Correy Has Come Up Fast on Dirt Track : Fullerton Teen Is One of Speedway Motorcycle Racing’s Newest Stars

Ronnie Correy’s debut in speedway motorcycle racing could be best described as unbelievable.

It wasn’t that Correy had been extraordinary on the race track as a 14-year-old in the junior speedway program. More that his parents, Darrel and Sandee Correy of Fullerton, had not believed their son when he told them he was becoming a racer.

Correy had been spotted by junior speedway supporter Bill Hancock riding a dirt bike at Saddleback Park in Orange. Hancock asked Correy if he wanted to ride a few laps on his son’s speedway bike.

“It looked like fun,” Correy said. “I rode that afternoon until I was ready to fall off the bike. I wanted to race.”

Hancock loaned Correy a bike, a pair of boots and riding leathers. On the day of his debut, Correy told his parents he was racing that night. They didn’t believe him.

But once the talented teen-ager started to win trophies, dad and mom were convinced. He blossomed into the junior program’s best rider, winning the title for scaled-down bikes in 1983 and 1984.

Today, the Correys’ living room is filled with trophies and plaques that are a tribute to the second-oldest of their four sons.

Correy, 19, has developed into the sport’s brightest--not to mention fastest--young rider. Despite standing only 5-feet 2-inches and weighing 115 pounds, Correy is a big man on the race track.

Like most successful riders, Correy had to advance through the ranks of speedway racing to become a top Division I rider. He graduated from the junior program in 1984 and was promoted the next season to Division III, a class that announcer Larry Huffman often refers to as “speedway’s answer to ‘The Gong Show.’ ”

“It was scary,” Correy said. “You don’t know what the other riders are going to do. I was taken out a few times by other riders who were out of control. I was glad to get out of there.”

It took Correy only two weeks to move up to Division II, where he found that most of the riders had comparable skills. He ultimately won the division’s point championship and earned a $1,000 bonus.

“I rode second division for a couple of months and felt comfortable,” Correy said. “But all along, I wanted to move up with the big boys in Division I.”

Correy got his chance at Ventura.

“I let the clutch out too fast on the starting line and flipped over backwards when the tapes went up,” he said. “Kelly Moran laid his bike down on the first turn and ran back to see if I was OK.”

Correy was dazed but recovered. He went on to win the track championship at Victorville and this year has become a 40-yard handicap rider in his first full season of Division I riding, meaning that he has become so good that he gets put back 40 yards from the starting line in handicap races. Most riders don’t become 40-yard handicappers until they have raced for at least two or three years.

He became a celebrity at Fullerton High School, where his racing exploits were often the topic of home-room morning announcements. But racing five nights a week and trying to graduate from high school was a heavy workload.

“I would get home from Ventura about 1 a.m. on Wednesday morning and San Bernardino at about midnight on Wednesday night and have to go to school the next day,” Correy said. “I took a bowling class on Tuesday and Thursday this semester that started at 7:30, but I didn’t have to be at school until 9 the rest of the week.

“I was on the principal’s honor roll my freshman and sophomore years, but my grades fell off a little when I started racing. I still graduated with about 10 units to spare. I didn’t have time to study. I never had time to get into anything in school while I was racing.

“It seemed like all I did was race, come home and sleep, go to school, come home to prepare the bikes and then go racing again.”

Correy decided that he wanted to enjoy his last week of high school and took a week off from racing for Senior Week. The decision cost him some valuable points in the rider’s standings as he dropped from fifth to ninth by missing five meetings.

“That was the last chance I was going to have to party and celebrate with a lot of my friends,” Correy said. “Racing is important, but that was something I wanted to do and will never be able to do again.”

Correy has won a couple of handicap main events at Costa Mesa, Ascot’s South Bay Stadium, Ventura and San Bernardino, but inconsistency has been his biggest problem. One week he’s ridden well enough to make the main event, the next week he fails to transfer out of his heat race.

“Sometimes I try so hard I blow it,” he said. “Other times, I’m calm and relaxed. You’re nervous when you first come out on the track in front of all those people, but as soon as you take off you don’t even notice the crowd. You’re too busy concentrating on what you’re doing.”

In Correy’s case, he’s concentrating on going as fast as possible. He is equipped with two four-valve-powered Weslake bikes that his sponsor, Charlie Larsen, bought for him at the start of the season.

Larsen, who owns a boat manufacturing firm in Costa Mesa, has been Correy’s biggest supporter during his speedway career.

This season, Larsen has invested $15,000 in equipment, accessories and riding apparel for Correy. He said Correy was a special rider, even in his days as a budding junior speedway rider.

“Ronnie rode one of my first junior bikes,” Larsen said. “I used to drag him and my son (Josh) out to Indian Dunes to practice. Ronnie was the only kid who could hold the bike sideways all the way around the track.

“He was also the only kid who ever blew up one of my bikes. He’s a hard-working kid. There’s something special about him on a speedway bike. He has that degree of balance that comes along only once in a great while. The last rider I saw like him was Kelly Moran.”

Correy has been described as a natural rider, but he said it took hours of practice to perfect his skills.

“You can’t jump on a speedway bike and go,” he said. “I did a lot of practicing on my own at Indian Dunes and Saddleback Park. I went to schools that Bruce Penhall and Mike Bast put on for new riders.

“I learned a lot of things the hard way. Once you do something wrong in speedway, you don’t make the same mistake again. Luckily, I haven’t broken a bone racing.”

Correy’s size is both an advantage and disadvantage in his racing. He claims his weight gives him an advantage on the straightaways, where he can maintain top speeds because he’s so light. But he has problems getting traction on his starts because he is so small.

He recently hired Dave Brant of Costa Mesa to do all his mechanical work so he can concentrate on racing. His goal this season is to qualify for the U.S. Championship at the Orange County Fairgrounds in October and finish in the top five.

“I’m going over to England once the season ends to check things out,” he said. “I’ve had offers from Sheffield and Wolverhampton to ride in the British Speedway League, but I want to see what the racing and living conditions are like before I make any commitments.”