things sort out.”
Casey, who began his Late Model career in 1996, successfully competed in mostly regional WISSOTA Late Model events for a decade before hooking up with Ranta in 2006. After stepping up to Super Late Model action in ’07, the team hit the Lucas Oil tour and found nearly immediate success in ’08 with their three series victories coming in the tour’s first eight races.
The team went on to record a solid rookie campaign that year and kept rolling into ’09 with Casey running up front and contending for victories during East Bay’s season-opening miniseries. But all the momentum proved to be for naught after two controversial run-ins with Richards late in the week, including one that resulted in Casey retaliating under caution. That led to the five-race Lucas Oil Series suspension that ended the team’s hopes of contending for the series championship.
“We all make some kind of mistakes along the line. I feel that was a mistake I made,” Casey said. “In a way it was a setback for my racing career because we wanted to contend for the title that year, but I’m an old school driver and I feel sometimes the score has to be settled on the racetrack. But that’s over and done with. All I’m worried about now is going out and trying to win races.”
Not being able to chase the Lucas Oil title that year is what Ranta believes led to the team’s dissolution following the season.
“Having the good year we had in 2008 leading up to 2009, we were really looking forward to a good run on the Lucas Oil tour that year,” Ranta said. “Running an independent schedule, we just didn’t really find our way with that. We really wanted to follow the Lucas Series and contend for a title. It didn’t go that way and that really kind of took the wind out of our sails. At the end of that year we both felt it was time to disband and move on to something else.”
Casey cut back his own racing efforts in ’10 and ’11 while focusing on assisting other drivers and building race cars. Ranta is confident Casey can quickly knock off the rust accumulated over two years of part-time competition and again compete on national tour.
“I think we have the makings of a team that’s capable of picking up right where we left off,” Ranta said. “Yes, the competition level’s probably picked up and there’s a bit more technology. We’re going to be a little bit handicapped after both being out of racing for the most part these past couple of years, but we’ve both got a lot of drive and determination. I think Terry still has it in him, so I’m confident we can go out and be competitive again.”
Casey is also confident in the team’s chances and is looking forward to a return to full-time racing.
“I’m just happy to be back racing and back on the road chasing a championship,” Casey said. “I’d like to finish in the top five of whichever (series) we end up running. Anything better than that, winning races or whatever we can do, that would be a plus. But our main goal is to go out and be competitive and be in the top five. We’ve got good equipment with these MasterSbilt cars, so I don’t see any reason we can’t go out and do that.”
