Thompson Will Call Down the Thunder at Anaheim Stadium

The late Mickey Thompson, who pioneered stadium off-road racing, was one of motor racing’s most innovative promoters.

Before he and his wife were slain March 16, 1988, at their home in Bradbury, the Mickey Thompson Stadium Off-Road Racing program was well in place, attracting crowds of 60,000 annually to Anaheim Stadium and other venues around the country. After running in place for six years, the board of directors decided the series needed some new ideas to stimulate interest--in the style of the series founder.

Who better to take control than Mickey’s son, Danny, 44? The only problem was that Danny was a competitor, a driver of a grand national sport truck.

Last April, after he had driven a Ford pickup to third place in the Anaheim race, the younger Thompson retired as a racer and became president of the Mickey Thompson Entertainment Group.

“It was the hardest decision I ever had to make,” Danny said. “I still have the itch to get out there and race. I’d been racing since I was 9. It’s a hard habit to give up.”

Even so, he has “done what my Dad would have done” by creating two new looks for the 1995 series, which will open tonight at Anaheim Stadium, rain or shine.

The trucks in the main event--the highlight of the stadium racing--will be full-sized, 5,000-pound vehicles, replacing the lighter, quieter and smaller grand national sport pickups used in previous seasons.

“We called them thunder trucks because that’s what it will sound like when those big V-8s fire up,” Thompson said. “I can’t wait to see the rooster tails of dirt and smoke when all that horsepower (700 to 800 per truck) bites into the track at once.”

The trucks, because of their size and lack of maneuverability, will race around the perimeter of the stadium, almost in an oval, instead of scrambling through the tight course that zigzags through the infield. All of the other classes--super 1600, 4-wheel ATV, superlite and ultracross motorcycles--will use the old-style course.

The switch to thunder trucks is the result of late-year decisions by Toyota and Chevrolet to withdraw from the Grand National truck series. Toyota had won 11 of the 12 manufacturers’ championships, and Chevrolet won three of the seven races last season.

“We were already planning a spec truck series for 1996 with all teams using the same body, with the difference being in the engine,” Thompson said. “When Toyota and Chevrolet pulled out last November, we had to do something to carry through 1995 because the spec trucks won’t be available until next year.”

Ford, spearheaded by Jim Venable’s B.F. Goodrich Rough Rider team, will be the only factory entry in the thunder truck series. Rob MacCachren, a two-time grand national race winner and champion of SCORE’s trophy-truck desert series, will be in a Ford F-150. Missing, however, will be series champions Rod Millen and Ivan Stewart of Toyota and last year’s Anaheim winner, Rick Johnson of Chevrolet.

In 1996, Thompson plans to run both classes of trucks on the same program.

The other new look tonight will be women’s stadium-cross. Anaheim will be the opening event of a 15-race series featuring the U.S. women’s motocross team, which includes Judi Hollow of Oceanside and Corinna Chinen of Gardena. Also competing will be Gale Webb, 50, of Menifee, Calif., known as “America’s Sports Mom” for her involvement in the “Keeping Kids Off Drugs” program.

Another new look for Thompson will be the racing debut of Travis, his 7-year-old third-generation driver-son, in the Pee Wee 50 class.

“I’ll probably be more nervous when Travis lines up for his first start than I will be counting the house,” father-promoter Thompson said.

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Henry Banks, a major figure in improving the safety of Indy car racing during his 12 years as director of competition for the United States Auto Club, died last month in Indianapolis. He was 81.

The English-born Banks was the 1950 national driving champion and drove in nine Indianapolis 500s, his best finish a sixth in 1951. During his USAC tenure from 1959-71, he proposed mandatory use of fire-retardant suits, shoulder harnesses, full roll cages for sprint and midget cars and stiffer standards for helmet construction. He was elected to the Auto Racing Hall of Fame in 1985.

Perhaps Banks’ most memorable moment occurred when he lost the big race to Clark Gable in the 1950 movie, “To Please a Lady.”

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Motor Racing Notes

MOTOCROSS--Seeking a third consecutive U.S. Supercross championship, Honda’s Jeremy McGrath won the season opener at Orlando, Fla. Tonight the 22-year-old from Murrieta will try for his second victory in the Minneapolis Supercross before returning home to ride Jan. 28 in Anaheim Stadium. . . . The second round of the VelveTouch Golden State Nationals is scheduled Sunday at Sunrise Valley Raceway in Adelanto.

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MISCELLANY--Mario Andretti, who retired from Indy car racing last year, will drive for the Porsche factory team in the 24-hour race Feb. 4-5 at Daytona Beach, Fla. He will share the seat with Scott Goodyear of Canada and Bob Wollek of France. . . . Rob King of Sylmar has been named national technical manager for the American Motorcyclist Assn.’s pro racing program. . . . The Winston West stock car series will open Sunday with a 75-mile main event at Tucson Raceway Park. . . . The Western Racing Assn. will hold its ninth annual awards banquet tonight at the Lobster Trap restaurant in Oxnard, honoring the Gilmore Gang that includes Danny Oakes, Dickie Ferguson and Edgar Elder.

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AWARDS--Veteran sprint car driver Leroy Van Conett, an eight-time NARC champion from Galt, Calif., was elected to the Motoring Press Assn. Hall of Fame. The Northern California organization also honored Kimberly Myers, a cystic fibrosis patient from Half Moon Bay, as motorsport person of the year. She was rookie of the year in NASCAR’s late-model division at San Jose Speedway.