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I will commit to "think about" it.......................

My first slot car set was a Gilbert set I got for Christmas. The year was probably around 1962. The set came with two cars, both resembled '40 Ford coupes.....sort of. For my birthday I got a third car, a '62 Corvette convertible. That car was much cooler! Unfortunately the set and cars were less than spectacular!

Sometime later in the same year my dad took me along on a visit to one of his CB radio club buddies where I was subjected to a severe slot car overdose. My dad's friend had two sons of high school age. Upon arrival I was overcome with excitement, seeing under construction hot rods in the yard, engines hanging from trees, and semi complete hardtops on jack stands undergoing rear end swaps and other really cool hot rod stuff!

Then we entered the basement of the house. On my right along the entire length of the wall was a two lane, wood routed 1/24 scale slot car track! There were 1/24 slot cars positioned all along the track perimeter. I was given the chance to "drive" one of the cars around the track, and although I was fun and exciting, it was also somewhat daunting for a seven year old! The track was so big and the cars were large and complicated. Then my attention was drawn to my left, where in the middle of the room sat a huge HO slot car track! It was only two lane, but the track went everywhere! There were things called "Junction Turn-Offs" that allowed you to manually change where your car would go! The cars themselves were small and oh so cool! I was hooked!

Christmas 1963 I found an Aurora Thunderjet 500 slot car set under our tree. It was the same type set I had seen in the basement! In the following years that set saw routine use and expansion with the purchase of more track and cars. To this day, almost 62 years later, I still have some of my original track as well as at least a couple of my original cars.

Because I was so young the larger scale cars and commercial tracks were not a real option for me. In approximately 1980 I met a local slot car club (PASER) that introduced me to competitive slot car racing at the club level. In the upstairs portion of a barn in Wilsonville I learned about Womp Womp and scratchbuilt cars. Oh man was that ever cool! Fast forward 23 years and I'm still at it, now with my own 1/24 routed wood track which served for years as the PASER club track!

I can honestly say I have reached all of my slot car goals and dreams! I have built and sold an Aurora Thunderjet 8 lane HO track on a 7 foot by 15 foot platform (a childhood dream I had drawn out on paper hundreds of times). I have collected, traded, and sold hundreds of HO slot car, and still have a decent collection I like. I have built, restored, and sold numerous routed slot car tracks in HO, 1/32, and 1/24 scale. I have a decent collection of 1/32 and 1/24 slot cars and parts. There is a famous saying that "he who dies with the most toys wins". As of this writing my good friend Gary "Goose" Gossett holds the title! I am however working on dethroning him!

Results from the December 7th race:

Last night was Even Thursday at Inslot's Checkered Flag Raceway in Vancouver. We had 9 racers in attendance starting the racing with the ever-popular Womp Class, racing three-minute heats, one time through the lane rotation. The racing in this class has always been competitive and close, and now since we adopted the use of spec motors, the field is even tighter! One of our best Womp racers (Doc) has been absent from Even Thursday races for a while. He returned to the track last night and showed he still has what it takes to put a Womp on the podium! Good to see you back Doc! Here are the results from the Womp race:

The feature race for the night was for NASCAR hardbody cars. Under the PASER NASCAR rules, any hardbody NASCAR that complies with the rules for any of the other Oregon clubs is legal to race. This was the first race for the PASER NASCAR Class since the rules have been revised to allow the additional types of cars and chassis configuration. Last night's race was well represented by at least one entry from every club and class! A race format of four-minute heats, one time through the rotation was used to determine a winner. Here are the results:

This is the finishing order by chassis type and class:

1st OSCAR Late Model NASCAR - McInSlot chassis (inline scratchbuilt)
2nd PASER NASCAR - Scholer chassis (anglewinder bolt together)
3rd PASER NASCAR - John Gill chassis (anglewinder scratchbuilt)
4th PASER Classic NASCAR - Hanna Econo chassis (inline scratchbuilt)
5th Northwest True Scale NASCAR - Howie chassis (big wheel anglewinder scratchbuilt)
6th OSCAR Late Model NASCAR - Rico Locati chassis (inline scratchbuilt)
7th Northwest True Scale NASCAR - 2NASTE (anglewinder bolt together)
8th OSCAR Late Model NASCAR - Tim Arnhold chassis (inline scratchbuilt)
9th PASER NASCAR - Hanna Econo chassis (inline scratchbuilt)

A few more:

It was an excellent race Howie, thank you!

And congratulations to Al on his win! He did an outstanding job driving to that win! He totally crushed the field!

Race results from the November 9th race:

Terry brought along a backup racer which did not see race duty.

Another angle on Douglas' entry.

The business end of Terry's entry.