Bloomington, CALIFORNIA (May 23, 2008) — Missing the first race was tough, but good things don’t happen overnight. For the last four months, Gene Woods and his DejaVu/Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club race team have been working twenty-hour days building a state-of-the-art, prototype, Dodge Pro 2 race truck. The first of it’s kind.

Woods gets his engines from Evernham Racing, but the rest of this race truck was completely fabricated at Wood’s race shop, here in Bloomington, Ca. The truck was about 98% complete when Gene ordered the team to load ‘em up and head ‘em out, to Las Vegas Raceway, for the team’s first Championship Off Road Racing event. The truck wasn’t ready for the first race at Pomona.

They left Bloomington California at 8:30 PM Friday night and didn’t make it to the track until 4:30 AM Saturday morning. Registration and technical inspections were held Wednesday, so the team was two days late! The CORR officials were very kind to late-register and tech Gene’s truck and allowed him to start at the tail of the field, since it was his first race.

Gene’s team worked on finishing the truck from the time they rolled-in at 4:30 AM until race time at 2:30 PM. Gene and the truck had no practice, no laps at all, prior to the race-start. The “No Sleep In Days” crew finished the truck just-in-time for the start.

Eleven laps into Saturday’s 19-lap Pro 2 race, the #20 DejaVu/Larry Flynt’s Hustler Clubs Dodge broke it’s driveshaft, also damaging the transmission housing. That put an end to Woods weekend, as the truck required more repair than the team could provide at the track.

The good news was that Woods was pleased with the truck, based on the eleven-lap hammering he gave it. Of course he wanted to finish, but he’s been racing long enough to know it doesn’t come over-night. Not with a brand-new race truck, anyway.

Gene Woods has raced Speedway Motorcycles, winning a national title. Gene raced Sprint Cars, Monster Trucks and most recently competed in the NASCAR West Series. Having just turned 50, being a life-long racer, he’s been at it a long time.

Gene Woods had these comments:

“I think we may have made a slight miscalculation because we didn’t have the transmission when we set-up the rear-end. This engine and transmission combination has never been used before in CORR and it’s a learn-as-you-go sort of thing. I’m sure we can repair the damage and correct stuff so that it won’t happen again. There’s another aspect of our suspension that I want to look at and possibly adjust before the next round at Pomona.”

”The truck is plenty-fast and handles well, we just have a few little details to work-out and we’ll be finishing races, near the front, I hope! Despite the limited success this weekend, I’m very encouraged; we built a heck of a truck and I can’t wait to get it up-front!”

“I would like to thank my sponsors; DejaVu/Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club, Lucas Oil, J.E. Reel, Sway-A-Way, TCS, Strange, US Graphics, S&B Filters, G&J Aircraft and DJ Safety, without whom I would not be in the hunt for a CORR trophy or two. Or more. Thanks to DirtNewz.com for the photo!”  

Here is a great video recapping some of our moments in the West Series over the past couple seasons. We would like to send out a big thank you to the guys over at Racing Shares for doing such a great job on this. You can view the movie in the upper right hand corner of this page. You can also find pictures from our recent appearance at Cerritos Dodge by clicking on the Appearance Pictures link in the top left block on this page.

You can find Racing Shares on the web here: http://www.racingshares.com/

 

Motorsports is full of highs and lows, just ask any competitor from the Saturday night short tracks to the Nextel Cup circuit. One week you can be at the very top of the heap, the next week you can be at the very bottom and a season of such highs and lows can take its toll. This is a lesson that Gene Woods has learned over the decades he has raced and this season racing the Monster Energy Drinks / Circle K Food Stores Dodge Intrepid on the NASCAR Grand National Western Division has been a prime example as the bottom fell out of an otherwise good season with several races to go forcing Gene and his team to pull out of the season ending Toyota Showdown at Irwindale Speedway.
 

For most of the season things went well for Gene Woods Racing, a team literally run out of Woods back yard in Bloomington, California. A season that began with little financial backing was aided by the addition of sponsorship from Monster Energy Drinks and Circle K Food Stores beginning at Fontana and with the additional dollars the team was able to build a new car and new engines and their performance improved and Gene seemed well on the way to his goal of a top ten points finish. Then came the fall Phoenix race.
 

A crash destroyed their new car and the team was forced to scramble to get their old car ready for Colorado. Another crash in qualifying there appeared to be the end of their season but help from other crews allowed them to get the car patched together and they scored a top ten finish and another good finish in Bakersfield put them back into the top ten in points going into the season finale at Irwindale. But Irwindale was a disaster as the old car and engine simply werent enough for Gene to be competitive and while he finished the race he was many laps behind at the end and ultimately lost his tenth place points finish. Although 11th was still good enough to qualify for the Toyota Showdown, with nothing new to bring out for the Showdown Gene decided it would be best for the team to skip the event to work on preparing for the 2005 season.
 

"We simply used up all of our equipment and budget for the season and with no new cars or engines left we need time to rebuild". Gene explained. "We did finish the season not too bad with 11th in the points. We wanted to be in the top ten again but going into the last two races we were just out of everything. But all in all I think we did very well considering out budget and if you know what other teams spend a season compared to us we did exceptionally well. It was simply not financially possible for us to compete in the Toyota Showdown this season even though we earned the spot. That was an accomplishment in itself just making it."
 

"I would like to personally thank the crew that worked so hard to do the things we did to keep us at the race track. I also want to thank Circle K, Monster Energy Drinks, Auto Trader, Dodge and all the people that helped us do what we got to do this season. We will regroup for next year and plan to build a couple of new cars and engines over the winter months and come back next season stronger than ever and give them our best season yet".

 

After an up and down season in the NASCAR Grand National Western Division Gene Woods and the other members of Gene Woods Racing are looking forward to the series season finale NAPA Auto Parts 150 Saturday night in Irwindale. After two races that saw them wreck two cars in Phoenix and Colorado Gene bounced back with a good race last weekend at Bakersfield and now they will be back on home turf with Irwindale Speedway being just minutes away from the teams Bloomington, California home base.

 "We finished 16th at Bakersfield fighting handling problems all day, but that was good enough to put us back in the top ten in points going into Irwindale next weekend for the final race of the season before the All-star Shootout. It was another late night before Bakersfield as we worked on the Monster Energy Drinks / Circle K Food Stores Dodge Intrepid until it was time to leave about 3:00 a.m. Crew chief Mike Fisk and the guys put in a lot of overtime to get us there, new paint, new rear clip and body, it was a weeks worth of work that had to be done in a couple of days, and our guys were great! Just to keep us going to the races everyone put in 110% effort to get the car done.

 Now were into the final laps of the season and theyre all in our own back yard. Were looking forward to a good performance Saturday night and then competing in the All Star Showdown and the best part is that we all get to sleep in our own beds from here on".

 

After two disastrous weekends on the NASCAR Grand National West circuit Gene Woods is hoping for a change of fortunes as his team heads to Mesa Marin Speedway in Bakersfield for the October Classic 150 presented by StarNursery.com.

A crash in the race at Phoenix left their primary Monster Energy Drinks/Circle K Food Stores Dodge Intrepid a wreck and another crash with their backup car in qualifying at Colorado might have ended the teams season if members of other teams had not helped them put "The Beast" back together for the race. Back on home turf in Southern California Gene is looking forward to getting things back on track.

"Now can we do something for Bakersfield. We have put a new rear clip on the backup car and have a new Monster Energy Drinks paint going. Were only eight points out of tenth place and were going to see if we can get back in the top ten and stay there until the end of the season".

But no matter what happens in the race on Sunday driver and car have something to look forward to on Monday morning as they will be making a personal appearance on behalf of Monster and Circle K. "We are going to do a appearance at the grand opening of the Circle K on Auburn St. in Bakersfield on Monday from Noon until 3pm. All race fans, and non race fans, are invited to come on out".