Holbrook Team Brings Three-Way Threat to ISMA Trail in 2009
Oswego, NY — When the huge red hauler pulls into the Waterford pits on May 23 for the season opener, a trio of good ISMA cars and good ISMA drivers plan on giving the Chris Perley-Vic Miller team a run for the money, and the plan on winning a few races too. After putting three cars in the top ten in ISMA points (2nd, 5th, and 9th), the Jeff Holbrook team is more than ready to do even better in 2009.
In 2004, Oswego supermodified driver Jeff Holbrook dabbled a little in ISMA competition after the non-wing supermodified season was done. In 2005, as a car owner, he brought one car to the winged ISMA circuit with Bob Magner as his driver. One year later, the car owner-driver, brought three potent supermodifieds into contention and found almost immediate success. The next two years saw more top ten placings, with sometimes four cars in competition.
There will be three main drivers in 2009 – Jeff, Russ Wood and young Mikey Ordway. A fourth driver, Dave Trytek, will run on a part time basis right as plans go right now. Dave’s Drinan car was sold to newcomer Mike Duggan earlier this year leaving Trytek to fill in when needed.
Jeff Holbrook spoke of his stable of cars recently. “Russell has the car that was new last year. Johnny Colloca is building a new 41 for Mike Ordway Jr. I have the same car that I’ve driven for the past two years. And Brian Allegresso is working on an Oswego car that we’re hoping will be ready by July 18th but it doesn’t look like it will. It definitely will be ready for Classic.
“We have one more at Oswego which young Danny Connors will drive. That was the 50, which we bought from Muldoon – the car I drove in Classic last year. They brought in a motor and we worked out a deal for them to use the car with the stipulation that Dave would drive that car at the Classic this year. So, at the very least, Dave will drive my wing car at the Super Nationals and the car that the Connors have, in the Classic. I won’t do a wing show that weekend, but will drive the new car that Brian is building. I have high hopes for the Oswego car. Brian’s been very successful there over the years.
Jeff attributes the team’s quick rise to success to the equipment they have. “I think racing is 75 percent car and 25 percent driver in most cases. Russell and Chris Perley are pretty much the exception to that rule. Those guys can take a bad car and do well in it. With most guys, if they have a good new car, they can do good.
Maintaining these cars takes a lot of work, but Jeff isn’t in the garage much during the week as he has his own business to run. The chores are shared between his local shop and one in New England.
Said Jeff. “John Colloca is retired now from the boilermakers so I pretty much don’t do anything in the shop in New Haven except for Saturdays and Sundays. Throughout the season Brian has one or two cars at Butch Valley’s New England Motor Racing Supply (NEMRS). For instance we had the 29 at our shop a little earlier this year and we went through and painted everything, did the frame and all that, while Brian was working on the new car. Then two months ago, I took the 29 up there and brought my car home. So, the cars go back and forth all year long.”
Jeff explained that he feels the consistency of the team comes from the experience they draw from. “In my car for example, most of the setups are from what Pat Abold ran in 1995 and ’96. Brian has years and years of notes. As a crew chief he’s got hundreds of wins, with Bentley, Abold, Gosek and the like. And, Johnny is now accumulating notes too as we run more and more. The old paperwork with the setups from previous years really helps. It’s a huge advantage. Doc Hathaway put pretty much everything on disk. He’s our statistician and has all the setups on the computer.”
Jeff has a reasonable view of what the team could possibly do this season. “Brian’s cars are built so that anyone can take one of them and do well. They are just that good. We’re really hoping Russell will win a few races this year. I thought Russ would win a few races last year, but there was just a few things that weren’t there on the cars and we hope we’ve got them fixed this year. Russell is very consistent. He could get the championship. He had a couple bad finishes and still ended up second.
“We’ve made a few changes on my car again and I’d like to win a couple myself. Even I had more than a few bad finishes and was still able to finish in the top five. Mikey is starting out with a new car. That’s hard. He’s kind of behind the eight ball. Hopefully the car will be good out of the box. If the car is good, he’s more than capable of doing well. Winning is nice but you have to finish races to get a championship. I’m just as happy when the other guys do well as if it were me. I’m as happy being an owner as being a driver really. It gives me great pleasure to see any of my guys doing well.
“Yes, we all would have won a few last year if it wasn’t for Chris. Chris is always in your way. He’s the guy to beat! But, you know he’s never lost his humility. You don’t mind getting beat by him. He’s a true champion. There are a lot of winners out there, you might not like, but Chris is a great winner. We’re all hoping that his luck will run out sometime.”
Holbrook Team Facts:
- Motors: R&R did the 29 car and 35 car. Finger Lakes Machine did the one in the 41 and the one in the Oswego car (35).
- Holbrook Team Sponsors: JWJ, Seabird Environmental, Sweet Manufacturing, Red Devil Brakes, Woody’s Auto Repair, New England Motor Racing Supply.
- The Crew: John Colloca, Brian Allegresso, Dave Trytek, Jeff Holbrook, Butch Ferguson, Jimmy Colloca, Eric Kingsley, Fletcher Petrie, Bob Bouchard, Jerry Martel, Doc Hathaway, Rodney, Russell Wood Jr. and Mike Caswell.
Sources: ISMA PR