PGARA revs up new season Saturday
Chris Arronge won’t have to worry about French cuisine spoiling his appetite for checkered flags. Arronge, the 42-yearold veteran Prince George Auto Racing Association driver has finished second to Wayne French in the final Canadian Tire street stock points standings the past two years.
That won’t happen in 2017. There will be no threepeat for French now that he’s decided to step back from racing.
Last year, Arronge and his 1980 Camaro finished 25 points behind French in the points race.
French decided he wants to spend more time camping with his family and Arronge says he will miss the challenge of trying to top the veteran driver and his 1975 Chevy Malibu.
“He was the biggest competition out there and he made us work longer in the shop and take care of details because the car had to be perfect to beat him,” said Arronge, now in his 10th year as PGARA president.
“But there are guys stepping up this year who will be fast, so it will be just as tough.”
One of those fast guys is likely to be Darrell Horvath, a perennial contender for the street stock title, back in the game after a five-year absence, among a group of 14 drivers entered in PGARA’s fastest class of racing. Also in the mix are Lyall McComber and Steve Jefferson, who both used to race Arronge in the CASCAR national series.
The big event looming on the street stock horizon at PGARA Speedway is the Tri-Cities Street Stock Invitational on Saturday, Aug. 12. Prince George will be the second stop in the three-race series. Last year, Bob Kuhn of Victoria won all three races, including an accident-plagued 75-lap Prince George race which took two hours to complete and had just 12 of the 25 cars still running when it ended. Kuhn broke the track record at PGARA during the invitational meet, clocking 17.667 to wipe the record of 17.847 Arronge set early last season.
“We won that (Quesnel) race last summer, it was the only one Bob Kuhn didn’t win in the last two years,” said Arronge. “He was close. We were within about 10 feet of each other at the finish line.
“We’ve done a lot of stuff on the car, it’s all pretty and beautiful again and we did some setup stuff to lighten the car, so it should be fast this year. It was just heavy since the day we built it. We had part of the body off to cut out extra metal.”
Arronge has won five PGARA points titles, one in bombers, one in hobby stock and three street stock championships. “I’m still excited every time I go out there, I’m not getting bored of it,” said Arronge, who ended up fifth in the Tri-Cities points standings.
McComber will be driving Kuhn’s car this year after Kuhn sold it to Chad McComber, Lyall’s nephew.
The green flag drops Saturday on PGARA’s 65th season with racing in all three local classes - street stock, minis and hornets. Last year’s Tri-Par RV Rentals hornets points champion, Tiffany-Rose Verkaik, has moved up to the Chieftain Auto Parts mini class this year and she will be in the mix with Stephen Woods, the defending mini stock points champion.
Second-generation racers Riley Markovics (son of Steve) and brothers Brandon and Spencer Forseth (whose dad Burt works Steve in Arronge’s pit crew), were part of a three-car battle for hornet bragging rights last year.
Verkaik finished three points ahead of Markovics and five ahead of the Forseths.
The Malicious Monster Truck tour comes to PGARA Speedway on the weekend of July 8-9.
“They’re the same guys who have been going to CN Centre but they will have twice the area to run around in and they can actually get on the throttle hard and get some big air,” said Arronge.
“We’re looking for school buses and RVs to wreck out there.”
Other big events coming this year to the Playground of Power is the return of the WESCAR series on June 17, Hit-to-Pass weekend (Sept. 1-3) and Friday Night Racing on June 23 (three main events followed by hit-to-pass racing).
Arronge said the success of last year’s Nitro Circus stunt show, which brought out close to 6,000 spectators, is on a two-year cycle and he hopes to have that event back in 2018. Preparations for Nitro Circus enabled the club to bury its electrical lines, which opened up more areas of the track infield to the monster trucks.
The club also replaced its rubber tire barrier on the pit side of the front straightaway.
Rain plagued the 2016 season with three rained-out dates and Arronge is hoping that’s not the start of a pattern. PGARA went without a rainout the previous eight years.
Racing starts Saturday with time trials at 6 p.m., followed by racing at 7 p.m.
The big event looming on the street stock horizon at PGARA Speedway is the Tri-Cities Street Stock Invitational on Saturday, Aug. 12. Prince George will be the second stop in the three-race series.