Hobby stock driver Eric Cross didn’t set out to become the 1,000th driver to register for the IMCA Super Nationals at Boone Speedway. Unfortunately, the need to rebuild an old car after totaling his hobby stock resulted in that.
In July, he rolled his hobby stock at Beatrice Speedway.
“That car was junk — I took it to the crusher,” Cross, of Salina, Kansas, said. “I bought an old 2019 Jet hobby stock. I started out not doing so great with it.”
Nevertheless, Cross still intended to race it.
“I tore the Jet car completely apart and went through every bolt, every measurement, and used the motor and driveline from my old car,” said Cross. “I’m known as the guy who would cut up anything to change the geometry of a car. I changed the front end, rear end, and made the car comfortable to fit my driving style. I get a level of satisfaction in doing my own thing.”
The changes worked.
“It was my first Jet car,” Cross said. “[Jet Racing’s] Johnny Saathoff came over to me … he was excited we were making it better and better. We made progress — it was an old car that had been wrecked and bent. When stuff was fixed, it wasn’t totally fixed. For example, someone bent a lower A-arm and never thought they damaged the mounts or bushings.”
Cross drove the car to victory lane on August 16 at Salina Speedway. He hoped to carry that success into the IMCA Super Nationals. Cross led the Race of Champions until lap seven and finished a respectable third. In his attempt to qualify for the Big Dance, he broke a transmission on Tuesday, relegating him to a last chance race on Wednesday. In that event, he was in a position to qualify until he hit a rut and bounced his car off the track.
“It was a tough week,” said Cross. “I accumulated enough points to be recognized as the first driver to not get into the Big Dance.”
If it’s any consolation, by virtue of that feat, Eric Cross earned a fire suit from Velocita, a driveshaft from Fast Shafts and many other contingencies from sponsors of the IMCA Super Nationals.
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.
