Cabral, Bertrand Celebrate First NEMA Championships
Randy Cabral and Tim Bertrand, driver and owner champions, will head up the honorees Saturday night Nov. 22 at the Northeastern Midget Association banquet at Whites of Westport in Westport, MA.
The #47 team won eight of NEMA’s 17 features including the Boston Louie and the traditional late season triple – Waterford’s Finale, Seekonk’s DAV and Thompson World Series, the latter three in succession.
“People think it’s stuff,” says Bertrand. “Well, it’s not just stuff. We have a great package. We have a great driver who is consistent week in and week out. We have a great crew. Yes, we have good stuff but everybody has great stuff. It’s the complete package that counts.”
With five different winners – Bobby Santos Jr., Greg Stoehr, Joey Payne Jr. and Jeff Abold joining Cabral – NEMA had a competitive season. The titles were clinched at the World Series.
The championships bring to a pinnacle a team that actually started with a crash at Seekonk in 2005. A broken Heim joint sent the car into the wall, destroying it. It was the third time the car had been crashed badly that season.
“When we got back to the trailer my wife Cara and I saw the entire Cabral family gathered around the car,” says Bertrand. “They were actually crying and we made the decision right there to search for another car. This is an incredible family.”
With help from Danny Driden they found a car in a barn in Indiana. Over the past three seasons (2006-08) the car, with Bertrand and Randy’s dad Glen running the show, has 14 wins. Often, it was the crew that turned defeat into victory.
Early in ’05, Bertrand’s car was crashed badly at Stafford. In casual communication with an obviously down Bertrand, Cabral mentioned driving the #47. “Tim laughed at me,” remembers Cabral, who was driving for Bobby Seymour at the time. “I didn’t take offense. I kind of walked away.”
“I laughed because I thought he was kidding,” Bertrand says. “I found him 10 minutes later and asked ‘are you serious? We can be a powerful team over time.’”
They tested a week later at Waterford. “Back then 13 flat was a super fast time at Waterford,” Bertrand continues. “Within five laps he was at 12.9. I remember saying ‘we’re going to win a lot of races in the future.’”
Cabral and Bertrand spent several seasons as competitors, the latter a NEMA driver from 2000 through 2004. A three-time Whip City Mini Sprint champion, Bertrand, who has a Waterford NEMA win, realized his job made it “difficult to focus my energy into driving a Midget.” He and his dad Gil became car owners only.
By 2005, Cabral, the 1999 co-Rookie of the Year, had seven NEMA wins – six in his dad’s car (including the 2000 Boston Louie) and one for Seymour. He’d been watching his father race since 1989 but it was Chuck Welling who got him in a racecar.
“I was working for Chuck and he kept telling me ‘you’re doing a good job and maybe I’ll put you in one of the cars.’ After three years, I showed up at Seekonk for a test one day and Chuck said ‘you got your gear with you? Better get it on.” Cabral was 19.
“Chuck would sit with me and say ‘what did you do wrong?’ Cabral continues. “I’d tell him and he’d say ‘Ok, you know what you did.’ He never yelled and that’s how I got better.”
The next year the Cabrals became a team. “My father said ‘well, you proved you can drive,’” Randy goes on. “At that point I was out of school and able to put some money in but the first time I drove for my father he said ‘drive like it’s your last race because we have no money left.”
He finished seventh and “from then on we raced off what the car made.” The Boston Louie win (besting Nokie Fornoro) was the final hurdle, earning enough money and enough prestige to make the team a contender.
“My father gave me a good race car, the best he could afford,” says Cabral. “Still, it wasn’t even half of what the Bertrands have given me.”
With 21, he is among NEMA’s all-time winners. He is the leader at Waterford and Thompson. And, Bertrand insists, he is still improving, still getting better.
Sources: Pete Zanardi/NEMA PR