In less than a week, Brandon Watkins and his team put together a brand-new modified. It would pay tribute to his crew member Cliff Foskey.
“A lot of people do tribute cars to racers after they pass, I wanted to honor Cliff while he was still with us,” Watkins, of Harrington, Delaware, said. “I wanted him to appreciate the tribute and live through the moment he saw it with us.”
Foskey, 71, raced modifieds during the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s. He competed with his uniquely designed 28. Over the course of the past 10 years, Foskey maintained engines for Watkins. While Foskey helped put together the new car for Watkins, he did not know that Watkins contacted Kevin Butler. Butler, a former crew member for Foskey, had a photo collection of Foskey’s cars.
“I took the photos to my lettering guy, Matt at Ad-Art Signs, and asked him to copy them to make a wrap for my new car,” said Watkins. “When I saw the wrap I couldn’t believe it — it was spot-on.”
With getting rained out on Saturday, June 7, the crew went to work on assembling the new car.
“We had a lot of the stuff here — a Winters rear end, the Lombardo Race Engines big block we got from Keith Hoffman, a Bert transmission, and Profile power steering,” Watkins said. “We worked until we couldn’t work anymore on Saturday, and then got back at it on Sunday. Then, we worked until we couldn’t go any further — we needed some small parts. The car was 80% completed by the end of the day Sunday.”
“On Monday, an order went out to Behrent’s, and on Tuesday we had everything we needed,” said Watkins. “We all worked on Wednesday, completing everything except the body. We told Cliff the rest of the crew could mount the body on Thursday, so he could go to Georgetown Speedway’s practice and help a young driver.”
Foskey crewed for Nick Nash while the rest of Watkins’ team completed the car.
“I worked on that car all week — and I had no idea what it was going to look like,” Foskey said. “When I saw it, I didn’t know what to say. So, I asked, ‘Have you guys completely lost your minds?’ All that work and extra money to make that wrap — I was in shock.”
Brandon Watkins debuted the car on Friday, June 13, where he finished eighth in the first of two features. During the second feature, he pulled in after he felt a vibration, which mud collecting in his left-rear wheel caused. Regardless of the on-track results, Watkins certainly left a last impressing on Cliff Foskey.
“After everything settled in, I realized how pleased I was — I really appreciate what they did,” said Foskey. “Just because I helped them out, they did this for me — what an honor.”
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
