Locals look for Dirt Cup success at Skagit Speedway

Winning the Jim Raper Memorial Dirt Cup is about much more than collecting one of the nation’s largest single-race payouts for sprint cars.

Finishing first in Skagit Speedway’s three-day annual event also means earning bragging rights over some of the best 410 Sprint Car drivers in the country. That’s an especially attractive idea for local racers, who’ve endured years of victories by visiting racers.

“Dirt Cup has always been one of those things that you wanted to be the first local to do it after all those others,” said Jayme Barnes of Marysville, the defending champion and first Skagit Speedway regular to win the race since 1992. “The pay’s good and not many around here can say they’ve done it. A lot of guys try their whole lives to do it. Luckily we have.”

The 38th Dirt Cup kicks off Thursday, continues Friday and concludes with a $25,000-to-win feature on Saturday night. Gates open at 5 p.m. each night with racing starting at 7 p.m.

Skagit Speedway is celebrating its 55th anniversary this year, and as it has been since the first race was run in 1972, the Jim Raper Memorial Dirt Cup, with an overall $150,000 purse, is one of the biggest draws at the three-tenths mile banked clay oval, bringing racers and fans from as far away as Australia.

“The heritage behind Dirt Cup makes it one of the biggest events across the nation,” said Skagit Speedway owner Steve Beitler. “This is one of those races that all sprint car fans and media outlets watch to see who wins.”

Raper, a four-time Skagit Speedway champion, track promoter from 1966 until his death in 1984, and 2005 inductee into the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in Knoxville, Iowa, came up the idea to put on a race with a large enough purse to attract the best 410 drivers in the country.

Former winners include current NASCAR Sprint Cup star Kasey Kahne of Enumclaw, whose victories in 2002 and 2003 marked the first time a Washington native recorded back-to-back Dirt Cup wins.

Although drivers are guaranteed to race on Thursday and Friday, they must gather enough points in those qualifying rounds to earn a starting spot in Saturday night’s preliminary mains and scrambles, which set the field for the Race of Champions.

“I’ve always known a local could do it,” said Rick Fauver of Everett, a 23-year veteran of sprint car racing at Skagit Speedway. “It’s getting the right equipment … getting through the first two nights unscathed, getting into the (scrambles).”

Along with Fauver and Barnes, current 410 division points leader Jesse Whitney of Stanwood, Colton Heath of Everett and defending champion Barry Martinez of Lynnwood are Skagit Speedway regulars with a good chance at keeping the Dirt Cup home for a second straight year.

Whitney, Skagit’s 410 champion in 2004, has two main event wins to date and has set fast time in qualifying six times. Heath has won features in three different classes at three different tracks this season — 410s at Skagit, 600cc Mini Sprints at Deming and a Midget at Gray’s Harbor — and 2005 and ’08 Skagit 410 champion Martinez also has two feature wins so far, including last weekend’s Dirt Cup tune-up.

“All those guys, plus (former World of Outlaws driver) Jason Solwold (of Mount Vernon),” said Beitler when asked which locals could do well at Dirt Cup. “The nice thing is the Pacific Northwest has a lot of really good talent. They start at (Skagit Speedway’s) quarter-midget track, go up to Deming for Mini-Sprints, then come back and they’ve been racing for 10-15 years.”

Barnes grabbed the lead in last year’s Race of Champions by diving between two lapped cars to pass Tyler Walker of Los Angeles on lap 12 of the 40-lap event. Barnes then held off Walker and the rest of the field through numerous restarts en route to the win.

Although there have been several other big events in Barnes’ life since winning Dirt Cup ¬— the 31-year-old married Shauna Barnes in April; the two have a 1-year old daughter, Jaelynn — a few weeks ago it looked like he would be in the grandstands, not defending his title after burning up a piston in his own car.

Fortunately for Barnes, Alan Larson and Kelly Welch of LAW Motorsports were looking for a driver for their No. 33 car. Having known Barnes for several years, Larson felt the defending Dirt Cup champion would be a good addition to their team.

“We’re just as excited as can be to have him drive our car; We honestly weren’t planning on running (Dirt Cup) because we didn’t think we would be competitive,” Larson said. “Once he agreed to run the car, then our plans obviously changed.”

Among the drivers expected to make the trip to Alger to compete this year are two-time Dirt Cup champion Jonathan Allard of Chico, Calif., Tim Kaeding of San Jose, Calif. — son of three-time Dirt Cup winner Brent Kaeding — and Sammy Swindell of Germantown, Tenn.

*1972Ross Fontes

1973Gary Patterson

1974Jimmy Sills

1975Jan Opperman

1976Jimmy Boyd

1977Jimmy Body

1978Doug Wolfgang

1979Doug Wolfgang

1980Jimmy Sills

1981Leeland McSpadden

1982Jimmy Boyd

1983Tim Green