SAN BERNARDINO, California -- The closest points battle at Orange Show Speedway will resume Saturday night, Aug. 19, when the high-powered Super Late Model stock cars return to the quarter-mile paved oval at the NOS Events Center.
Two veteran drivers, 51-year-old Glen Cummings and 63-year-old Ron Overman, are separated by just two points after eight of the 12 races on the schedule for the track’s premier class at the American Speed Association (ASA)-sanctioned track..
The lightning-quick Pro-4s and popular Late Model stocks will join the Street Stocks, Sport Trucks, Mini-StocKars and West Coast Pro Trucks for what promises to be an action-filled program. Spectator gates open at 5 p.m. and racing gets under way at 6:30 p.m.
Tickets are $10 for adults and $2 for children 6 to 12. Kids 5 and under are free. Parking, through Gate 3 off Mill Street, is $4 per car.
Cummings, from nearby Highland, has three wins and 312 points. Overman, from Lakeside in San Diego County, has a two wins and 310 points. Cummings grabbed the lead during the most recent appearance for the class, on Aug. 5, when he won the main event while Overman was finishing third.
That finish resulted in a four-point swing in the Orange Show Speedway points system, which awards 50 points for a main event win and two points less for each subsequent finishing position (50-48-46 and so forth).
With defending class champion John Manke of Ramona and former champion Mark Shackleford of Riverside tied for third, 44 points behind the leader, it’s a two-man race for the title. But Cummings said it’s too early to change his approach.
“The whole thing I started out doing this year was trying to run as hard as I can every race, and until the last race that’s what I plan on doing,” he said. “It seems like every time you back off and try to watch somebody else, you get involved in someone else’s deal. I’m just going to keep running hard and trying to win races. I think it’s going to be a fight down to the end. I’ve really just been trying to enjoy myself and having a good time and letting stuff fall where it does. It’s been nice.”
Cummings, who built his Chevrolet Monte Carlo and maintains it with brother Robert as crew chief, said he and Shackleford have a territorial rivalry with Overman, Manke and the others who migrated to Orange Show Speedway when Cajon Speedway closed early in 2005. No one takes it seriously, however.
“We want to do good because it’s our home track,” Cummings said of the Inland Empire drivers, “but we need them to be here to have a good show. Having the guys up here and racing has been very good. They’ve got good cars, there’s a handful of them that run really fast and hard and they’ve made us step up.”
Cummings won several track championships in the 1980s, then went racing in the NASCAR Southwest Series and at other venues around the southwest. He said, “It’s been a long time since I actually started a season at a track and run there (regularly enough) to be doing this good.
“It would be a neat thing to win this. It really would.”
If Cummings does win the championship, though, there could be a problem engraving the trophy. Do you spell his first name with one n or two?
“My mother prefers it with two, but I spell it with one ‘cause it’s easier,” he said, laughing.
There was one change in the Aug. 12 results. Apparent Sport Truck main event winner Spencer Samaro was disqualified after his Toyota failed post-race inspection and the win was awarded to on-track runner-up Ed Reid.
Racing at Orange Show Speedway is sponsored by Leno’s Rico Taco, Blackhawk Protection, CEC Embroidery, Golden West Tire, Lucas Oil, Soboba Casino, Budweiser, Sunoco Racing Fuel, Hoosier Racing Tires, Neff Rental, Pepsi, Loma Linda University Medical Center, J&M Trophy, Matich Corp., Lazer Radio, La Salle Medical Associates, California Highway Patrol and the San Bernardino County Sun newspaper.
For further information, call 909-888-6788, X438, or visit the speedway web site at www.nationalorangeshow.com/speedway.htm.
