MINERSVILLE -- Just like a baseball player, race drivers get into slumps.
And there's nothing like a Texas League single or, in Duane Howard's case, the Coalcracker 100, to help turn things around.
For Howard, the only four-time winner of the event and long-time crew chief Alan Finch, the extra-distance races have been a cure for their slump in seasons past.
"For some unknown reason, every team I've ever been with, if it is because of my driving or what the circumstance is, I am always in a mid-to-end-of-season slump," Howard said. "We start out strong every year and then we have a real big lull, and then come back strong at the end of the year."
He has a feeling that the current slump he is in is turning around as he seeks an unprecedented fifth title on Aug. 31 in the 28th running of the event for the 358 modifieds.
The Coalcracker weekend kicks off on Friday, Aug. 29, featuring the Coalcracker 50 for the sportsman modifieds, the 358 modifieds non-winners' race and the ARDC Midgets. The roadrunners join the racing card Sunday.
Bob Emerich won the first Coalcracker in 1979 when it was a 50-lap affair. Since then, 15 different drivers have gone to victory lane in the 27 races run. The Coalcracker did not run in 1983 and 2005. The 100-lapper pays $10,000 to win.
Howard won back-to-back races in the early part of the season at Grandview, won the big block modified special at Big Diamond in April, and was poised to have a great season.
Up until three weeks ago, he was leading the points at Big Diamond and was in position for his seventh track title, but a DQ followed by a wreck the next week will have him finishing second to Jeff Strunk in the final point standings.
"It's not the year we were hoping for," Howard added. "Now we're on the upswing again and I feel we're going to hit (our) stride and I really feel the team is coming around."
Last Saturday night, while leading the feature at Bridgeport Speedway, Howard got a flat tire.
"That's the way the season's been going," he said.
Big Diamond ends its points and regular season tonight with a regular three-division show of 358 modifieds, sportsman modifieds and roadrunners.
Howard has five wins at Big Diamond in 2008. He's 18th in points at Bridgeport Speedway with one win and 15th in points at Grandview Speedway with three wins.
He started racing modifieds in 1989 after racing late models at Silver Spring Speedway and he's won extra-distance races at Penn National Speedway, Delaware International Speedway and Grandview Speedway. Howard's been close to wins in both the big block and 358 modifieds 100-lap features at Hagerstown's Octoberfest 350 and has yet to win at Syracuse.
He owns 60 career wins at the coal region oval.
According to Howard, he and the crew don't overanalyze these extra-distance events.
"I think we hit stride at the end of the season where some of the teams might be low on budget or running out of funds, where I think our race team is kind of gearing up and we become strong again," Howard said. "What is it that we get in the rut through the middle (of the season), I have no idea. But it seems to happen to me every single year. I think we don't overanalyze the race, I think we're just coming out of the rut at the right time."
Howard scored three of his four Coalcracker wins in 1989, 1999 and 2001. His fourth came in 2006.
"We're usually hanging in the top four or five and we're usually consistent enough that we don't overthink the race and we don't dial ourselves out of the event," he said of his success in the Coalcracker wins. "I think what stands out is we are always riding around lap 50 in the top five and we're prepared enough to make it to the end."
Craig VonDohren is the defending winner of the Coalcracker 100. The all-time winningest 358 modified driver at the track with 63 wins won his first Coalcracker in 1987.
He's been winning as of late with a victory in the 50-lap, $10,000 Forest Rogers Memorial at Grandview Speedway a few weeks ago and then winning back to back to start off the month at Big Diamond.
The Coalcracker 50 for the sportsman modifieds started in 2003 and has produced single wins by David Van Horn, Jason Hamilton, Willie Osmun and Jordan Umbenhauer.
Sports
Related Photos
-
Shawn Wood/For The Daily Item
-
-
Discussion
Motorsports: Howard: master of the Coalcracker
- Sports
-
-
College Lacrosse: Bucknell men prepare to improve upon great season
LEWISBURG -- It started a handful of years ago, when the Bucknell men's lacrosse team put a big 'X' on the national map in Central Pennsylvania with an upset of No. 1 Maryland. From that point on Bison coach Frank Fedorjaka has had a difficult time getting big-time opponents on the schedule, even with Bucknell opting to travel under the worst of circumstances.
-
High school football: Pratt says Kutztown the right fit
SUNBURY -- When Shikellamy's Tyler Pratt joins the Kutztown University football team as a free safety next fall, he will already have a good feeling for what his position coach will expect from him. Pratt, who signed a national letter of intent this week to accept a scholarship offer to play for the Golden Bears, will be under the tutelage of his father's high school football coach.
-
Todd Stanford On high school boys basketball: Increasing the refs' workload
If two heads are better than one, does that mean six eyes are better than four? Not necessarily, according to some Heartland Athletic Conference officials. There is a move afoot in the HAC to cut the number of basketball referees from three to two for part of the season beginning next year.
-
High School Roundup: Greenwood boys complete perfect TVL season
Greenwood capped off an unbeaten 2011-12 Tri-Valley League season by crushing Halifax 61-38 on Thursday Night.
-
Shikellamy Braves pull away from Shamokin
SUNBURY — Tyler Pratt kept Shikellamy in the game in the third quarter Wednesday, scoring all seven of the Braves’ points. He then got some help in the fourth.
-
High School Roundup: Selinsgrove tops Jersey Shore
JERSEY SHORE — With the game tied at 32 at the half, the Selinsgrove boys basketball term went on a big run in the third quarter to open up the game and take a 65-56 Heartland Athletic Conference Division I win over Jersey Shore on Wednesday.
-
Shikellamy Braves rally to stay alive
SELINSGROVE — With 11 losses, the Shikellamy girls basketball team is teetering on the brink of elimination from the District 4 Class AAA playoffs. And on Wednesday night, it looked like the Braves were going to go quietly into the offseason when Selinsgrove built a 14-point lead early in the third quarter.
-
They learn to be tough young
It's difficult to recall exactly how the sequence unfolded because it happened so darn fast. Shikellamy made a couple baskets, and the crowd began to stir. It was still anybody's game, and the Braves had some momentum late in the third quarter of a recent run with Danville.
-
Motorsports: Selinsgrove, Lincoln speedways to host 360 sprint series
MECHANICSBURG -- Mach 1 Chassis of Mechanicsburg will be the title sponsor of the Mid-Atlantic 360 Sprint Car Championship Series, a $120,000 six-race tour that will include five shows at Selinsgrove Speedway and one event at Lincoln Speedway in 2012.
-
Girls basketball: Records fall, Red Tornadoes stay unbeaten
SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT -- An overflow crowd zealously cheered Tierney Pfirman's pursuit of the South Williamsport scoring record throughout Tuesday's game, until their breathless faces matched the Mounties' royal blue.
- More Sports Headlines
-
