23 replies to this topic

[salvino]

Updated 5/26/2010
Western States Pro Group 7 Champions

1968 - Charlie Nelson
1969 - Mike Steube
1970 - Terry Schmid
1971 - Gil Gundersen
1972 - Philippe de Lespinay
1973 - Philippe de Lespinay
1974 -
1975 -
1976 - Bob Johannis
1977 -
1978 -
1979 -
1980 - Don Noon
1981 - Mike Greeley
1982 -
1983 -
1984 -
1985 - John Tore Anderson
1986 - Dave Donnelly
1987 - Gil Gundersen
1988 - Tom Hansen
1989 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
1990 - Fred Hood
1991 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
1992 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
1993 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
1994 - John Tore Anderson
1995 - Bob Maxwell
1996 - Monty Ohren
1997 - Bob Everett
1998 - Kerry Champion
1999 - Connie Aloise
2000 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
2001 - Carlos Aloise
2002 - Paul Ciccarello
2003 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
2004 - Richard Curnutte
2005 - Forrest Watchers
2006 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
2007 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
2008 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
2009 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen
2010 - Paul "Beuf" Pedersen

[TSR]

Rick,
Good job.
We will do our best to complete the chart over time. Please post any new name and year and I will edit the initial post.
Regards,

[Keith Tanaka]

Rick, FYI, I just borrowed some Model Racing Journals from Bob Maxwell. One of the issues covers the first Western States Championships held in 1968. An independent racer, 15 year old Charlie Nelson won this race at Checkered Flag Raceway in Inglewood. Mike Steube was 2nd in this race. Mike of course won the USRA championship in 1968.

Charlie immediately became a Team Checkpoint member after he won the Western States.
An interesting tidbit about this race was that Charlie won a Bob Bondurant driving school prize. Since he was only 15 years old at the time, he gave his prize to Doug Henline who happened to be a good gokart racer at the time. Lucky Doug!


Keith

[68Caddy]

Keith can you fill me in on this list how come I don't see Cukras , Warmack or Anderson?
I don't know what happened at that time frame.
Thanks

Nesta

[Keith Tanaka]

Nesta, this list is for any winner of the "Western States" from it's inception (1968) to present. The Western States is one of the big USRA races held during each year. It attracts mainly west coast racers, but has also attracted racers from other areas of the U.S.
John (Tore) Anderson won the Western States in 1985 and 1994. Cukras and Warmack did not race much beyond 1969, so they did not enter very many Western States races. Keep in mind there were a lot of "other" big races held from 1967 to 1970 in other states (especially back east) in which Cukras and Anderson won. Cukras won a lot of big races in those days and actually did not compete in all of the west coast races in those days since he was traveling all over the U.S. for big events.
The Western States champions list is for all to reflect on. It is the longest running "Big" race series in slotcar racing history. SoCal racers in particular should be proud of the history of this event as well as those who have won it.

Keith

[Keith Tanaka]

Today while looking at a copy of Miniature Auto Racing (Vol. 1, No. 5), I noticed that Terry Schmid was the Western States Champion for 1970.


Keith

[TSR]

I made the relevant corrections to Rick Salvino's listing as requested.

[Keith Tanaka]

Today I added Beuf Pedersen as 2010's champion.

Keith

[S.O. Watt]

I think it was Gil Gunderson in '87 and me in '88.

[TSR]

Tom,
I have added these but can it be verified?

[S.O. Watt]

Magazines of the day should verify it (It may have been Gil 2nd behind Donnelly with me 3rd in '86, the track died for a couple of hours at that one at Valley raceway [?]).

I definitely won up here in Seattle in '88, it was a poorly attended race after we had the Nats up here. Somewhere around here I have the plaque off the trophy...

[TSR]

The first Western States race took place at Checkered Flag Raceway on Arbor Vitae in Inglewood, California, for the amateurs on August 3, for the pros on August 17, 1968. it was run under the USRA Sports Car regulations.

[MrWeiler]

Yep 1980 (if I remember correctly) Don Noon won and I was second... it was at Pop's place that year.

[DCR]

I won the Amateur class at Monaco Raceway in 78 or 79,but I don't remember who won Pro?....anyone have a idea?.........Thanks DC

[Jesse Gonzales]

Joe DeHalle won a major Western States race and has been left off this list due to not being one of the California "Golden Era" racers, see info in SlotBlog regarding his big win. No matter how you slice it he deserves to be added to this list and several people agree with me, the one person standing in the way of Joe being added is trying to protect the sanctity of SoCal supremacy of slot car racing. Please support me in adding this now deceased racer from Phoenix AZ.

 

Jesse Gonzales

[Jason Holmes]

The List is only for Grp7 winners did Joe win a W/S Group 7 race what year ??

 

jason

[Jesse Gonzales]

http://slotblog.net/...-states-winner/ in 1966 it was open season to run what you brung, there were no "Group" destinations only to win. There were many races won using Pitman motors as well as rewound mabuchi cans.

[tonyp]

2 different races. They had nothing to do with each other. The western states everyone recognizes today was a yearly race during the first pro era.


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[Jesse Gonzales]

I'm aware of that, I raced in some of the early Western States races and some in the 80's. The fact that the race was a major race and was touted as a Western Race should count for something. in the 60's there was no Group designation as we all ran the same armatures more or less using Blue Dots, DZ's White Dots etc in either Mura or Champion cans. The NCC as you recall started the group designations. There are many old and current SoCal racers that agree that Joe deserves some sort of recognition for his big win but they don't want to butt heads with the main detractor.

 

Jesse Gonzales

[TSR]

Jesse,
sorry to hear about the fate of the De Halles, tragic end. I understand the need to keep the memory of the Western Model Car Championship won by Joe De Halle with a Pittman powered Cooper (which I do in the history section of the book), but I agree with Tony P, it really has nothing to do with the Western States Championship Races organized by the USRA. Two different animals.
The WMCC race in 1965 was more akin to the two events organized in 1966 by the AMCRC in Los Angeles and Chicago, where teams and individuals had to perform in several events with different cars, from bone stock to "modified".
The Western States races were only for individuals with a single car, of Can Am format, which remained that until late in the 1970s or even 1980s (I don't really know or care...) when various other categories were added.

[Jesse Gonzales]

Glad to hear you included him in your book. His accomplishment deserved to be memorialized somewhere. Oscar Kovaleski ran add for quite some time touting Joe's win to sell off his 196B's with "Joe DeHalle went all the way" header so plenty of old guys read the ad I'm sure, this was the rest of the story.

 

Jesse Gonzales

[TSR]

Jesse, I am sure that you will like what I wrote about that race and others large events that took place either before or at the same time as the first truly competitive racing series, the 1966-1967 Rod & Custom.
 

[Jesse Gonzales]

Another thing, I raced in the 60's both in AZ and in CA, under ARCO, Car Model and NCC rules so I understood the differences that have been pointed out by you and others. I pitted for my fellow Arizona racer Dave Fortner in the race that you won while Earl and Dave came in 2nd & 3rd respectively. Helping Dave and watching Earl break four seconds were the highlights of the weekend.

 

I didn't want Joe's race being written off due to the "he wasn't one of us" bias that some held against racers from AZ.

 

Jesse

[Jesse Gonzales]

I had expected a CA led effort to deny the fact that an Arizonan won a big race in CA, why then when another post by a well known and respected member of the blog makes a posting of the race, how large it was etc. there are no objections? http://slotblog.net/...11/#entry466908 sort of brings back bad feelings when an LA racer with an accent dismissed Arizona's best racers as being rank amateurs.

 

The facts are that Joe DeHalle won the big race.