Florida Speedweeks Modified Reunion 2013

[Frasson118]

Dick Montgomery is coming down, for what I believe he said was his 51st. Daytona Speedweeks... including a couple at The Beach. These days, instead of playing with full size cars, he plays with miniature ones. He brings a COOL collection of the Die-cast Modifieds, complete with old Coupes, Coaches, Pinto's, Vega's... of ALL the big name racers, and a bunch of the leseer known racers also. Very nice collection/side-business.

I met Dick for the first time, at the 1st Reunion. It turns out, he was friends and neighbors with my fathers business partner as I was growing up...never knew it.

[Frasson118]

I haven't talked to this guy yet, but I'm betting he will be there. Ted Renshaw, from Ontario, also known as "Rickshaw" to his friends.

This car, and Ted, mark a milestone for me... this is the VERY FIRST racecar, I actually touched, and looked into. But. I never met Ted then, or any other time I lived up there... I finally got to meet him at the 1st. Reunion,

Car owner, Don Adler, also lives in the Lake County area, and I need to find him again also.

[Frasson118]

Chuck Boos was a great racer at Lancaster, Spencer, and especially Cayuga, Ont. He wasn't afraid to go on the road to the big tracks either... Trenton, Pocono, and here, which I think is Langhorne.

Todays racers would have a coronary over pit conditions like this... Chucky didn't bitch. !

Another Boos story, is that he once built a 4-wheel drive Modified. Couldn't get it to hook up on asphalt, so he tried testing on the dirt at Ransomville Speedway. It was FAR too advanced for the time, shattered the track records just in testing.... and decided that it was TOO far superior to anything else, that he scrapped it completely. Didn't feel it would either be fair, OR fun... so he bailed out of the project. Can you imagine today that someone would have the integrity to admit an 'unfair advantage'...?

[Frasson118]

Paul Degl... better known in the racing world as Bill Spade, was a very successful racer at Freeport, Islip, Riverhead, Long Island, has a great story behind him. As a teenager, he bought a racecar, which his parents went berserk about. They told him to move out, or get rid of the car... he came up with a compromise. If he HIRED a driver, would they let him keep the car, as long as he didn't drive it. The folks said OK. The next week, he 'hired' a driver named Bill Spade (loosely based off Hollywoods Sam Spade), which in actuality, was himself under Spade, instead of Degl.
He got busted when his old man was out fishing, and another fisherman congratulated him on his son, 'Bill Spade' winning the Feature race the night before. It took a while, but the old man figured that if he kid was a winner, he may as well get behind him. Shortly after, he was proud to introduce himself as "Bill Spades father"...

One of the 'mid-range' cars, and one of his newer ones, that looks to me like a Corvair body.

[Frasson118]

Bill Spades long-time friend, and his partner at each reunion, is Gene Suizdak, who also spent some time behind the wheel of some cool cars on long Island...

[Frasson118]

I don't know at this point if David Hollinger, brother of Boneman Rex, will be bringing out this beauty again this year...

But I WILL say.. (with no offense to anyone else's Vintage stuff(, this is THE coolest, most historical car that has been to these shows. An original, Jim Shampine 1967 Oswego Championship car. These were they days of the one-of-a-kind racer cars, and Shampine's ideas were almost always WAY ahead of the curve.

As a twist of Karma... the driver that ran this car last year at NSS, was Doug Heveron. Doug's first super was also an ex-Shampine car.

[Frasson118]

Just found a '67 picture of the Shampine/Hollinger car...

[Frasson118]

Speaking of Doug Heveron... here are just a FEW of thes phases he's been through behind the wheel.

A cool overhead shot of Doug in his ex-Shampine Super
Victory Circle after a Mod win in Richmond
The one he'll kick my ass about if he knows I posted this..
And his shot at the Indy 500, which ended in a broken car, and a busted ankle. reports are that before the crash (testing days), he was fast enough to be in the show.

[Frasson118]

New England's George Summers won a ton of races, and very respected among his fellow racers.

In these shots, it's ironic that the first pic is George modern day, in a car that looks older than the other 2. Photo was dated 2011

I love the purple car, and the Troyer chassis Pinto is about as modern as George got.

[Frasson118]

Leo "The Lion" Cleary is as funny a guy as you'd ever want to meet... but leave the kids at home, and hope your girl has a wide-open sense of humor...

First shot he is driving for Joe Brady, who EVERYONE has driven for. He brings the car that Teddy Christopher drives each year now at NSS. Joe knows TALENT, and that's all he puts in his cars.

2nd. shot is a coooool-ass Mustang, complete with fuel injection.

3rd. shot... it might just be me, but this car would look like 100 MPH sitting still. Something about the body lines, and streamlining... it just looks cool as hell to me.

[Frasson118]

Jimmy Winks now lives in Edgewater FL. but grew up in NY. He has won a bunch of races at Volusia, NSS and Orlando over the years... which were his kinda laid back years.

The first shot, he is driving the famous Howard Purdy "Deuce". Others that drove this car before him were the late Ronnie Lux, and the great Bentley Warren. Both won in the car before him, and Jimmy didn't break the streak. He won in this car too.

A cool Coupe I'd never seen before tonight.

In the Turner Brothers Corvair. The unique thing about this car, is it was a "convertible". It would run as a traditional Modified on Fridays and Sundays, but Saturdays, the Turner brothers would remove the body, do some tweaking,,,, and VOILA'..... a SUPER Modified. Gary Reichert was the driver during 'that' period, but here is Jimmy in that same car.

Don Turner, one of the brothers (Ray has passed on), usually comes out too.

[Frasson118]

Nick Ronca always ran Red & White #7 cars... always pretty. This one I think is pretty damn sweet...

[larrytg]

2 of Ted on the hook

I haven't talked to this guy yet, but I'm betting he will be there. Ted Renshaw, from Ontario, also known as "Rickshaw" to his friends.

This car, and Ted, mark a milestone for me... this is the VERY FIRST racecar, I actually touched, and looked into. But. I never met Ted then, or any other time I lived up there... I finally got to meet him at the 1st. Reunion,

Car owner, Don Adler, also lives in the Lake County area, and I need to find him again also.

I took these in the late 60's

[Frasson118]

Tom Wiest from the Rochester area of NY is coming down. For some reason, this is the only picture that I could "lift" for this page. He has had plenty of cool looking cars, including the new Camaro body-style on a Modified.

[Frasson118]

Bill McPeek has been a big supporter of this event right from the beginning. He's a big helper if someone needs display cars or promotional events, Bill always seems to be there.

Here he is in the pits at Darlington.