Shuman Makes One More Try for Ascot Outlaw Win

Although he has already announced that he’s going to switch sanctioning bodies in 1988, Ron Shuman of Tempe, Ariz., will make one more try to win a winged World of Outlaws event at Ascot Park in the Midwinter Nationals, February 19-20.

The versatile Shuman, who put on one of the most sensational finishes of a 15-year career last fall, has decided to forgo the winged World of Outlaws series for a shot a the non-winged California Racing Assn. this year. However, Ed Ulyate, owner of the cars Shuman will drive, will supply him with a winged Challenger for his battle with the his touring companions of the last half dozen years in racing.

Among those he will compete against in the Midwinter are sprint car racing’s big three--Steve Kinser, Doug Wolfgang and Sammy Swindell.

Shuman does share a distinction with Kinser and Swindell. He’s the only other driver beside those two to win sprint car racing’s triple crown of the U.S. Nationals at Knoxville, Iowa, the Western World Championship at Phoenix and the Pacific Coast Nationals at Ascot. Shuman and Swindell did it without wings. Kinser did it last year with a wing. Wolfgang meeds am Ascot win next fall to become the fourth to accomplish the feat.

Otherwise, Shuman’s resume includes unique feats of his own. He’s a four-time winner of the Western World in his native Arizona. In midget auto racing, Shuman has won the U.S. Auto Club’s Turkey night 100-lap Grand Prix six times in the last nine years, including last Thanksgiving night.

That win climaxed a month-long tear that saw him win the CRA challenges races at Ascot and Manzanita when the Outlaws shed their wings, take a second behind Kinser in the Western World, win a regular CRA event and lose the season-ending Don Peabody Classic to Brad Noffsinger on the 50th and final lap.

In the World of Outlaws 53-race national schedule, he was living out of a motor home with his wife, Chris, school-age son, Casey, and baby daughter. In CRA competition--with most of the races at Ascot--he plans to commute from Phoenix. He will run some special races like the spring and fall Outlaw shows and the nationals at Knoxville.

Like Wolfgang and Swindell, Shuman will be using Challenger chassis built in Des Moines, Iowa. Owner Ulyate is the California representative for Challenge Racing.