The “No TV and No Beer Make Homer… Something… Something” Award
The “No TV and No Beer Make Homer… Something… Something…” Award: THIRD NIGHT It seems strange now to think that there was a time when it was 105 degrees outside with 80% humidity, but that was the case Third Night. Ah, Chicago in July… In preparation for the extreme heat, the Route 66 management decided...
The Strangest Season Split
The Strangest Season Split: DAMAGE, INC.’s MATT WILSON While pondering the Rookie-of-the-Year award, someone mentioned the name of Damage, Inc’s Matt Wilson. I was considering awarding it to him for a while until I looked at Wilson’s season splits. It was then that I realized that Wilson had completed one of the most unusual seasons...
The Antsy in his Pantsy Award
The Antsy in his Pantsy Award: Damage, Inc.’s Dave “Repo” Swan Here’s a trivia question for you: what percentage of Damage, Inc’s races featured Dave “Repo” Swan getting out of his car during the middle of the race? Half of them. Damage, Inc raced six races this year and in three of them, Swan got...
The Most Battered Driver Award
The Most Battered Driver Award: RECKONING’S “SPEEDY” STEVE VOLLBRECHT Matt Wilson’s mother might have an issue with this recipient of this award, but Reckoning’s “Speedy” Steve Vollbrecht (unfortunately) truly earned it. As most people remember, Wilson was sawed out of his car and carted off to the hospital in the middle of the Damage Inc....
The “Most Drivers” Award
The Most Drivers: DAMAGE, INC On the teamdemos.com web-site, Damage, Inc. is listed as having 8 different drivers race for them this year, a number that ties them with Seek-N-Destroy for most drivers (there are 9 names listed for Damage, Inc., but Matt Wilson is listed twice). However, that doesn’t paint the full and complete...
TrackSide #16 (October 4, 2011)
Minor Point #1: Transparency Made Its Way to the TDA It brings me great pleasure to be able to write that the TDA handled the scheduling of Fifth Night’s races with as much transparency, class and grace as could have been imagined. In hindsight, there wasn’t one element of the process that I would have...
TrackSide #14 (August 30, 2011)
Minor Point #1: Roster Changes I love the team demolition derby. I am enamored of so many different facets of it, I probably could write an interesting column simply by listing the myriad things I enjoy about the TDA. To wit: I love Kyle Shearer’s fearlessness, Johnny Ryan’s ferocity, Ryan Bleuer’s speed, Steve Gursky Jr.’s...
TrackSide #13 (August 23, 2011)
Race of the Night: Mean Green Machine vs. Full Throttle There were several important races on the evening. The two most important were in the second round when Reckoning had a chance to clinch the season title against Orange Crush, and in the finals when Mean Green Machine battled tooth-and-nail against Orange Crush to secure...
TrackSide #12 (August 9, 2011)
The TDA races returned to form in the Third Night, with an exciting evening of hard hitting match-ups, SpeedChannel on site and the upset of the year taking place in the second round (when Stranglehold defeated Orange Crush). However, the grand majority of these elements were lost in the wake of Johnny Ryan’s driver’s door...
TrackSide #10 (July 26, 2011)
Let’s start this off right. As of Sunday night, both Matt Wilson and Nick Hartung were released from the hospital and are resting uncomfortably at their respective homes. Wilson reported that his neck hurt, his ribs were really sore and that he found it hard to move, but that he was well on the road...
TrackSide #7 (June 28, 2011)
Minor Point #1: Damage, Inc’s Matt Wilson is Mr. Persistent During the first two races of his young racing career, Matt Wilson has been active, fearless and determined. This is almost the exact opposite of the Damage, Inc team as a whole. At numerous points during Damage, Inc’s opening round match-up against Full Throttle, Wilson’s...