Underdog Harris looks for glory
Published Saturday August 30th, 2008
GEARY - Is Matt Harris the Rocky of stock car racing?
Like in the movie, Harris is fighting for respect and to show the world he has what it takes.
Again.
Harris and about 40 other top pro stock class racers in the region, along with some of the best hired guns from the southern United States, will be chasing the Scott Fraser Trophy Sunday in the biggest stock car race of the season, the Peterbilt 250.
The eighth annual 250 is the centrepiece of the Leisure Family RV Centre's SpeedWeekend 7 at Speedway 660 in Geary.
Racing begins Sunday at 2 p.m. with the 250 itself expected to roar into lap one about 7 p.m.
The Coast Tire Street Stock Division will be providing the support card for the pro stocks. They will race for points, the only division to do so, and feature in a 50-lap final. There will also be an appearance by the Maritime Legend Cars tour and a set of four pro stock qualifying heats and one pro stock last-chance race.
But as good as the undercard might be, the grand finale will be the Peterbilt 250 with a purse of $70,000, including a guaranteed minimum of $15,050 to the winner.
All the big boys will be there: NASCAR truck and Busch champions, Maritime champions, speedway division kings and legendary drivers from all points of the compass.
Matt Harris will be there as well.
"Last year, we missed qualifying for (the 250)," Harris said. "After that I held up one finger to my crew. I meant we had one year to get ready for this year's race.
"Everything we've done since then has been directed at this weekend. I want to make it (into the race) as a goal and stay on the lead lap. After that, well, in this race anything can happen. I've got a car that is turning great times in testing, but it's a long race with a lot of other good cars in it."
When the speedway in Geary opened 15 years ago, Harris was there.
He was the first champion in the old Super Street class. A year later, he was rookie of the year in sportsman. He progressed to pro stock and for a few years was one of the top cars at the speedway.
However, recent seasons have been tough on the Fredericton Junction resident.
"(Racing legend) Frank Fraser shook his head and told me he had never seen any driver who had so much bad luck with motors," Harris said of the past four summers. "I didn't want the best engine, but I just wanted a good one, and all I got was problems. Things just kept going wrong.
"I just felt so beaten down, people can't realize how down I was. I didn't want to be out there running at the back, I was embarrassed.
"I'd come out some weeks and the car would be awful and I just wished I could turn invisible and drive off the track and get out of the way."
Instead he dug in his heels and decided to fight back; he was tired of being a tough-luck case scratching and clawing just to make big races.
"I decided this season would make me or break me," Harris said. "We went out and bought a new car from Scott Alexander. That gave me two good cars and two good motors. I still had the Scott Fraser car as well. If we couldn't turn it around this season we never were going to."
Early in the season nobody noticed a difference.
"We started slow, slower than I wanted," Harris said. "But I worked with Lonnie Sommerville and we brought Gary Crooks in for one week and things started to turn around."
The visit from Crooks seems the turning point. Crooks, for want of a better description, is a racing doctor. He fixes what needs fixing. The North Carolina resident has based himself in Halifax for the summer and worked with a number of pro stock drivers. He's also the man who built the car Harris bought from Alexander.
"He was great," Harris said. "He brought out the best in me. He also showed me my flaws and my weaknesses. He showed me that racing theses days is almost a job; you have to behave like it's a business. He rebuilt my confidence and set up my car. He took us to another level."
That week, in a Best of the Best 100-lap race, Harris ran near the front most of the night, including a thrilling side-by-side duel with Sommerville for a number of laps before settling for fourth.
"That was the race; that was what I needed," Harris said. "I needed something to show me I could do it and we came through that night. I felt so good after that."
Since then, Harris has closed to within 28 points of the lead in the Irving Lubricants season points standings for pro stock cars. He's second, trailing only Greg Fahey.
"It's been a lot more fun for me," Harris said. "But it's also good for the guys in my crew like Chris Moore and Wayne Morgan who've stuck with me all these years."
In SpeedWeekend action today the O'Leary Pontiac Excitement 150 sportsman class race highlights a full night of racing that gets underway at 6 p.m. Monday, also at 2 p.m., SpeedWeekend wraps up with a 200-lap Enduro race.
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