At 48, Williams Aims for Milestone

By SHAV GLICK

Nov. 19, 2004 12 AM PT

When Rip Williams was 6 days old, in 1956, his parents took him to the old El Toro Speedway, where his father was running a micro-midget.

Forty-eight years later, the Ripper is still going to racetracks. Saturday, he will be aiming for his first championship as he races in the 50-lap Jack Kindoll Classic at Perris Auto Speedway, the final USAC/CRA sprint car main event of the season.

Williams has a 50-point series lead over Damion Gardner. Only 74 points are available, and Williams will collect 13 by qualifying.

Both have won this year at Perris, Williams three times and Gardner five.

Williams -- Rip is his given name -- will also be seeking the 100th win of a sprint car career that began in 1978 when he and his father, Bob, showed up at El Centro with a home-built car.

“Me and Dad sat down before that race and set a goal for ourselves, to win 100 races,” Williams said. “No one had done it back then, and it seemed like a nice thing to shoot for. All these years, I’ve never thought much about winning a series, it was all about winning one race, then another.”

That first night at El Centro, Williams said: “I just went around in circles. I didn’t have a clue. It was real dry and we had no idea how to set the car up.”

By the end of the season, though, he and Ric Paronelli were voted co-rookies of the year in the California Racing Assn. He won his first main event May 28, 1983, in the 50-lap Salute to Indy at Ascot Park, where he won 18 times before the track closed.

Although he hasn’t won a championship -- yet -- Williams twice finished second to Ron Shuman, once by 12 points and another by 16. Each time his car owner won the championship, but Williams fell short of a driver’s title because Shuman scored more points while driving for two owners.

“This year, it just sort of snuck up on his,” he said of his title chase in the inaugural USAC/CRA season. “It’ll be great winning for Jack and Sharon Jory, two great car owners.”

Only the late Dean Thompson, with 103, has more sprint car victories in the series that has gone from CRA to Sprint Car Racing Assn. to USAC/CRA since it began in 1946.

A former tailback at Garden Grove High who passed up college to go racing full time, Williams spends his off-weekends in Yorba Linda watching his three sons play football, one in high school and two in Pop Warner League.

Williams won the first Kindoll Classic in 1997 and among his other accomplishments are victories in the 1997 Oval Nationals, 1986 and 1990 Pacific Coast Nationals and 1984 North vs. South Civil War, an eight-race series between SCRA drivers and those from the Northern Auto Racing Club.

Dave Darland, 1999 USAC sprint car champion from Lincoln, Ind., and Cory Kruseman, two-time Oval Nationals winner from Ventura, will join the USAC/CRA regulars for the season finale.

Shades of the BCS

Speed Channel, wanting to stimulate interest in its driver-of-the-year award, is offering fans an opportunity to vote. The catch is that someone pre-selected eight drivers for voting purposes.

Kurt Busch, the NASCAR Nextel Cup series leader going into Sunday’s final race at Homestead-Miami, is not among them. Nor are Jeff Gordon, only 21 points behind Busch in third place, and John Force, winner of 13 National Hot Rod Assn. funny car championships.

On the ballot, however, are Ryan Newman, who has been eliminated from Nextel Cup contention, and Martin Truex Jr., champion in the Busch series, a lesser NASCAR class. Voting for Truex would be like baseball writers voting for a triple-A player for most valuable player in the major leagues.

The others, all legitimate, include series champions Tony Kanaan, Indy Racing League; Sebastien Bourdais, Champ Car; Steve Kinser, World of Outlaws; Tony Schumacher, NHRA top fuel; and from NASCAR, Jimmie Johnson, winner of four of the last five races, and Dale Earnhardt Jr., the likely winner in a popular vote no matter where he finishes.

Last Laps

Jason Line, driver of a Pontiac pro stock car, was named winner of the Auto Club’s Road to the Future trophy as rookie of the year at the NHRA awards banquet Monday. Line won four national events and was runner-up to his car owner, Greg Anderson, in the Auto Club Finals.

The Detroit River Regatta Assn. has acquired assets of the Unlimited Hydroplane tour, including the traditional Gold Cup, according to Tom D’Eath, president of the regatta association. The sport had fragmented last year after former series head Gary Garbrecht resigned.

This Week

NASCAR NEXTEL CUP

Ford 400

* When: Today, qualifying (Speed Channel, 10:30 a.m.); Sunday, race (Channel 4, 10 a.m.)

* Where: Homestead-Miami Speedway (oval, 1.5 miles, 8 degrees banking in turns).

* Race distance: 400 miles, 267 laps.

* 2003 winner: Bobby Labonte.

NASCAR BUSCH

Ford 300

* When: Saturday, race (Channel 4, 10 a.m.)

* Where: Homestead-Miami Speedway.

* Race distance: 300 miles, 200 laps.