Leffler Following in Tracks of Some Big Wheels

For young race car drivers with ambition and promise, the roads today lead to NASCAR, and for the very fortunate, they lead to Joe Gibbs Racing.

Joe Gibbs, the Super Bowl-winning coach turned race car owner, has Bobby Labonte, 35, contending for the Winston Cup championship, and Tony Stewart, 28, having the greatest rookie year in NASCAR history.

In the wings, he has Jason Leffler, like Stewart and three-time Winston Cup champion Jeff Gordon, a product of open-wheel racing with the United States Auto Club. Leffler, the 1998 USAC midget and Silver Crown champion and the current midget points leader, is testing the waters in Busch Grand National cars this year and will run a full schedule for Gibbs next year.

In the meantime, Leffler will continue to run open-wheel races, among them Saturday night’s USAC program at Irwindale Speedway, where he will drive in all three classes--Coors Silver Bullet (formerly Silver Crown), sprint car and midget.

“When I was a teenager, all I thought about was driving in the Indianapolis 500 and racing an Indy car all year,” said Leffler, 24. “But the way things are now, Winston Cup is where it’s at, even for open-wheel drivers.”

Stewart won Silver Crown, sprint and midget championships in 1995, the only time it has been done in USAC history. Gordon won two USAC titles before making his move to stock cars.

“It’s been a real learning curve for me,” the diminutive Leffler said. “The Busch cars are heavier and down in horsepower from what I’ve been used to. The hardest thing is getting them to turn.”

Leffler, who grew up in Long Beach, comes from an open-wheel environment. When he was 14 and 15, he swept floors, washed cars, cleaned mud off wheels, and did whatever he was asked to do in Parnelli Jones’ racing garage in Torrance.

“Parnelli’s been a big help to me, introducing me to important people, and teaching me how to race when I was starting out in TQs and midgets. My dad used to keep my cars in Parnelli’s garage, while I helped P.J. and Page [Parnelli’s sons] work on their cars. They were all great to me.”

P.J. is now driving in the CART series. Page is living in Indianapolis while undergoing therapy for head injuries suffered in a sprint car accident at Eldora Raceway in Ohio in 1994.

“Page is coming along pretty well,” Leffler said. “It’s slow, but he comes to a few of my races. He lives about three doors from me in Indianapolis.”

Leffler left Long Beach when he was 20 to join the Willoughby Racing team in Indianapolis.

“I kind of hated to leave Long Beach, but there wasn’t a whole lot of racing out here,” he said. “Pete Willoughby gave me the chance to run the whole USAC midget series and we won six races and the championship. That was 1997, and then I won again last year with Steve Lewis and have a good lead again this year.

“The one race I want to win is the Turkey Night Grand Prix, right here at Irwindale. I finished second last year [to Jay Drake] at Bakersfield.”

Lewis, a Laguna Beach magazine publisher, owned USAC championship midgets driven in 1993 by Stevie Reeves, 1995 by Stewart, 1996 by Kenny Irwin Jr. and 1998 by Leffler.

“One of the things that will help Jason is that he is a great test driver,” Lewis said. “He has the knack of getting his car up to speed right away. Some drivers only go about 75% for a few laps, but Jason gets it right to the limit. That is a big help to the mechanics. If the driver’s not up to speed, there’s nothing for them to relate to.”

One reason for Leffler’s move to stock cars is money--or the lack of it in open-wheel racing.

“Winning the Silver Crown isn’t very lucrative,” he said. “When Ken Schrader won in 1982, he got more than I did last year.” Leffler received $7,200 for the championship.

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What is a Silver Bullet car?

It is a throwback to the front-engine cars that ran at Indianapolis immediately after World War II, the most famous being Lou Moore’s Blue Crown Specials.

About the only difference from the classic upright chassis of that era, driven by Mauri Rose, Bill Holland, Johnnie Parsons and Troy Ruttman, from a Silver Bullet car is the roll cage designed to protect the drivers.

When Frank Kurtis built his first roadster for Bill Vukovich in 1953, the reign of the uprights at Indy was over. However, they continued to race as “dirt-track cars” in the AAA national championship season.

USAC established the Silver Crown series in 1971 to keep the old cars in business. Even though it was created for dirt-track cars, the series also runs on paved tracks, such as Irwindale.

“We have to have two completely different cars, one for dirt and one for pavement, to run the series,” Lewis said. Five of this season’s 14 races were run on dirt.

The Irwindale race will be the first in the immediate Los Angeles area. Among the entries are Jack Hewitt, who won all four main events at the 4-Crown Nationals at Eldora last year; Jimmy Sills, last Saturday night’s winner in Sacramento, and Brad Noffsinger, former California Racing Assn. champion.

MORMON METEOR

The Bonneville Salt Flats might never have become famous for land-speed records had Ab Jenkins, who later became mayor of Salt Lake City, not lobbied international speed demons away from the sandy beaches of Florida to the saline stretch of land west of his hometown.

Jenkins built one of the largest vehicles to make a record attempt, the Mormon Meteor. The third version, Meteor III, had a wheelbase of 142 inches, measured 250 inches overall, weighed 4,800 pounds and had a tail fin that stood six feet off the ground. Its Firestone tires were four feet high.

Jenkins never set a land-speed record, but he averaged 160 mph for 24 hours, driving on a 10-mile course on the salt flats. In those days, there were no seat belts, safety harnesses nor fireproof uniforms. Jenkins wore a white T-shirt and trousers, white rubber-soled shoes and sunglasses.

After Jenkins’ final run in 1939, the car stood in the Utah Capitol building in an enormous glass case for nearly 50 years. It was considered a Utah treasure.

A few years ago, it was removed for a Fourth of July parade and for some reason was not returned. Left outside, the Meteor deteriorated until Marv Jenkins, Ab’s son, convinced the state that it should be restored to its original grandeur.

After a $100,000 restoration that took Jenkins 30 months, it is on tour. This weekend it will be at Famoso Raceway in Bakersfield as a feature attraction of the eighth annual National Hot Rod Assn. California Hot Rod Reunion. When the three-day reunion ends Sunday, the Mormon Meteor will be on display, starting Wednesday, at the NHRA Motorsports Museum at the Pomona Fairplex.

BUSY BAKERSFIELD

Besides the NHRA’s California Hot Rod Reunion, racing fans in Bakersfield will have the 23rd annual October Classic, a weekend of NASCAR stock car racing.

All Kurt Busch needs to clinch the Featherlite Southwest Tour championship is to show up Saturday night for the 200-lap race around Mesa Marin Raceway’s half-mile oval. The Las Vegas driver has won the last three races, equaling a series record shared by Dan Press and Rick Carelli.

On Sunday afternoon, Mesa Marin will host the $106,000 Re-Refined Oil 250 for Winston West drivers. Sean Woodside of Saugus has won the last two Mesa Marin races and is the series leader with 1,740 points to 1,693 for Austin Cameron.

Only one race remains, the Coca-Cola 500 at Twin Ring Motegi in Japan, the first overseas NASCAR points race in history.

LAST LAPS

Roger Penske continues to make changes designed to restore his team to its former championship form. After dropping Al Unser Jr. and signing Gil de Ferran and Greg Moore, and dropping his own Penske chassis for Reynard, Penske is now replacing the Ilmor Mercedes engine, of which he is part owner, with Honda power for 2000.

The International Jet Sports Boating Assn. will conduct the championship rounds of its 18th Skat-Trak World Finals this weekend at Lake Havasu City, Ariz. Often described as “motocross on water,” the finals were originally to be held in San Diego, but were rescheduled when the California Coastal Commission said it needed more research regarding potential environmental impact on Mission Bay.

NASCAR has fined car owner Kyle Petty $15,000 and crew chief Jim Murray $2,500 for violating carburetor regulations. The altered carburetor was found in Adam Petty’s Busch series Chevrolet after qualifying for last Saturday’s race in Charlotte, N.C. The car was disqualified.

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This Week’s Races

WINSTON CUP, Winston 500

* When: Today, first-round qualifying (ESPN2, 1 p.m.); Saturday, second-round qualifying 8:45 a.m. (ESPN, 1 p.m., tape); Sunday, race (ESPN, 10 a.m.)

* Where: Talladega Speedway, (tri-oval, 2.66 miles, 33 degrees banking in turns), Talladega, Ala.

* Race distance: 500.08 miles, 188 laps.

* Defending champion: Dale Jarrett beat Jeff Gordon by 0.14 seconds, and won a $1 million bonus.

* Next race: Pop Secret 400, Oct. 24, Rockingham, N.C.

CRAFTSMAN TRUCKS, O’Reilly 300

* When: Today, race (ESPN, 5:30 p.m.)

* Where: Texas Motor Speedway (quad-oval, 1.5 miles, 24 degrees banking in turns), Fort Worth.

* Race distance: 187.5 miles, 125 laps.

* Defending champion: Inaugural event.

* Next race: No Fear Challenge, Oct. 30, Fontana.

CHAMPIONSHIP AUTO RACING TEAMS, Honda Indy

* When: Today, qualifying, 9:30 p.m.; Saturday, race (ESPN, 9 p.m.).

* Where: Australian Street Circuit (temporary road course, 2.795 miles, 12 turns), Surfers Paradise, Australia.

* Race distance: 181.675 miles, 65 laps.

* Defending champion: Alex Zanardi, now on the Formula One circuit, won his seventh race of the season. Dario Franchitti finished second.

* Next race: Marlboro 500, Oct. 31, Fontana.

INDY RACING LEAGUE, Lone Star 500

* When: Saturday, qualifying (Speedvision, 10 a.m.); Sunday, race, 11 a.m. (Channel 7, 1 p.m., tape).

* Where: Texas Motor Speedway (quad-oval, 1.5 miles, 24 degrees banking in turns), Forth Worth.

* Race distance: 312 miles, 208 laps.

* Defending champion: John Paul Jr. won the inaugural race, beating Robby Unser by about 10 car-lengths. Paul won for the first time since the 1983 Michigan 500 on the CART circuit.

* Next race: End of season.

FORMULA ONE, Malaysian Grand Prix

* When: Saturday, qualifying (Today, Speedvision, 10 p.m.); Sunday, race (Saturday, Speedvision, 11:30 p.m.; Sunday, Fox Sports West, 10 a.m., tape)

* Where: Sepang International Circuit (temporary road course, 3.443 miles, 15-turns), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

* Race distance: 189.365 miles, 55 laps.

* Defending champion: Inaugural event.

* Next race: Japanese Grand Prix, Oct. 31, Suzuka.