The 4^th Turn

~ By Tom Boggie

Ken Tremont Jr. came up with a great quote last Friday after getting his first modified victory of the season at Albany-Saratoga Speedway.

“It’s not like you can put a magic bar on the car and your troubles are over,” he said.

In 1995, Hillary Clinton wrote a book titled, “It Takes A Village, and Other Lessons Children Teach Us.”

In Tremont’s case, it takes a conglomerate. Just call it Tremont Inc.

“This is a total group effort,” said Tremont. “It’s the Malta team, the Lebanon team, and we’ve learned some things at Devil’s Bowl that have helped.

“We’ve got three separate teams. I’ve got my Friday night guys, and on Saturday, it’s a whole different deal, with a different car and a different truck. Then, on Sundays, it’s me and my dad and Mike Sullivan. But we all bounce ideas off each other.”

And Tremont Inc. doesn’t stop there. When I walked into victory lane at Albany-Saratoga after Tremont’s victory, the first person I ran into was Troyer Race Cars owner Blll Colton. Colton began working for Maynard Troyer as a sheet metal fabricator in 1981, and bought the business from Troyer in 1999. I can remember the first time Colton set up a complete satellite shop during Super DIRT Week at the State Fairgrounds in Syracuse in 1993. Colton did some work on Tremont’s car that weekend, and Tremont finished second in the Wheels 300.

No one knows a Troyer better than Colton, and there he was Friday, with the Tremont camp.

But it doesn’t stop there. Tremont has also been picking the brain of Carlton Hughes, who used to field cars for Tommy Corellis.

“Carlton has been hanging around with us for years,” said Tremont. “He’s got a lot of good insight. He’ll watch other guys race, and when he sees something, he’ll say, ‘Hey, this guy is doing this,’ or that guy is doing that. And he’s not afraid to tell me what I’m doing wrong. It’s just another experienced voice.”

Tremont has cut back on his racing program this season, dropping the small block modifieds at Lebanon Valley out of the picture. He’s got three big block wins at the Valley, and had won four sportsman/modified races in a row at Devil’s Bowl until he was involved in a multi-car wreck last Sunday and saw the streak come to an end.

But the kingpin of Tremont Inc. also admits that there are times when he’s probably the biggest problem the team has.

“It doesn’t help when the driver comes to the track in a bad mood,” he said. He wouldn’t elaborate, just adding, “I can’t say anything else. I have to watch out who I piss off.”

No one was pissed off Friday night. Maybe Colton and the Tremont conglomerate hit on something that will help him finish the season strong. Maybe they just found a combination that only worked once, adapting for one night to a race track that has been uncharacteristically fickle this season.

Hey, even when you’re a 13-time champion, you can’t put on a magic bar and your troubles are over.

MORE FROM MALTA

Mike Coffey Jr. picked a perfect time to get his first career sportsman victory at Albany-Saratoga, winning last week’s Fifth Annual Mark Hughes Remembrance race.

Coffey Jr., who blew the driveshaft in his car and didn’t even make the feature the previous week, had to hold off defending champion Tim Hartman Jr. to get the win. They were dead even going by the flagstand on the white-flag lap, but Hartman Jr. drifted a little too wide in the fourth turn on the final lap, letting Coffey Jr. win by a car length.

“When I saw Timmy, I knew I was in trouble,” Coffey Jr. said in victory lane. “I’d never pick myself over Timmy.”

What a difference a week makes. Two weeks ago, Elmo Reckner followed Brett Hearn across the finish line, with Hearn getting his 135^th career win and Reckner finishing second. Last week, Reckner again followed Hearn across the finish line. This time, Hearn finished 23^rd and Reckner was 24^th. Hearn had a rough night. First, he and Reckner banged together on the first lap of their heat race, then he and Ronnie Johnson made hard contract going down the backstretch on the fourth lap of the feature, sending both cars to the pits for quick repairs.

Hearn’s finish probably ended any chance he had of successfully defending his track championship. Marc Johnson finished second Friday, extending his points lead over Matt DeLorenzo to 18 (476-458). They are followed by Peter Britten (444), Tremont (442) and Hearn (422).

Hartman Jr. took a big step toward his second straight sportsman crown with his second-place run Friday. With Connor Cleveland finishing 15^th, Hartman Jr. now has a 498-464 lead.

Nice run by Rich Ronca last week. Ronca finished fourth in the modified feature, his best finish since a fourth on July 24, 2006. His last top-five finish was a fifth on Sept. 1, 2017.

During the sportsman feature, track officials spotted a fan watching from the trees off the third turn. Not from the ground; he had climbed up about 15 feet into one of the trees. He must not have been around when C.D. Coville took the Barcomb No. 11 into those trees.

AROUND THE TRACKS.

Obviously, good things come to those who wait. Veteran Floyd Billington won last week’s SCoNE sprint car feature at Devil’s Bowl. That was his first win at the Bowl since taking a checkered flag in a sportsman feature in 1999.

Jeff Trombley, another former modified driver, won last Friday’s CSRA sprint car feature at Afton Motorsports Park.

Lebanon Valley promoter Howie Commander celebrated his 75^th birthday last weekend by paying $7,500 to win for the King of the Dirt modified feature. Matt Pupello started on the pole and walked off with the top prize. The engine in his car was one of the experimental engines that Mike Petrucci developed just for the Valley.

Stewart Friesen finished second in both modified features last Saturday at Fonda (he finished second with a bent-up front end in the first one, and the Halmar team rebuilt the front end before the second 20-lapper), but then came up with a big payday Sunday in the STSS South Region race at BAPS Speedway in Pennsylvania. That victory was worth $10,000.

By now, everyone knows that Friesen had his Halmar truck confiscated last Thursday at Kentucky Speedway. During inspection, NASCAR officials said they found the truck to be unacceptable and confiscated it for further evaluation after finding a firewall issue with the truck.

That evaluation happened Tuesday, and NASCAR issued no additional penalties.

Friesen had to start at the rear of the field (32^nd) at Kentucky, and wound up finishing second, which kept him second in the Gander Truck point standings. No team members were penalized.

In the blast from the past department, Harry Shaffer won last Thursday’s sportsman feature that took place at Brookfield Speedway as part of the Madison County fair. That was the first race at Brookfield since Mike Budka Jr. ran the place in 1995.

Five Northeast tracks, including Fulton and Brewerton, have already canceled this weekend’s racing because of heat indexes that are expected to be in triple digits.

Fonda Speedway will be having its Hall of Fame induction ceremonies Saturday, with Dave Camara, Randy Glenski, Jack Cottrell and the late Danny Ody being honored. All have ties to Albany-Saratoga Speedway. Dave Camara is a former modified champion; Glenski and Jack Cottrell used to battle door-to-door in their late models (Glenski in his Chevy Nova and Cottrell in the Hemi Barracuda); and Ody ran a mini-modified at Malta. He once won the Hangover 100 in a big, old Cadillac that Mark Krosky bought at an auction. If I’m not mistaken, that was “Krash Mender’s” only victory as a car owner.