Connecting Highway

[Paul Precht]

Hi Casey, up to the tower to collect your pay and have a few beers. They always had cases of Schmidts stacked up near the clocks. That place had character

[Casey Miles]

W.H. was always a guess to how much $ you won if you the race. It sure was alot of fun back then. I won a race there with an $8 entry fee, raced Bill Marshall in the final and we split $1300. Not bad for a half assed track.
Grudge racing was at it's best there also. Alot of cars would show up from out of state and the cash would be flowing. You could make as much money in the stands as you could winning for the day. Also, you had to run your car out, because back then they only had true win lights, so if the other car you were racing red lighted and there was a bet on your car, you still had to get the win light to get paid. Alot of arguments, "I'll make you so broke that you'll have to borrow money from your kids", that was fun!

Casey Miles
248H

[cammer427]

Originally Posted by art leong

Hey Eddie.
We were at all of the above. We raced "Brooklyn Heavy", the Smallwood Bros, Fast Eddie, Maxie,, George Elliot etc.
Used to race to get enough money to go to the nhra national events LOL All the traveling we did years ago and neither one of us had a drivers license. Taken away for street racing. I got popped twice in the same night at first avenue by the same cop. He asked me why I didn't leave after the first ticket (speed contest) I told him I had to make some money to pay for the ticket LOL.
Those were crazy days, but fun.

What were the Smallwood Bros. racing with when you raced them? I've read they've owned two ex-Sox & Martin cars.

[herbjr]

I know Ronald Lyles was big up there as well. He called my dad at midnight one night wanting him to fly up to NY the next night to run a street race in his 71 pro stock car. Ill find out which Sox and Martin car the Smallwood Bros bought.

Herb Jr

[Paul Ceasrine]

GaryGoFast,
The 'Wedge Inn'. The Castro family owned the place. The dividing line
between Westchester racers and The Bronx racers..
Many 'burn-outs' on Boston Road (Route 1)
Don't know if you were their for the race between the 67' Chevy II
427 Tunnel-rammed A/MP car from the University of Vermont
(silver color, lettered 'Amphetamine'), and the 70' 'Motion' Camaro
from Long Island. Best 2 out 3 race I ever saw on the Hutchinson River
Parkway!!!
Paul

[cammer427]

Originally Posted by herbjr

I know Ronald Lyles was big up there as well. He called my dad at midnight one night wanting him to fly up to NY the next night to run a street race in his 71 pro stock car. Ill find out which Sox and Martin car the Smallwood Bros bought.

Herb Jr

Herb, one post I came across mentions the two cars were a 1969 notchback-roof car and a 1972 Plymouth 'Cuda, but it would be interesting if you could find out for sure. Did your dad end up shoeing that night for Ronald Lyles? Do you recall what year this was?

[mopar68]

Originally Posted by herbjr

I know Ronald Lyles was big up there as well. He called my dad at midnight one night wanting him to fly up to NY the next night to run a street race in his 71 pro stock car. Ill find out which Sox and Martin car the Smallwood Bros bought.

Herb Jr

From what I recall it was the 1972 'Cuda.







M68

[mopar68]

Originally Posted by gremlin1945

Anyoneremember John D'Andrea?Had a 1970 Gremlin with a 390 AMC motor,won alot there.

Yeah, I remember seeing John's Gremlin at Raceway Park sometime in the late-1970s or early-1980s.
I had no idea he street raced the car until I saw this scan. I didn't know Art and Ray did either.



M68

[Ed Fernandez]

Originally Posted by mopar68

Yeah, I remember seeing John's Gremlin at Raceway Park sometime in the late-1970s or early-1980s.
I had no idea he street raced the car until I saw this scan. I didn't know Art and Ray did either.



M68

The guy writing the article must have breathed in too many fumes.Masotto is driving a Nova.Even an AMC die hard like me knows that.
I don't know what happened to the gremlin.John bought an AMX and raced it for a long time.He still has it.It's purple now and sat for a long time.It's been out a few times at RP
but it's in pretty sad shape now.
I bought/traded the 304 and 904 trans from my 1st gremlin for a Vitar 727/390 engine from John.I think I also gave him $600.The car went from low 14s to mid 11s and finally
low 11s.I literally put over 3500 runs on that 390 with one puff up on it,Still have every
time ticket.The car is about 20 miles from me.Sitting in a large garage/shop.One day......

[hemicop]

I ran around a few of those places back then--Connecting, conduit, Francis Lewis & the World's Fair Marina. I had a '71lime green Pinto that today you'd call it a "proStreet" car. It was caged, tubbed,etc. with a mild smallblock Chevy. Got it from a guy who worked at Corvette City in Elmont. I knew John D'Andrea pretty well back then. He lived off of 150th in his parent's basement. At the time he was a Housing Authority cop and it always amazed me no one seemed to know that. Like alot of others he'd work on the Gremlin in the street in front of his house.One day a guy goes by his house smoking the tires & John threw a wrench through the guy's back window! The guy comes around & John Badges him & tells him to get the **** outta there--end of discussion!!! He was the first guy I knew that had an automatic for racing, from Vitar Engineering as I recall. He knew a guy that had an original S/S AMX and wound up using its top-end for a little while. He eventually bought the car from the guy and kept it in a garage near RP. I saw him years ago, he was working for Scott Schafiroff and still working on cars in front of his parent's house. It's been a long time since I spoke to him but I'm guessing not much has changed. He said he'd never get rid of the AMX (don't blame him!) . I have my own "war stories" about those places & miss the whole scene but I never was one of the "big dogs" and generally ran against my own "locals" that lived in Flushing....