Louisville, KY (FH) Day 1 TNT

[kouvre]

Date: October 7th.

Course: A large dirt roller, followed by a set of 2 cars, and a set of 10 cars. Finish line is in the middle of the last car.

Awesome Kong IV (Steve Dane), Bigfoot IV (Rich Hooser), Casper (Dale Harris), Carolina Crusher I (Gary Porter), Grave Digger I (Dennis Anderson), Heartbeat of America (Brett Engleman), Jus-Showin'-Off I (Paul "Pablo" Huffaker), Mad Dog III (Jon Breen), Night Life II (Dave Wieczorek), No Problem I (John Moore), Southern Storm (Terry Bowman), Stomper I (Mike Whitt), Stomper II (Marvin Smith), USA-1 II (Rod Litzau), Wild Hair (Bob Breen)
-Engleman suffered a broken nose in qualifying
-Huffaker broke in qualifying

Round 1:
Anderson bye
Smith bye (Huffaker could not effect repairs in time)
Engleman d. Whitt
Dane d. B. Breen
Hooser d. Harris
J. Breen d. Bowman
Porter d. Moore
Litzau d. Wieczorek
-Whitt broke the rear tie rod

Quarterfinals:
Anderson d. Smith
Dane d. Engleman
Hooser d. J. Breen
Litzau d. Porter

Semifinals:
Dane d. Anderson
Litzau d. Hooser
-Litzau rolled over

Finals:
Dane d. Hooser (break rule)
-Both trucks hit the final jump with only one front tire. Since Dane crossed the finish line first, he was declared the winner.

Notes:
-Although the TV broadcast stated that either Bigfoot or USA-1 had a chance to walk out of the event with the points championship, in reality USA-1 was far enough ahead that Rod Litzau's semifinal win was enough to clinch the points championship, regardless of how far he or Hooser advanced in brackets in night two.
-USA-1's rollover at this event was its first, but most certainly would not be its last. Over the next two years, the truck would roll over eight more times and have several other crashes. A particularly nasty crash towards the end of 1989 in Flint, MI would ultimately cause Litzau to take a sabbatical from driving, which would be made permanent by Everett Jasmer's decision to withdraw USA-1 from the sport.
-This event was unusual in that both Stomper trucks raced in the same event, and theoretically could have faced each other in the semifinal round.
-Brett Engleman's broken nose in qualifying happened due to a bounce slamming his face into the steering wheel.

[dave3ba]

Couple notes:

1. Steve Dane was driving what most consider to be Awesome Kong IV (the skinny truck), Terry Bowman was driving Southern Storm, and Gary Porter was driving the original Carolina Crusher.

2. This was the first televised event for Brett Engelman driving the Heartbeat of America truck at a TNT event. Engelman had, howeer, driven his event primarily at USHRA and USA motorsports shows through the years.

[kouvre]

I put Carolina Crusher II because I thought he merely switched bodies for 1989, but looked closely at picture of the frame he was running at this time and saw that it matched the original, only lengthened. I fixed this in the original post.

[dave3ba]

Yeah, I thought that at first too, but I believe it was a completely different truck. I'm guessing Porter decided later in the year to build a new one, because he wouldn't have gone through the trouble of lengthening the old one if he didn't think it would work well.

[unclecoachmason]

Date of this race was October 7, 1988

Confirmed by a TNT commercial I have on tape of upcoming events