Changing Gears : Harboring a Dream of Racing Indy Cars, Kevin Bollinger of Granada Hills Plans Step Up to Formula Atlantic Circuit

Kevin Bollinger was outside his Granada Hills home in a building that looked more like a toy store for speed freaks than a 2-car suburban garage. Resting on trailers were a pair of gleaming red and white racing cars, one slightly larger than the other. Next to a wall were banks of stainless steel mechanic’s tools and a sign informing friends, “I would rather loan my dog than my tools--my dog can find his way home.”

Forget about gardening equipment, old furniture and other items usually stored in garages. Auto racing has taken over Bollinger’s garage--as well as his life.

“This whole year, I’ve done nothing but work and race,” he says, “which makes your personal life a little miserable.”

Bollinger, a 27-year-old bachelor who restores vintage cars and also works for Tri-C Engineering in Sun Valley, is an up-and-coming race driver, winner of his class in the recent Palm Springs Grand Prix and the overall points champion in the Formula Russell Series Mazda Cup. One of the cars in the garage is a Formula Russell, which resembles a scaled-down Indy car and is capable of speeds approaching 150 miles per hour.

Formula Russell is to Indy cars what ponies are to thoroughbreds; regardless of his skill, a rookie driver doesn’t jump in an Indy car and become Mario Andretti. “You won’t make it,” Bollinger says.

First, Indy cars are too expensive, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy and maintain. They are also too fast for inexperienced drivers.

But Formula Russell, a step up from top-of-the-line go-karts, is the perfect steppingstone to larger machines. So that’s why Bollinger’s garage also contains a Formula Atlantic car, which looks the Formula Russell’s big brother and can go 30 m.p.h. faster. After dominating the Mazda series in the smaller car, Bollinger plans to move up in 1989 and get closer to his ultimate dream: Indy cars.

Bollinger reckons that he has the talent. All he needs now is the money. His Formula Atlantic is 4 years old and outdated. A new car costs $60,000, without the motor, which runs about $20,000.

Big-time racing demands more than dedication and skill. It usually takes a wealthy relative or a corporate sponsor. Up until now, Bollinger has been sponsored by his father, Alex, a race-car buff and manufacturer’s rep for contamination-control equipment. Two years ago, Alex bought his son’s Formula Russell, which cost about $30,000, but with the stakes beginning to go up, the Bollingers have to seek corporate sponsorship.

It was Alex who got not only his son into auto racing but his wife, too. “We do everything as a family,” Kevin says.

Although Bollinger did not play sports at Kennedy High, he was a successful motocross racer and turned pro at 18. But his mother hated watching him. “I had to stop going,” Barbara Bollinger says. “My stomach couldn’t take it. Kevin knows only one speed--wide open--and would be leading in his race but wind up crashing. I was always afraid he’d come home in pieces. His father had to take him to the hospital a few times.”

A few years ago, Alex began restoring old Lotus GTs and the family got involved in auto racing. Even Barbara. All three Bollingers went to the Jim Russell Driving School at Riverside Raceway. Three years ago, the Bollingers trailered their Lotuses to Kansas City for vintage-car races. “Mom doesn’t scare herself and has a good time, which is what vintage racing is all about,” Kevin says.

The Kansas City race was Kevin’s first competitive racing experience and “I was hooked,” he says.

The following year he entered the Russell Graduate Series at Riverside, renting a Formula Russell for the races. Not only was he named rookie of the year, he won the series of 8 races and his parents wound up buying the car.

“It was a career thing,” Alex says. “If Kevin wanted to go to USC, we’d have paid for that, too.”

By 1987, Bollinger was into racing on a full-time basis but terms the experience a “learning year--it was a struggle,” he says.

Bollinger and a friend, Pete Consolo, who worked without pay and gave up his vacations from work, did all the mechanical work on the Formula Russell. Bollinger was always a mechanical whiz--”I’ve always been able to do anything”--but the time he spent under the hood last year prevented him from concentrating on driving.

So this year he hired a full-time mechanic, paying Steve Ekeren $1,300 a month to keep the car in racing shape. The result: Of 10 races in the Mazda series, Bollinger had 2 wins, 5 seconds and a third, clinching victory after only 7 races and winning about $15,000. He also entered a Formula Atlantic race, doing well enough to encourage him to move up in class next year.

“Kevin has the physical ability and maturity to go as far as he wants,” Alex says, “provided he gets what he needs to compete.”