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Austin
as born on Feb. 26, 2000 in Sarasota Florida. The day he was born, it just
so happens that my favorite driver had won the Busch race just seconds before
Austin entered this world. That driver being Mark Martin. How I was able to
get my wife Nancy to agree to watch a race during labor still puzzles me.
Although, I wasn’t able to turn up the volume. Besides, I think the
Doctor may have had something to say about it.
It
wasn’t long after he was born that we could tell he was gifted with
ability to do many things that kids his age were unable to do. He was walking
at 8 months. At 18 months old he was riding a three wheel stand up scooter.
A big mistake of mine was telling him that as soon as he could ride a two
wheel bicycle, I would buy him a dirt bike. We were camping and Austin asked
me to take off his training wheels. I told him he was going to wipe out. He
just took off and never looked back! Well, at three guess what Austin had.
A PW50 Yamaha. I had to hold it up for him as his feet did not reach the ground.
I would get it started for him and hold it up and tell him to hit it! He would
take off and ride his little heart out. When he got tired, he would just dismount
by jumping off and cutting the engine off at the same time. We later sold
the dirt bike as it was hard to ride in Florida sand. We ended up getting
an LT50 four wheeler. He loves riding and riding fast within reason.
Some
time after Austin was born, I saw Matt Martin racing Quarter Midgets on his
web site. That was the start of what we hope will be an awesome sport that
both Austin and I can enjoy for years to come.
Austin
had turned five and it was time to get started with novice training. August
of 2005 we set up our first lesson with JR Garcia at Ambassador Racing School
located in Balm Florida. It was a big surprise that Austin was a little intimidated
by the whole thing. He is fairly extraverted and has always riding his dirt
bike and four wheeler to the max speed I would allow him with the throttle
restrictors. He started out slow. After a few lessons and some bribes, he
began to pick it up. He finally got up to speed and it was time to get out
on the track with JR to test his skills with another car on the track. This
is also intended to test his knowledge of signals from the flag man. Well,
Austin decided he was going to slow up considerably. JR began to push him
down the straights. That wasn’t going to fly with Austin. He stepped
on the brake going into one with JR pushing him from behind. Austin spun into
the infield and that was the end of going fast for a while. We spent the next
few months trying to get him up to speed again. It wasn’t until December
31st that Austin was up to speed and I had told him that JR would be getting
out on the track with him again. He was prepared this time and ran with JR
at speed. Austin had finally passed novice training. We found a car for sale,
a Nervo Coggin 1900 76” car. We picked it up and I began immediately
tearing the car down to familiarize myself with it as well as to make it our
own. Austin wanted a red chassis and a yellow body. It was bright! We got
it all back together replacing the parts that needed to be replaced and we
are ready to go racing boys! Boogity, boogity, Boogity!
At this point, we have to make a special mention. I was in the process of trying to find a pit cart after painting the car. You are always able to find helpful people in racing but I met Neil Potter of Potter Racing and his son Louis. I had e-mailed Neil about a pit cart. He said he had a used one for sale and invited us over to the east coast to practice at Little New Smyrna Raceway. I felt this was opportunity because Austin has been very cautious in his driving to this point and New Smyrna has walls all the way around. The fastest way around is against the walls. Well we got there and Austin did take his time getting up to speed. After the third practice session and some adjusting on the car he got up to speed and didn’t seem to be worried about the walls. Neil was very helpful in many ways and we are appreciative of his help. He can be contacted at
Created
By NorPac Networks.com (2007)
