Indoor racing hits Allentown’s PPL Center on Dec. 30-31
ALLENTOWN >> In addition to over 100 Three Quarter (TQ) Midget, Champ Kart and Slingshot racers, and thousands of spectators, sponsors will play a big part in the second annual Indoor Auto Racing fueled by VP events to be held inside Allentown’s PPL Center on Friday and Saturday, Dec. 30th and 31st.
The two days of racing, sponsored by Ironton Telephone, has proven to be a popular investment with national and regional businesses who have taken advantage of sponsorship opportunities revolving around the event.
Ironton Telephone, in conjunction with Avaya with presentation by Future Homes, are the returning title sponsors for the race weekend.
VP Racing Fuels is the title sponsor of the entire Indoor Auto Racing Series which started a week ago in Trenton, N. J., and ends inside Atlantic City’s Boardwalk Hall on Friday and Saturday, January 27th and 28th.
Action Track USA, in Kutztown, is the overall Slingshot division sponsor. Hoosier Tire is the overall Champ Kart class sponsor and is the provider of the official tire for the TQ Midget and Champ Kart classes.
Interest in the Friday night Slingshot support class has been kindled with the recently filed entry of NASCAR Cup Series team member Jason ‘ Spanky’ Eidson, of Gastonia, N.C.
The Allentown Indoor Auto Racing weekend, sponsored by Ironton Telephone, will feature TQ Midgets both nights and Slingshots and Champ Karts as the second class on respective nights. Eidson, who will be moving from the NASCAR Richard Petty Motorsports team to Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) in January, will drive a Slingshot owned by John Gilroy of Wilkes-Barre, in the Friday night Slingshot races.
“I met John three years ago when I was at Hamlin (PA) Speedway for one of their NASCAR Mechanics Night races,” Eidson said. “I drove his car that first night and have been driving it ever since.”
Eidson’s duties with SHR will involve driving one of the team rigs to and from the races each week as well as serving as the team chef.
Eidson, 44, joins TQ Midget ace Ryan Flores as Allentown race entrants with NASCAR Cup team lineage. Flores’ full time job is with Penske Racing. He works in the fabrication shop during the week and is a front tire changer for Ryan Blaney’s No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford on race days.
Eidson’s outdoor racing experience consists of dirt track racing in his native North Carolina in Street Stocks and Four Cylinder cars.
“I love driving them,” said Eidson of the Slingshots. “If we had them in the south, I’d race them every chance I could get.”
Bob Hilbert Company has signed to sponsor a bonus for the TQMidget class: if a driver wins all four AMains in the LSMPSeries, he will earn a $10,000 bonus. By winning the inaugural race at Sun National Bank Center in Trenton, N.J., on December 10, Erick Rudolph of Ransomville, N.Y., is the man eligible to collect. To do so, he’ll have to win both Friday and Saturday night’s A-Main in Allentown and then in Atlantic City’s NAPA Auto Parts classic.
Other businesses have come aboard to sponsor di- visions or special awards within the classes in Allentown. Among them are E. Schneider & Sons, who will sponsor the TQ Midget, Slingshot and Champ Kart Hard Charger awards, All American Property Maintenance which is supporting the running of the TQ Midget heat races, Pocono Raceway, which has lent its name to the three TQ BMains, and S&S Speedways which will back the Slingshot heat races.
Steve Post, a veteran NASCAR pit reporter for the Motor Racing Network will join the announcing staff of the Indoor Auto Racing Series for events in Allentown and Atlantic City, N.J. Post will join the ‘Voice of the Three Quarter (TQ) Midgets’, Bob Marlow, and Pocono Raceway’s chief announcer Earl Krause on the series starting with the Allentown event held inside the PPL Center on December 30 and 31. Post will also play a major role on the team at the Gambler’s Classic inside Atlantic City’s Boardwalk Hall on January 27 and 28.
Tickets are available on- line at www.PPLCenter.com and or at the PPL Center box office located at 701 Hamilton Street, Allentown, PA 18101.
The finale for the 20162017 Len Sammons Motorsports Productions Indoor Auto Racing Championship Series season is set for Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, N.J., on Friday and Sat- urday, January 27-28, 2017, featuring the 15th running of the Gamblers’ Classic.
Remaining Allentown and Atlantic City Indoor event and promotional sponsorship opportunity information is available at www.indoorautoracing.com or by phoning 609888-3618.