Motor Racing : Schmitt Tries to Make Point Stand Up in Close Race to Finish

What is at the moment the closest race in the 36-year history of the NASCAR Winston West championship series will return to Saugus Speedway after an absence of 12 years Saturday night for a 200-lap main event on the one-third-mile paved oval.

Bill Schmitt, 53, two-time champion from Redding, leads defending champion Roy Smith of Canada by 1,325 points to 1,324, with rookie Bill Sedgwick of Van Nuys at 1,269 and 61-year-old Hershel McGriff, 1986 champion, at 1,221.

The closest finish was in 1968, when Scotty Cain edged Ray Elder by two points. More recently, Jim Robinson nosed out Derrike Cope by four points in 1984, and Schmitt finished five points ahead of the late Tim Williamson in 1979.

Only two races remain after Saugus, Sept. 24 on the road course at Sears Point, and Nov. 5 as part of the Winston Cup’s Auto Works 500 at Phoenix International Raceway.

Smith, 45, closed to within a point of Schmitt when he drove his Ford to victory in the Coors 200 last Saturday night at Bakersfield’s Mesa Marin Raceway. Fading brakes in Schmitt’s Chevrolet caused him to drop back to third, behind Sedgwick, on the last lap.

The lead changed hands seven times between Smith and Schmitt over the final 81 laps, before Smith won by 0.6 second in a four-car blanket finish.

Smith, who won consecutive championships in 1980-82, dropped out of racing for four years to work as a commercial fisherman in Victoria, British Columbia, then returned to the series in 1987. Last year, he won his fourth championship. Only Elder, the racing farmer from Caruthers, Calif., who won six between 1969 and 1975, has won more.

Sedgwick, 34, has been the surprise of the season. He finished better than fifth only once in 11 previous Winston West races over nine years and was better known as the jack man for McGriff’s crew in the early ‘80s and as co-crew chief for Roman Calczynski last year when Calczynski won the Southwest Tour championship.

After the first three races of the $1.3-million 11-race season, Sedgwick appeared likely to become the first driver to win the championship and become rookie of the year in the same season. He won the opener at Madera and repeated two races later at Eureka, opening a wide lead, but lost ground when he failed to qualify for the first Sears Point race.

He will be more at home in the 66.6-mile race at Saugus, where he was a Saturday night regular in sportsman cars before electing to run the Winston West season.

“It sure doesn’t hurt to be running at what we consider our home track,” Sedgwick said. “They aren’t kidding when they call Saugus the action track, and I can guarantee the heat of a close championship will provide even more action than usual.”

Winston West cars have not raced on the saucer-like oval since 1977, when Jim Thirkettle of Sylmar, now on the Southwest Tour, won, with Schmitt third.

McGriff, who drove in his first NASCAR race in 1950, won a Winston West race at Saugus in 1972--when Sedgwick was 7.

When McGriff won last May at Mesa Marin in his Pontiac, it was his 35th Winston West checkered flag and snapped an 18-month losing streak. He also was the highest West Coast finisher in the Sears Point Winston Cup race last June.

The 200-lap event will be the longest nonstop race ever held at Saugus. Races such as the Saugus 330 always were split into two segments. Because of the length, track officials have installed a pit area where cars can refuel or change tires.

Saturday night’s program will also include a 40-lap sportsman main event and a train race. The starting time has been moved up an hour to 6 p.m.

SPRINT CARS--California Racing Assn. drivers will get a bonus Saturday night at Ascot Park when they run for points in the Budweiser American Challenge Series as well as the season-long Parnelli Jones Firestone series. Brad Noffsinger won the first of the three Budweiser races.

MIDGETS--Robby Flock and Sleepy Tripp, after a barnstorming trip to United States Auto Club races in the Midwest, return home this week for a Jolly Ranchers Western States race Sunday night at Ascot Park. Flock and Tripp finished 1-2 in Lincoln, Neb., and Flock picked up a second at Denver. Three-quarter midgets will share the program.

OFF-ROAD--The Pahrump Station Nevada 500, sixth stop on the High Desert Racing Assn./SCORE series, is expected to have more than 200 entries when it starts Saturday morning in Pahrump, 50 miles west of Las Vegas. Bob Richey, a plumbing contractor from Corona who was the overall winner of the Fireworks 250, will be first off the line at 8 a.m. Drivers will run a 470-mile loop on existing dirt roads to Tonopah in central Nevada and back to Pahrump.

MOTOCROSS--The Continental Motosport Club will start a three-event Ascot Night Challenge series Friday night at the Gardena track. . . . The seventh round of the CMC’s Dodge Truck summer series will be run Sunday at Glen Helen Park in San Bernardino. . . . The American Motorcyclist Assn. national 500cc championship race scheduled Oct. 29 at Hollister Hills, in Northern California, has been canceled.

MOTORCYCLES--Ron Correy of Fullerton will be the lone U.S. rider in the Intercontinental Speedway Final, Sunday in Coventry, England, which is a semifinal round for the World Final, Sept. 2, at Munich, West Germany. Sam Ermolenko, the other U.S. qualifier, is sidelined with injuries.

The Budweiser speedway series will return to Victorville Saturday night and will serve as a tuneup for the United States qualifier on the same track Aug. 19. . . . Phil Collins and Bobby Schwartz, tied with six wins apiece, will continue their battle for Ascot Park speedway supremacy tonight on the South Bay Stadium oval. The AMA Castrol Grand Prix for 250cc road racers will be held Sunday at Sears Point Raceway with Modesto’s John Kocinski, a protege of Kenny Roberts, favored to win his third straight race. . . . The American Road Racing Assn. will hold a 500-mile enduro Sunday at Willow Springs Raceway.

DRAG RACING--The United Sand Assn. will hold its monthly sand drag competition Saturday at San Bernardino’s Glen Helen Park. . . . The Firestone/Center Line bracket points series will continue Saturday night at Los Angeles County Raceway in Palmdale.

STOCK CARS--Sportsman cars will headline Saturday night’s show at Cajon Speedway. . . . Ministocks will be featured at San Bernardino’s Orange Show Speedway.