They’re Taking Stock : Some at Cajon Speedway Have Big Plans; Others Just Have a Thing About Going Fast

It’s Saturday afternoon, and the living is good at Cajon Speedway.

A smattering of fans diligently climb the chipped but sturdy bleachers to get early-bird seats for optimum viewing. The concession stands are already catering to the pit crews, drivers and other volunteers who drop by between practice rounds.

This is really what weekends were made for:

Stock-car racing.

This is the day of the week that boils the blood of the avid stock-car fan.

Drivers live for it. Fans live for it. Low-profile pit crews live for it. This is the one day each week that stock-car racing loyalists can get their fill of pure, unabashed speed.

Cajon Speedway is in the midst of its 28th NASCAR Winston Racing season, which began in April and runs through October, duplicating the season of its brother on the national scene, the Winston Cup circuit. It features NASCAR super and sportsman stock cars and Cajon Speedway Car Racing Assn.’s street, bomber and pony stock cars.

At the top of the racing classes at the track is the super sportsman division. Because of the high cost of keeping a machine in prime running and safety order, the super sportsman division has dwindled in numbers and has been replaced by the sportsman class as the main event.

The smooth operation of Cajon Speedway depends largely on the Brucker family: father Earle, 63, and his sons, Steve, 37, and Kevin, 33. Earle is the manager, Steve is in charge of personnel, and Kevin deals with advertising.

“I’ve been playing this game for 32 years,” Earle Brucker said of his association with the race track. “But at the present time, I’m what you’d call the head gardener. I only do the stuff I like to do. I let everyone else do the rest.”

For the novice racer, the pony division is the first level of competition. Racers then work their way through the ranks of bomber, street, sportsman and super sportsman.

According to Steve Brucker, it’s all a question of dollars and skill, with emphasis on the dollars.

“It’s the money, really,” he said of the difference in classes, “plus the skill level needed to build and maintain it.”

The cost of a pony or bomber car runs between $2,500 and 3,000; street stock cars cost anywhere from $7,000 to 12,000 to finance. Sportsman cars cost between $8,000 and $20,000, and the super sportsman cars start at $20,000.

Tires are the second-biggest expense. Street cars require new tires every week, and the sportsman and super sportsman cars need new tires twice a month.

The speed these cars reach is one of Earle Brucker’s primary concerns.

“My job is to keep them from going too fast,” he said. “They keep finding ways to get faster, and I keep finding ways to slow them down.”

The record for a lap on Cajon’s 3/8-mile track is 87.21 m.p.h., with a top speed of 113.37 on the straights.

“Safety is the first reason we keep the speed down,” Earle said. “The second is financial. The faster you go, the more it costs.”

Stock-car racing at Cajon Speedway has a short and sometimes stormy history, Earle Brucker said.

He explained that in the 1950s, the plot of land that is now the speedway was intended to be built into a ballpark and a spring training facility for a major league baseball team.

When a change of law forced the abandonment of this idea, Earle’s father, Earle Sr., obtained the lease for the land and built a stadium.

From 1958 to 1960, it was used for high school football and motorcycle racing.

In the fall of 1960, the Chargers moved down from Los Angeles and took over Balboa Stadium, where auto racing was a successful draw.

At this time Tom Jackman, who had strong ties in the racing community, approached Earle Sr. with the idea of building a quarter-mile oval track at his stadium.

Cajon Speedway celebrated its opening night on July 15, 1961. Less than a year later, the Speedway Racing Assn., predecessor of the Cajon Stock Car Racing Assn., was formed.

Cajon raced modified or sprint cars until 1962, when the super stock cars, which look more like the cars sold at National City’s Mile of Cars, gained in popularity. The oval track was enlarged to 3/8-mile for the 1965 season and was paved the next year.

In 1971, the county decided it didn’t want to renew Jackman’s lease, but the CSCRA found a lawyer who ensured that the county couldn’t stop the Bruckers from racing cars. Only one race was run in 1972, but the speedway returned to full action in 1973.

But Cajon Speedway has weathered another trend.

Ten years ago, California auto racing tracks were closing at an alarming rate because of the high cost of land. Only Garden Grove and San Bernardino have tracks that remain open in Southern California.

Luckily, in a sign that perhaps the worst is over, some tracks are being renovated.

“Not too many have closed lately,” Steve Brucker said, “and the hearties have been able to ride this thing out. They are beginning to rebuild the ones that have already gone down.”

The 50-year lease on the property where Cajon Speedway is located expires in 2005.

The July closing of the Riverside International Raceway left California without a major Winston Cup track. But Steve Brucker said that next year, a race is scheduled at a track now being built in San Jose.

But drivers on the way to San Jose must first get past the smaller venues, such as Cajon Speedway. The road to the Winston Cup is a road lightly traveled, Steve Brucker said.

“It just doesn’t happen too often,” he said. “You have to have major sponsorship, and you almost have to have a dad or someone in the high ranks helping you.”

A racer would have to win a championship on a local track, then move on to the Southwest Tour, the premier West Coast racing series on 14 tracks in California, Arizona, Nevada and Washington. The process could take years and never be completed.

“Like I said,” Steve said, “it’s a long road.”

All of which leads Earle to speak of the commitment of the Cajon racing community.

“It doesn’t take long to see what these guys sacrifice for you to have respect for them,” Earle said. “It’s a very unselfish and demanding sport.

“This is not just a fun deal. We’re a family-oriented operation. Friendships are important. You have something in common with the guy who’s sitting next to you or racing next to you. It’s a lot more than a race on a Saturday night, it’s a life style.”

Some drivers use Cajon Speedway as a steppingstone toward the upper circuits. Others use it as a quick fix for a habit that’s hard to break.

John Borneman, 39, of Ramona, is a competitor. He is trying to win his second consecutive sportsman title at Cajon Speedway and is in first place.

Borneman started racing in 1968 at Cajon Speedway, but he became acquainted with the track much earlier.

“My uncle got me interested in racing,” Borneman said. “I used to come out here all the time. I even used to sweep the stairs after the races.”

When he began racing, his progression came at a rapid-fire pace.

“I did so well, within seven weeks, they told me I had to move up to the street stocks,” Borneman said.

By the late 1970s, Borneman was competing in NASCAR’s Winston West circuit. His biggest victory was in 1978 in a series race in Spokane, Wash., at the Evergreen Speedway, where he beat a young driver by the name of Bill Elliott.

Two years later, the plastering contractor dropped out of racing.

“I didn’t have a family when I first started,” Borneman said, “but after I was married, I felt guilty because I put all of my family’s money into this. Then I quit, I thought I was all done.”

But Borneman had underestimated the effect that quitting would have on his family. He was back racing for the 1987 Cajon Speedway season.

“I felt I had cheated (my family) and I wanted to give something back to them. My kids would see my scrapbooks and they’d say, ‘Look, Daddy did that.’ I knew I had to go back and without their support, I wouldn’t be here at all.”

Borneman and his wife, Debbie, exchanged wedding vows on the track at the speedway in 1974, and Debbie comes out to watch him race as often as she can. Of their children, John, 11, Eddie 19, and Cassandra, 7, only Eddie choses not to race.

“My kids are into racing,” Borneman said. “Eddie’s not, but John Jr. and Cassandra are. They love it. They’re out here every week. We have a little circular dirt track at home where John Jr. drives a four-wheeler. He’s going to be better than I am. He even put me on my head last year. I’ll be in this another five years, just keeping his fire burning. “

The things he teaches his little racers are timing, how to drive with a throttle and brake, acceleration, and steering.

Borneman said the qualities of a good driver include physical stamina.

“Anyone can go fast a couple of laps,” he said, “but I say race car drivers are athletes. In a 200-lap race, you have to be there at the end. At Indy, the racers go 200 m.p.h. There, you don’t get a timeout. A pit stop is all you get.”

Also important, he said, are excellent timing, physical symmetry and a sort of sixth sense of what’s happening around them.

“Timing is everything, how you read traffic, when and how you pick up the acceleration. From your feet to the brain, everything better work as one. And you have to be able to read things around you.”

A good pit crew is another must. “It’s a thankless job,” he said. “I can have all the talent in the world, and without a good crew, it won’t be any good.”

When he’s not playing coach, Borneman readies his car for Saturday nights, where every night brings an important race. After winning 15 of 19 races last year, Borneman said he is tempted with the idea of trying the Winston Cup.

“My No. 1 goal is to go to Daytona Beach,” he said.

On his mandatory shopping list for that venture is a good car. And for that, he needs corporate sponsorship.

“Sponsorship is the name of the game. Without it, you can’t get to the Winston Cup,” he said.

Borneman is now sponsored in part by Mark Norris, the man who is in first in the super sportsman standings and hasn’t missed a race here in 17 years.

But Borneman said he would welcome more sponsorship, should the opportunity arise.

He used to paint his car blue and yellow, symbolizing the Chargers, and Borneman said he could really use some Charger sponsorship.

“If I could get (Charger owner) Alex (Spanos) to give me some of what he gives those guys for signing, I could race for a year,” he laughed.

Borneman said that Cajon is pivotal proving ground for young drivers.

“Here, the guys see if they have what it takes to move on.” Borneman said. “Only about 1% make it, but every driver here aspires to be with the big boys.”

While he is one of the speedway’s older racers, Borneman said he feels age is an advantage.

“There’s no set age for racing, but the more experience you have, the better off you are. Here, the average age is under 30. This is a young men’s track.”

Or a young woman’s track. Jody Lockmann, 30, of Santee is the flip side of the competitive spirit. She has no grand illusions of becoming the next Shirley Muldowney.

Said Lockmann: “For my husband and I, we’re very comfortable with what we’re doing. It’s just our hobby. It’s how we have fun.”

Lockmann is in eighth place in her third racing season in the street stocks division at the speedway and is the only woman in the top 10 of any division. Her husband, Harry, is second in the same division.

She races not out of desire to go anywhere with her avocation, but simply because she is hooked.

They first drove at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium in 1983, Jody Lockmann said, in a “slalom race” that could be entered by anybody off the street. Harry Lockmann became enchanted, but Jody drew some extra attention.

Explained Jody: “A guy saw me racing at the stadium and offered me a street stock ride (at Cajon Speedway). I didn’t want to do it, but my husband said to go for it. I was kind of living out his dreams at first. We got a car and fixed it up to race in the bomber division. We were supposed to share the ride, but instead we went out and bought another car.”

Between heats at the track recently, she said, “It’s addicting. If you do well, you get so pumped up. When you do lousy, you’re low, and I mean low.”

She said she finds racing almost a game of mind control.

“It’s very challenging for me, personally, for me to be able to keep my emotions under control and to keep my mind on what I’m doing. You have be be alert, and when an opportunity arises, you have to take it. You can’t sit there and wait for things to happen. Your mind is constantly taking everything in.”

Although she is one of a handful of woman drivers to roam the pits, Lockmann said her presence in a male-dominated sport is inconsequential.

“In this division, I’m the only woman,” Lockmann said, “and that adds to the challenge for me. But the drivers don’t treat me any differently. They have to pass me just like I have to pass them.”

And in passing them, she still can do it all for fun.