E3 Spark Plugs News

Tim Spurlock started wrenching with his dad as a kid and was just a teenager when he began building engines as a part-time, after-school business. Twelve years ago, he opened his own paint and body shop which since has grown to two locations with 15 employees. Clearly, his blood is tinged with motor oil. And maybe a little mud. Now, he’s riding high – and fast – as one of his area’s top mud bogging champions.

The latest Team E3 Racing Tier 2 winner has a penchant for rebuilding and restoring classic Ford trucks, particularly those from 1953-1979. So when he decided three years ago to build a full mud racing truck, he chose a 1978 Ford F150 that he highly modified for competition. That choice proved a good one.

“In the last two years I have been undefeated in two classes for our local series, won a class at every race I have entered in the surrounding three states – a total of 18 first place finishes in 2012 alone,” says the New Paris, Indiana resident who last year partnered with the New Paris Speedway to produce and promote a new mud bog series that has prove wildly popular with regional competitors. “People know my truck is serous and will be putting on a show when it hits the mud.”

While he certainly enjoys the winnings and bragging rights, Spurlock and his Old Blue Mud Racing team truly love hanging with fans at competitions, car shows and cruise-ins.

“At competitions, we spend half the day in the pit area showing and discussing the truck with interested spectators,” he says.

Spurlock and his team often forfeit winnings to benefit area charities and causes. He loyally attends bogs with competitor payouts, where the funds benefit the local Hospice and Camp Millhouse, a summer retreat for children and young adults with mental and physical disabilities. And this year, he headed up the Michiana Mud Bog Series, a partnership between the New Paris Speedway, Ruffriders 4×4 and South Bend Sod Busters, expected to raise several thousands of dollars for worthy causes. Even when he’s off the competitive track, he’s still on the dirt, running off-road ATVs and dirt bikes and camping with his family.

From all of us here at E3 Spark Plugs, congratulations and welcome to the team, Tim!

It all started with a mystery Christmas gift. Then 15 years old, James Steffenhagen, Jr. was a bit perplexed when he unwrapped a small package that contained a toggle switch.  But when he realized that the switch was for a car’s ignition system, it all made sense.

“It confused me at first,” said Steffenhagen, the newest Team E3 Racing Tier 1 winner. “But then Dad explained that it was my turn to get into the car and see what I could do.”

Steffenhagen had been enamored with the racing world since he was 10 years old. His Uncle Ed Steffenhagen ran NASCAR modifieds at tracks throughout New York and Pennsylvania and his father worked crew. Eventually, both of James’ parents would race as well, his father driving a street stock numbered 31. So, it’s no wonder that the youngest Steffenhagen would anxiously await his turn behind the wheel of a racecar.

“The car we had was older, obtained cheap after a big wreck, and put back together, complete with home built motor,” Steffenhagen says of his first racing ride. His first time competing proved he had some potential – “which means, I didn’t get lapped,” he says. But victory would prove elusive early on.

“I had dreams of winning, holding the flag in victory lane, but it didn’t happen that way,” he recalls. “After a few good wrecks, and some bad finishes, I started to think maybe it was me, maybe I just didn’t have what it takes. I immediately dismissed this however, because to me, I was driving that thing as hard as it would go.”

Steffenhagen refused to give up. He continued racing and gleaning pointers from fellow competitors and racing vets. Some advice he put into practice – other tips, he tossed. Still, cracking the top 10 in race finishes and series points proved tougher than he had expected.

“Someone said, ‘It’s just bad luck,’” he recalls. “I couldn’t accept that. In my head the same four or five guys were winning every week, and no one’s luck is that good.”

To debunk the luck theory, Steffenhagen began pouring himself into researching what makes a winning racecar. He found a book that explained “just about everything there was to know, from Ride Height, to cross weights and so on,” he says. Once he put his newfound knowledge – and a little superstition – to work, things changed quickly. He finally – and consistently – began finishing in the top 10 of nearly every race.

“I couldn’t help but remember that line though, ‘It’s just bad luck’. So to challenge, that I changed the number from 31, to 13. First one win, then six, then seven straight feature wins. Needless to say, my lucky number is 13.”

Steffenhagen has been a regular on the winner’s podium for both race wins and series championships ever since.

He’s currently on the Big 10 Super Stock Series Roster and plans to make his 2013 season debut May 17 at Spencer Speedway in Williamson, NY. He’s part of the JamesGang racing team along with fellow Team E3 Racing winner Darryl Barrett. Long term, he’s got his sights set on NASCAR. But as much as he loves winning, he loves interacting with fans, too – especially kids. He’s been known to take young fans for a spin through a track or event venue parking lot in his racecar.

“I hate it when guys velvet rope or have ‘do not touch’ signs,” he says. “In my mind, if a kid can break something on your car, it’s probably junk to begin with.”

Steffenhagen credits his family with being a solid support team. This includes his beautiful wife and toddler son, Uncle John, siblings numerous cousins, aunts, nephews, nieces and friends.

“My Dad does almost everything on the cars himself,” Steffenhagen says. “He is a retired mechanic and, as much as he won’t admit it, loves doing it. He paints the letters on the tires orange every week.”

But he has a special place in his racing for his late mother, also a racer.

“My No. 1 fan rides with me now as I lost my mom to cancer a couple of years ago,” he says. “I’ll never forget the time I won, and she took the mic from the announcer and told a story about me in a plastic pedal car, saying that it was in my blood to win. That’s my favorite racing memory of all time. I couldn’t tell you anything else about that night.”

We expect there will be many more memories over the course of a very successful racing career. From all of us at E3 Spark Plugs, welcome to the team, James!

Most days, Tyler Shepard suits up and plies his relatively tame trade as a medical industry sales rep. But upwards of 20 weekends a year, the latest Team E3 Racing Tier 2 winner dons a much flashier getup than his workday jacket and tie, wowing crowds as the “Wheelie Wizzard.”

Shepard was just 14 when he first saw “Wheelie King” Doug Domokos perform at a flattrack race in Celina, Ohio in 1995. The young rider immediately began developing his own daredevil style and within a few years, made his own debut before a crowd. For 13 years now, he’s been performing a family-friendly motorcycle entertainment program showcasing his famous wheelies at major events nationwide.

Just about any rider with a little experience can rev the engine, pop the clutch and grab a wheelie. But riding on that back wheel for any real distance is tricky.

“You have to keep the rear brake on the entire time, then adjust the throttle for how high you want the front wheel to come up,” Shepard told reporters recently.

It’s an art that Shepard has perfected. In fact, in one particularly popular show feature, he rides a Honda XR 50 with no front wheel detached altogether – sometimes flying over the top of a Ford box-van. Not surprisingly, he holds the current world record for the highest wheelie on a 50cc motorcycle.

Shepard uses four different bikes in his shows. Two are stock Honda CRF 50s. One is a Honda CRF 50 with custom sprocks that allow for performances in small venues. With a modified gear ratio, he can ride a wheelie slower than the average person can walk.

Shepard’s talents have landed him gigs with top-name clients and events including Ripley’s Believe it Or Not, Sports Illustrated, Lucas Oil on the Edge and the Monster Energy Supercross Series. Throughout the 2013 season, he’ll be the featured attraction at the Monster Nation and the Toughest Monster Truck Tour! But his favorite part of performing actually happens between popping those wheelies.

“The people who come out with all of their kids,” he says when asked about the most enjoyable part of his work. “They have stories about when they used to ride, and the kids are telling me about how they have bikes. I just like hearing stories fans tell.”

We’re looking forward to hearing lots of stories of the Wheelie Wizzard’s continued success. From all of us here at E3 Spark Plugs, welcome to the team, Tyler!

Little Aidan Hinds could grow up to become an accountant, an architect, an astronaut – anything he wants. But chances are he’ll become a famous auto racer. After all, he’s already got a big head start. That’s why he’s the latest Team E3 Racing winner.

Hinds has spent nearly every Saturday night of his seven years at the Dirt Late Model race tracks with his dad, Kenny, and spends his evenings in the garage, learning all about the mechanics of sleek, powerful racing machines. Plus, racing runs in the family. Grandfather Richard Proffitt also was a racer. So by age five, young Hinds was ready to hit the tracks himself.

In 2011, the Aidan Hinds Racing team was founded in Loveland, Ohio and Hinds’ competitive mojo revved up quickly. In just his seventh race weekend, he took the pole position and outclassed the field throughout the entire weekend at the Kid Kart Nationals Restricted race held in St. Louis, MO. Clearly possessing a natural talent, Aidan went on to rack up an impressive 23 wins in his rookie season.

In his sophomore season, Hinds raced in seven states, running the Great Lakes Sprint Series and competing in the Ohio Valley Karting Association. A nasty flip in Camden destroyed his kart and sidelined him for three races. Still, he managed to finish the season fifth in the final GLSS point standings.

Hinds, who drives both a Birel B25 Chassis and a 2010 Haase Chassis, starts the 2013 season with 51 wins and an eye on two championships. He’ll continue to race in the GLSS Kid Kart Division and run the Route 66 and OVKA Series. He also plans to run dirt ovals and is developing a dirt racing team.

From all of us here at E3 Spark Plugs, congratulations and welcome to the team, Aidan!

Erik Gehrke is always in hot pursuit of someone. During the day, it’s drivers violating Illinois’ speed limits. But come evening and weekends, it’s his American Super Cup Series competitors. The newest Team E3 Racing Tier 1 winner makes his living as a law enforcement officer, but fulfills his passion as a driver for Lawmen Racing, Inc.

A nine-year, fourth-generation police offer, Gehrke is an active hostage negotiator for the northern Illinois region. But he’s also a pro at negotiating the curves of a race track at top speed. He started working on Legends cars in 2002 for CPM Racing, then drove Legends cars in the 2003 season. In 2004, he began racing in the Super Cups series. He’s since racked up more than 40 wins, landed the 2005 National Short Track Championship and took back-to-back Super Cup Championships in 2007 and 2008. Gehrke has won all three of his feature races at Madison International Speedway and three feature races at Rockford Speedway on the last lap.

If Gerhke’s name sound familiar, that’s because he was a Team E3 Racing Tier 2 winner last year. He made the most of his win by having his entire Lawmen Racing team don E3 Spark Plugs T-shirts and hats and plans to do it all again this year, adding our logo to all cars in the Super Cup series and thousands of handout cards. Based in Antioch, Illinois, Lawmen Racing is comprised primarily of current or retired police officers and their families, performing every racing-related task from driving the cars to maintaining the engines to marketing the brand.

Gehrke races a Chevy Impala Minicup car with partner and fellow Team E3 Racing winner David Cerer. He’ll race throughout the 2013 season while also helping his son rev up his own racing career.

Welcome back to the team, Erik!

In the summer of 1976, Daryl Barrett took in his very first race at Canandaigua Speedway in New York, which happens to be celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. That night proved quite eventful, but not for what happened on the track. Shortly after the evening’s program began, the grandstands collapsed and the track subsequently closed for the better part of two years.

Anyone less enamored with the racing world might well have considered the drama a bad omen. But Barrett was hooked. Over the years since, he’s become a respected team owner, accomplished crew member and chief and a talented racer. And now, he’s a second-year Team E3 Racing winner.

Barrett has raced at the local and national level, landing more than 250 wins and nearly 20 track championships, including two national titles, in everything from microds to karts to micro sprints to street stocks to modifieds on both dirt and asphalt tracks and even a few road courses. Owner of Asylum Motorsports Group, he races in the Grand-Am and the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) World Challenge series in DP, GT, GS and GTS classes, and runs the DIRTcar Sportsman Modifieds series.

He’s been through quite a few over his three decades in professional racing. But his current race ride is an AMG/Bicknell chassis with a Roush Yates engine dubbed “Wilma.” She’s a beauty, most definitely – especially sporting the E3 Spark Plugs logo.

Congratulations, Daryl!

Stephen Kildahl certainly knows his way around a powerboat. After all, he’s been piloting one since long before he could drive a car.

“I started racing when I was 9 years old, and moved up to the pro circuit when I was 16 years old,” says the Estero, Florida resident and second-year Team E3 Racing Tier 1 winner. “When I moved up to the pro circuit, I had to sign a release waiver. This is because they were allowing me to race under the minimum age requirement, which is 18.”

Kildahl quickly proved himself a definite exception to the rule while going deck-to-deck against a pool of older and more experienced racers on the Super Boat International Offshore Boat Racing Circuit. Now entering his seventh season, he remains the youngest full time driver on the circuit and has racked up 15 career wins including three Florida championships, two national championships and two world championships. In 2012, Kildahl’s Scott Free Racing team, which includes father Steve Kildahl as the throttleman, finished second in the nationals standings and third in the Key West World Championships.

Kildahl currently races a 30-foot Phantom with a 525HP racing engine, hitting breakneck speeds of up to 95 miles per hour. While that’s a dangerous enough speed on land, it can be particularly perilous on the water — No set course features and a racing surface that literally changes with the winds and tides. Plus, while auto racers handle both the speed and the steering, powerboat racing is a team effort. One member pilots the craft while another mans the throttle. If one sees something the other doesn’t or makes an unexpected decision, it could mean the difference in winning, losing or even finishing the race.

E3 Spark Plugs congratulates Kildahl on an already spectacular racing career and a solidly competitive future.

Shea Holbrook recently experienced the “best five laps of my life,” she says. While walking the paddocks at the Homestead-Miami International Speedway during a Formula and Automobile Racing Association event, she spotted her dream car – an Audi Sport Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM) racecar. As luck would have it, she knew the team and car owners, and thus scored the chance to take it out on the tracks for a few laps.

“The sensation of driving the ‘Batmobile’ came over me because everything is pushed back a few feet,” Holbrook writes in her racing website blog. “I’ve never felt more comfortable in a racecar than driving this one. Cool, calm and collected I roll out of the pits. Getting a feel for the car, aggressively grabbing the upshifts with my foot to the floor and then punching the downshifts as fire lights under my butt (exhaust comes out the side of the car rather than the rear) I feel at ease.”

Holbrook’s passion for racing is evident just from reading that quote. And it’s clear that she’s a natural at her sport. That’s why she’s the latest Team E3 Racing Tier 1 winner.

Holbrook first discovered her passion for driving at age 16. While her friends were just happy to get their driver’s licenses, she was ratcheting things up with a Richard Petty Driving Experience at the Daytona International Speedway. And that was it – She was hooked. Soon, Holbrook was racing high performance driving events throughout Florida and gunning for her Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) license. She since has been road racing competitively nationwide, with event ranging from sprint races to 25-hour enduros.

The gorgeous Groveland, FL resident holds several firsts in her racing career. In 2008, she became the first female alternate for the 2008 VW Jetta TDI Cup, and in 2011, she became the first woman to win the Grand Prix of Long Beach in a touring car during the 2011 Pirelli World Challenge season – making her one of just four women to ever win at the track alongside Katherine Legge, Dancia Patrick and Simona De Silvestro. Other bragging rights include the Sobre Rodas Talent of the Year Award in 2007; Women in the Winners Circle (Lyn St. James Foundation) recipient of the Cooper Tire & Rubber Company Scholarship in 2008; Optima Batteries Best Standing Start Award and the Sunoco Hard Charger Award in 2011; and Living Legend Honoree Award at the Live Your Legacy Summit in 2012.

Holbrook is a formidable competitor off the tracks as well. She’s an accomplished national competitive water skier holding numerous state, regional and national titles. But she’s got a soft heart when it comes to charity. Her team, Shea Racing, partnered with Frito Lay Corp. to raise $12,500 for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure and has helped to raise thousands of dollars for Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy, which benefits Duchenne muscular dystrophy – a condition that affects her own family. As if that’s not enough, she recently earned her Bachelor’s Degree in Interpersonal and Organizational Communications with a minor in Marketing from the University of Central Florida. For her accomplishments was featured in the Women in Motorsports SuperCars Super Show Exhibit and Teen Vogue magazine.

From all of us here at E3 Spark Plugs, congratulations and welcome to the team, Shea!

Brandon Williams followed up his 2010 rookie year in unexpected fashion – by taking his sophomore year off. But with good reason – the busy new dad who operates a crane for U.S. Steel by day and spends his nights and weekends at the dirt tracks wanted to be around for his baby boy, Blake.

Having landed the 11th spot ranking in the Kankakee County Speedway Points  and 23rd in the I-MOD Association series piloting an I-MOD in his first year as a professional dirt track racer, he came back strong in 2012, landing respectable ninth and 12th places in two races.

For the 2013 season, he’s gunning for the UMP  (United Midwestern Promoters) National Championship title in the Pro Late Model class, piloting a recently built UMP Pro Late Model MasterSbilt Chassis with a 604 GM Crate Engine. He’ll make his season debut at Farmer City Raceway in the Illini 100 event, competing in the Pro Late Model class on Saturday, April 6. And he’s already eyeing success in 2014, building a midget sprint for the 2014 Chili Bowl Nationals.

All the while he’s helping to promote E3 Spark Plugs, handing out decals and t-shirts at various races. And he’s keeping race fans up to the minute on the latest competitive and dirt track racing news via his wildly popular DirtXtra online magazine. Check out Brandon’s Williams Racing Facebook Fan Page to keep up with him and brother, Adam, also a pro racer since 2006.

E3 Spark Plugs congratulates Brandon on his second stint as a Team E3 Racing winner.

Cody Perry has a bright future in racing – and perhaps the best manicured lawn in the neighborhood.

“This may sound crazy,” says the latest Team E3 Racing winner. “But I always mow the grass right before we load everything up. It helps me concentrate, brings me good luck.”

Perry’s strange pre-race regimen apparently is paying off. The high school senior from North Vernon, Indiana first hit the tracks in 2008 and quickly let it be known that he was the one to beat. Among his accomplishments:

• 3rd in Points at Twin Cities Raceway Park in the Hornet Division in 2009
• Rookie of the Year at Twin Cities Raceway Park in the Hornet Division in 2009
• 5th in Points at Twin Cities Raceway Park in the Hornet Division in 2010
• Twin Cities Raceway Park Hornet Track Champion in 2011 with 12 heat wins and three feature wins
• 2nd in Points at Lawrenceburg Speedway in the Hornet Division in 2012

Perry became interested in racing while working crew for his racing cousin for several years. Eventually, he slipped behind the wheel himself and never looked back – except to smile and wave at the fellow racers left in his dust. Perry races a 2005 Chevrolet Cavalier in the Sport Compact/Hornet Division at the Twin Cities Raceway Park, Lawrenceburg Speedway and Brownstown Speedway. He lists sprint car driver Jeff Bland Jr., late model driver Earl Pearson Jr., modified driver and cousin Rick Hudson, super stock driver Randy Petro and pure stock driver Dustin Petro as his favorite drivers.

Perry’s full crew consists of his dad, who handles all the mechanics, and his mother, who serves as his mentor and biggest cheerleader. He plans to attend college after graduating this summer, but no doubt will remain a driving force on the racetracks.

From all of us at E3 Spark Plugs, congratulations and welcome to the team, Cody.