It looks like the “Promoter of the Year” competition is heating up for 2026. We had two new drivers visit Stewart Raceway for this “Under the Lights” event on SR3.

First, a warm welcome to Phil Rogers and Ramsey Wright. Phil is a local resident who lives just a few miles away near Full-Speed and Seltzer Racing Teams. Ramsey is a college friend of Team Jolley’s, Dustin Jolley. Both new drivers seemed to have a great time, and we look forward to their return to Stewart Raceway for more slot car action soon. Phil hadn’t raced slot cars since the 70’s. Ramsey has been a slot-car enthusiast since he first discovered them, but had never raced on a routed track.

Short Story

Dustin and Ramsey arrived too late to get much practice in, but after a very nice dinner of pan pizza, salad, and cheese bread, we got down to business with racing.

Race 1: Jag Hobbies PR-5 GT F1 Hardbody (IROC)

We again used this new House IROC set of PR-5 GT chassis’ with AFX/Racemasters F1 hardbodies to kick off the night. With seven drivers, we had nearly enough participants to run a normal race without excessive interruptions from track-call button(s).

We actually had eight people in the paddock, so the Race Director decided to cut the lanes down to four, leaving three drivers free to corner marshal, and Kathy available to handle track calls on the keyboard. SR3 typically requires four corner marshals to pull off a fluid and timely raceday.

Unfortunately, one team in the paddock vehemently opposed this prescription, sparking controversy. Once all that got settled, and the opposition team finally gave up insisting we run all six lanes with individual driver track-call buttons, we got underway with four lanes, 25-lap segments, and a 30-lap fuel allocation.

These cars are pretty quick (4.960) on SR3, but not quite as “stuck” as a Viper F1 Lexan (4.657). Still, a good platform for new drivers to get up to speed on routed tracks quickly. Dustin Jolley led this race from the second segment all the way to the final segment. Of course, the newly upgraded Expert driver, Dean Donaldson, was having none of that and took over the second-place position from Bev Seltzer at the end of segment three, holding on to second until the final segment, just one point behind the race leader Dustin Jolley.

Newcomer, Ramsey Wright advanced from 4th to 3rd going into the final segment, but was done with his rotation with 42 points. Dustin Jolley was also done with his rotation, leading with 56 points, and Dean Donaldson, in second, had finished his rotation with 55 points. Home Cook’n was in 4th overall going into the final segment with 48 points. Was the leaderboard about to get shuffled?

Team Seltzer came out of the gate in the last segment blazing. Jeff Seltzer had put the hammer down and completed every lap with very consistent times, finishing 2nd in the segment and securing the third podium spot. Bev Seltzer was on fire in this one also, clearly getting back in her groove. Bev completed all 25 laps, had the fastest median lap time, and won the segment handily. When the two Experts were removed from the leaderboard, Jeff finished the race in 2nd and Bev in 3rd. Very sold driving by Team Seltzer!  Dustin Jolley’s 56 points were just enough to put him in 2nd overall and 1st in the Sportsman class. Great driving!  Details

Race 2: Viper Super 7 NASCAR Eric Lane Set (i)

We lost Phil Rodgers after the first race, which I’m sure felt like being thrown into a pit of Vipers. Phil actually did pretty well, considering he’s been away from slot car racing for quite a spell.  We hope he enjoyed the experience and returns to racing with us again soon.

Phil’s departure changed the marshaling situation, so we went back to six lanes and track calls for crashes. This extends the runtime considerably, which shortens the number of races possible.

This IROC set is a lot like running a Viper V-SPEC L4 hardbody car, but with a little less speed and handling, mostly because stock Tyco 440-X2 NASCAR hardbodies are used.

This one seemed like three races going on at once. The two Experts, Dean Donaldson and Home Cook’n, duked it out the entire race, swapping the race lead nearly every segment. Sportsman drivers, Dustin Jolley and Jeff Seltzer, battled for the third podium spot the whole race, and Bev Seltzer and Ramsey had a heated battle going for 4th overall in the last few segments.

New driver, Ramsey Wright, had a good groove going, battling Dustin for third until the fourth segment, when Jeff Seltzer made his move in the Green lane to drop Ramsey (Blue lane) down to fifth place, and fighting off a hard-charging Bev Seltzer, who was just one lap down on him going into the final segment.

In the end, Home Cook’n won the Expert battle by just one lap, Dustin won the Sportsman battle by four laps, and Ramsey bagged the final Sportsman podium by just two laps ahead of Bev Seltzer.  Details

We lost Full-Speed Racing and Team Seltzer after Race 2, and it was pretty late in the evening. Dustin, Ramsey, and I played around with a few of Ramsey’s tricked-out cars, then called it a night around 1:00 AM.

A big thanks to everybody for contributing to another great night of “Under the Lights” racing!  The highlight of the night (for me) was seeing Ramsey come down the driveway with a handmade slot-car box. I have one of those that I made in woodshop during my high school days in the mid-seventies. That was cool!

Still way too early to post seasonal points, but I predict that Dustin Jolley will be the next Sportsman driver to advance to the Expert ranks.

If you're the Sportsman points leader for 5 consecutive raceday events, you advance to Expert.

Due to the NFL Playoffs, no Saturday track action this week. Kathy’s and my Mom’s favorite teams are both playing Saturday. Hopefully, we can get another “Under the Lights” event in the books this coming week, and maybe even a Saturday event; we’ll see.  Have a great weekend!