March | 2023 | Rick at the Races

End of March 2013

Well, things haven’t started warming up yet, but the snow is easing off and what new stuff we’ve had, soon melted.

Regular readers will know that another of my hobbies, is diecast car collecting and an event taking place, in Ottawa caught my interest.

I didn’t know what to expect , so with nothing else to do, I went along to find out more.

I’d never been to the EY Center before, but I’d passed it many times when using the Ottawa Airport (its next to it)

It’s an exhibition center, and the Toy Auction was part of a Farm Show.

On arrival , the first thing I noticed was the familiar site of the Fat Les food trailer parked at the main entrance of the building.

Les Winters , the owner , is a major sponsor in Eastern Ontario Dirt Racing . He sponsors my good friend Corey Wheeler from Cornwall.

I bumped into Les, inside the building and we had a good chat.

I had plenty of time to look at some of the machinery on show, before the auction started at 7-00.

Most of the lots up for sale were diecast tractors, which I have no interest in, so didn’t end up buy anything, or staying to the end.

The same day that I was in Ottawa, so was my good friend Ron Morin. He was there in preparation for some surgery at the Civic Hospital the following day.

His procedure went well , but they kept him in until Monday. He is now at home convalescing .

On Saturday 18th March, I was thinking of going to the Selinsgrove Speedway, in Pa. There was a Short Track Super Series event taking place, and its a track I’ve never been to before.

In the end , I decided against it and stayed nearer to home. One of my local drivers, Mike Maresca was the winner.

So, on Saturday, instead of going there, I joined my buddy Don Simpson on one of our Race Shop visits. That was to the one used by Bob Ray and Pierre Picard in my city of Cornwall.

Let me digress,

Back in 2004, I was writing a monthly column for Europe’s leading oval racing publication , SHORT CIRCUIT MAGAZINE that was based in the UK. One of my fellow scribes , was Malcolm Foskett from Southern England , who was also an oval racer.

That year, a few of us got together, and organized a Malcolm ‘Fozzy’ Foskett Canadian Tour, where he loaned several cars and raced at a bunch of different tracks in Ontario and Quebec..

More info on this tour can be seen in the 2004 REPORT here , on www.rickattheraces.com

One of the drivers that loaned his car was, one of my local Mini Stock drivers , Bob Ray from Cornwall.

Malcolm used Bob’s #18 Mini Stock at the Capital City Speedway in Ottawa (That was then known as the Ottodrome).

Bob is still active in various forms of racing and shares his race shop with Pierre Picard, one of the current top names in local Mini Stock racing.

Don an I were invited along to the shop , so they could be interviewed.

Pierre was preparing his car for the on coming season, while Bob had another project in progress.

He is renovating a vintage Mercury Pick Up. It was nice catching up with Bob and reminiscing about 2004.

After we’d finished at the race shop, the sun was still shining and it was a nice dry day.

It was time to get the T Bird out of hibernation, and take her for a run.

Sunday 19th March, was F1 Grand Prix time , I watched the TV coverage as Sergio Perez took the win at the Saudia Arabian GP. Fellow Red Bull driver Max Verstappen was runner up with Fernando Alonso in the Aston Martin taking third.

The start of the week , was also the official start to Spring, so on Tuesday my Impala was booked in to Seaway GM , to get the Snow Tires removed.

The St Lawrence Seaway also reopened during the week, so on Thursday 23rd March , I took a little drive down to Mariatown to watch the Ice Breaker, Martha Brown go by.

In between all this the Ottawa Senators have been keeping me glued to the TV , hanging on to that slim chance of a play off spot.

I’ve been a Sens fan since moving to Canada nearly 29 years ago.

On Saturday 25th of March , I had a lot going on. In the morning I was heading to the Nepean Sportsplex for the Ottawa Toy & Collectable Sale

I went there about 15 years ago and this was my first visit since then.

It’s a real Geek’s paradise (or as we’d say in the UK, anoraks) for all the quirky things that people collect.

Many things were artifacts and keep sakes from TV , including these Daleks from Dr Who

I came away with a Diecast model of an F1 Jaguar that Eddie Irvine drove in 2001.

From Ottawa, my next port of call was in Plantagenet, Ontario for a Spaghetti Supper & Silent Auction fund raiser for the # 8 Pro Stock Team of Marc Lalonde.

It took place at the Catholic Secondary School in Plantagenet.

I met up with Don Simpson and before things got under way, we took some pics of Marc and his wife Josee, in the schools work shop where the car is maintained.

I happened to mention to Don that the old car panels lying around would look good on my basement wall.

To my surprise , he talked with Marc about having one , then handed it to me . What a nice gesture.

The Spaghetti Supper and two short picture presentations followed this.

As in previous years the food was excellent.

The students who maintain the car then took the stage before the auction winners were announced.

It had been snowing all night which meant a messy drive home.

Sunday was a quiet day, but I did take time out for a short drive to the other side of town to drop in on the Gage Morin Team.

They were at work getting their 358 Modified ready for the rapidly approaching season.

As the month wound down I had some plans for another road trip.

On Thursday the 30th, I was going to set off for the Atomic Speedway in Ohio for the Super Dirt Car Series, scheduled for the 31st/1st April.

At the beginning of the week, I’d been monitoring the weather in the area and it didn’t look good. Rain was predicted for the first day, and cold and windy for the next. With the long distance involved for race teams and fans, it was no surprise to hear on Tuesday (28th) that the organizers had pulled the plug on the event. It made a lot of sense and appreciated, as no one wants a wasted journey.

So, the last few days of the month were spent enjoying my T Bird.