~ By Tom Boggie

When Lebanon Valley Speedway kicks off its 2023 season on Saturday night, Ken Tremont Jr. will begin to get a better idea if his great chassis switch is going to pay off.

After a long relationship with Troyer, and a handful of seasons running a Bicknell, the King of the Valley will be sitting in a PMC chassis built by his longtime friend Pete Chuckta. This isn’t the first time that Tremont has run a PMC; heck, he’s sat in just about every chassis ever built. But suffice it to say that anything before his association with Troyer is ancient history.

There’s no question that Tremont has been off his game with his big block at the Valley in recent years. Although he’s won 14 big block championships on the high banks during his career, he’s only got one championship in the last five years, and he’s only been to victory lane four times in the last four years.

Being the cynic that I am, is that lack of success a direct correlation to the fact that most chassis builders have switched from torsion bars to coil springs? Tremont has said repeatedly in recent years that setups change from one week to the next with a coil car.

And how is the switch to a PMC going to help out, taking into consideration that the PMC also uses coils?

“I wanted bars. Pete said no,” said Tremont last Friday prior to warmups at Albany-Saratoga Speedway. “My vote was for bars. At least I can be consistent with bars, I could have some repeatability. With coils, you can run good for two weeks with the same setup, and the third week, that same setup doesn’t mean a thing. I know I can be more consistent with bars.

“With coils, you can start with a basic setup, run a couple of laps and then come in and want to get hooked up better. You talk to five different people and they give you five different answers how to do it. There are guys who are running consistently with coils, but I’m not one of them.”

Tremont thinks that chassis builders are hesitant to go back to bars when everyone else is on coils.

“Maybe they don’t think the bars will keep up,” said Tremont, who has a record 141 victories at Lebanon Valley. “If someone comes along and repeatedly wins with bars, then it might change.

“It also has to do with track prep,” he added. “On a dry, slick track, you need that left side panhard and those short rods (used in a coil setup). You have to match the setup with the track surface, and right now, with the old-style setup, it would be hard to keep up.”

For the record, Tremont’s last win came in a car equipped with torsion bars. He won the Vermont 200 at Devil’s Bowl last September driving for old friend John St. Germain Jr. The 2019 PMC Tremont drove was the only car in the field with a torsion bar setup.

Tremont and Chuckta are in this for the long haul, if there is such a thing as a long haul in racing anymore. “It will mean more personalized help with me in the pits,” said Tremont. “It will give me another person to offer his thoughts, instead of just relying on my own.”

Tremont said that Chuckta hasn’t ruled out going back to bars, but the team plans to go all in to make the coils work. “We should have a better idea by August,” Tremont said with a smile.

MALTA NOTES
Marc Johnson debuted a brand-new Bicknell chassis last Friday at Albany-Saratoga Speedway, and brought the car home second in its maiden voyage.

That’s the short version of the story. The long version began last fall, when Johnson first brought a new Bicknell chassis for Malta Massive Weekend, beginning a short love-hate relationship
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“I didn’t like it then,” said Johnson after the finish of last Friday night’s feature. “Then we took it to Charlotte and I didn’t like it there. Then I didn’t like it for the first two weeks this year.”

So last weekend, Johnson made a call, which led to another call, which led to a new Bicknell chassis being delivered to Johnson’s house on Tuesday.

“We spent about 30 hours, with about six hours sleep, getting everything off the old car and onto the new car,” Johnson said. “We got it together and put it on the scales this morning.

“You know, I’ve done some crazy things, but I think this (preparing a new car in two days) is one of the craziest.”
So, I had to ask. Are you happy now, Marc?

“I’m still not happy with it,” he answered. “We just threw a random setup at it. We’ve still got some work to do.”

Johnson almost had his good run wiped out when he drove into the lapped car driven by Ed Kitchell coming out of the fourth turn with two laps to go in the 35-lap feature. “I didn’t think I was closing on him that fast,” Johnson said. “I thought I had more of a gap. He must have hit the brakes or something.”

It was good to see Ronnie Johnson back in victory lane. Starting on the outside pole, the 49-year-old Johnson led all 35 laps to break a winless drought that dated back to Aug. 20, 2021.

“We work hard on this,” he said after his win. “This is my life, and to win a race here is a real confidence-booster. Now, we just have to keep it going.”

Although RJ left Albany-Saratoga midway through the 2022 season to race at Utica-Rome, he confirmed that he’ll be at Malta every Friday night this season. “I’ve got a great support group here,” he said. “We’ve decided to run here all year.”

Kim Duell should sponsor pro stock features more often. For the second straight year, he sat in victory lane after a feature sponsored by his Twister Chassis fabrication business, and for the second straight year, he gave the extra money that would have gone to the winner to the drivers who finished second through sixth.

Duell held off a late charge from Chucky Dumblewski to record his 27th career win, which puts him just one behind Rob Yetman, who leads the pro stock division with 28 victories. Duell and Dumblewski were side-by-side on the last lap, but Duell got a big run out of the fourth turn on the final lap to get the victory.

“What a blast,” Duell said in victory lane. “I knew it was just a matter of time before someone got on me because we were slowing down a bit there at the end.”

More bad luck for Adam Pierson and Don Ronca. Pierson was in the wrong place at the wrong time on a restart on lap four, when Keith Flach bounced off the inside barrier in the fourth turn, shot to the outside and slammed into Darren Smith. Pierson was caught up in the chain-reaction and was done for the night. In the first three weeks of the season, Pierson has finished 17th, 13th and 28th.

Ronca looked like he might be on his way to a good finish when he pulled off the track with a flat tire while the field was under caution on lap 18. In three weeks, he’s run a total of 35 laps, with finishes of 29th, 27th and 22nd.

While fans were focused on the battle for second between Marc Johnson and Scott Huber, they missed a great charge by Peter Britten. He made a quick pit stop under caution on lap four and had to restart at the end of the 30-car field. But when flagger Rich Peterson threw the checkered flag, Britten had worked his way back to seventh. If Britten hadn’t gone to the rear of the field, there’s a good chance he would have been in the middle of the Flach-Smith incident.

Speaking of Huber, I’m going to wager that he’s going to get his first career win at Malta sometime this season. Just don’t ask me for a Kentucky Derby pick.

WHAT’S AHEAD
The big blocks will be competing for $3,500 to win in Saturday night’s opener at Lebanon Valley.

In addition to the regular divisions, All-Star and Junior Slingshots will be part of the racing card at Albany-Saratoga this Friday. The limited sportsman will be competing for $500 to win, courtesy of Gary and Patricia Van Alstyne.

Hall of Famer Brett Hearn will be back behind the wheel of a race car Sunday when the Super DIRTcar Series stops at Orange County Speedway in Middletown. Hearn, the winningest driver in the history of Orange County, will be driving a TEO prototype chassis with a motor provided by Brian Madsen, who owned Hearn’s cars during some of “The Jet’s” best seasons.

After a rash of rainy Sundays, Glen Ridge Motorsports Park will kick off its season on Sunday.